Cheers, to your High Performance team!

A team needs to know where it is going, and why it is meaningful to get there.

A lot has been made of vision, purpose, mission etc.. but for me it doesn’t exactly fit what we now know about teams. Most sports teams will create goals for the season, ‘where they want to go’ – however very few will be able to say why they want to achieve that goal, and even fewer will have a meaningful reason attached to the goal. The why is critical as it raises the importance or specialness of the goal and that energy can be used to up the intensity and commitment in and out of game time.
To maximise the performance of any team, you need to understand team dynamics and how team dynamics can support or hinder performance.

Because every high performance team is unique, for me there is no generic unifying model of what to do, how to do it or any sorts of measurements that can be consistently applied. This area has been fascinating to me, and so currently we are looking to see if we can create exactly that - a high performance team model…. watch this space. (If there is already such a model, I would love to hear about it – please let me know) However if you get a handle on the things that affect team dynamics, it will help with your awareness of what is going on.

People – add one extra person to your squad or management team, or take one away and the dynamics shift and change – not always for the better. Some people in high performance sport believe that the one secret to success is having as many of your (fit) top players on the field together as possible, playing for as much time as possible. This makes sense, but the concept is often abused with star players playing through serious injury and underperforming or worsening their injury.
Leadership – a critical piece, a change of leadership or even the empowering of leaders within your side can dramatically improve team dynamics.

The work that is done – dynamics change from pre-season to in-season, to knock out stages, to tournaments. Understanding that means that as a coach or player your approach needs to be flexible.

The amount of team the team has been together – as team’s mature, things change. Trust and comfort is often a result of a team staying together, provided that strong leadership ensure there were no rifts or divisions in the team. What works for a team in its first year, may not necessarily work as well again. Teams need to be aware of what makes them successful, whilst at the same time re-examining their processes when appropriate.

The system the team is in (and the systems they create) – The people around the team, the other teams that are related to the team, the administration or club management, or even school administration all has an affect on a team. There are other systems: supporters, press, family, friends and loved ones, and so the list goes on. Sometimes the affect from a system is subtle, sometimes it is significant. Most of the time this affect is almost ‘accidental’ in that it wasn’t planned, so the chances of this affect being positive is a lot slimmer than if it was a purposeful affect.

For example a 1st team at school makes a point of visiting a junior teams locker room to tell them that they believe in them and support them fully vs the 1st team rugby players arriving late in the day, with plenty of time before their match, but missing a lot of their junior sides playing.

To your high performance team!

Vision - You control your future

The vision thing can often be tricky for student leaders or in fact for most people.
Your vision may simply be wanting to do your best. Often, students will tell me their vision is "to have the best year ever." But what does that mean?
Left on its own, it sounds more like a mission statement.
Anyone stepping into student leadership can say, "I want to have the best year ever, we want to be the best group ever." But that statement doesn't say anything unique about your situation, it's not measurable, and it will end up meaning different things to different people.
A vision is simply a picture of where you'd like to end up.
It gives people a sense of the big picture and helps others get a sense of where the group is headed.
For example, Emile was elected as a Student Representative for next year. Emile shared his vision with Talk the Talk. His vision is for his class to create a park, filled with trees, in front of the main office block for students to enjoy. He announced that this would be the matric gift to the school for 2008.
As a part of this vision, the other students on the council realized they would need to do more fund raisers, coordinate the plans with the Headmistress, and begin right away to make this project a possibility.
A vision doesn't have to give all of the details, but it needs to be specific enough that people can figure out what details need to happen.
The idea of a new park in front of the main buildings was unique for this class. It is measurable - the class will know if they accomplished the vision or not. Plus, it gives added meaning to all of the other events which precede it’s opening. Fund raisers will be more than raising money for the class, they were for getting resources to complete the park.
One of the best ways to communicate a vision is to paint a picture and put your people in it. Continue to talk about it and let people’s imagination see themselves there.
EXERCISE:* What type of project or event can you imagine accomplishing during your student leader year?* Are there projects that are on-going from past years which you need to complete in your student leader year?* How can you turn your vision into a picture people can see themselves in?
A clear vision provides people with an idea of what is possible. A vision will point toward a change in the future. Hoping that it will happen is not a strategy.
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT: What kind of vision will you offer those you lead next year?
SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT: Write your vision below and see how it feels when you read it.
My Vision for 2008 is ...


Think seriously about this...
Anxiety and fear strips away courage and makes great performances impossible.
Doubt makes even the best decisions feel difficult.
Anger rips your focus away from your goals.
Frustration can only serve to make you quit.
Guilt makes it impossible to enjoy any successes you achieve.
Jealousy and envy create dishonesty, hate and corruption.
Your thoughts and emotions are the only things that can truly stop you.
Likewise, the only things that can help you to do, be and have anything you want in life are also your thoughts and emotions. Next month Talk the Talk will look at responsible partying, where’s hot and what’s not