Team Structure
I have been in groups and teams that have been mildly
successful, and some that have not been. By far, the most successful team that
I was a part of was my high school Water Polo team, specifically my Junior and
Senior year (2015 and 2016). What made the success even more meaningful was a
period of under-performance during my Sophomore year, when we failed to reach
the Sectional Final for the first time in a while (not sure on the exact year,
must have been since at least 2008). For the next two, quite successful years,
we had some added motivation due to previous “failure”. In 2015 we won the
Sectional Championship against our rival school (who we had lost to three times
earlier in the year). In 2016 we finished 3rd in the state which at
the time was the highest finish in school history.
What I enjoyed about the structure of our team, specifically
my senior year in 2016, was that we didn’t really have a single standout player
or two, rather a larger group of good players to worked really well together as
a unit. We had a group of guys that all understood what being a good teammate
was, knew what each other’s respective strengths were, and that encouraged an
unselfish style that really helped us throughout the year. Being good teammates
was an instrumental aspect of our team – everybody understood our long-term
group goal (winning the State title), and did not let shorter-term, maybe more
individual goals, detract from focusing on the bigger picture. This behavior
was encouraged mainly by our coaching staff and the captains of the team (I was
one of them).
Relating to the fundamental team configurations, since this
is the basic sports team structure, I would consider it “one boss” or a “simple
hierarchy”. The coach of the team had authority, as they all do, but he relied on
the captains often to deliver messages to the team in and out of the pool. I resonate
more with the simple hierarchy, as the second level represents the captains
relaying the message/goals from the boss, or in this case, the coach. The team
respected this “hierarchy” and it helped everyone work together. We had a
saying throughout the year: “know your role, accept your role, and execute your
role”. This was monumental in helping us achieve the team structure that was ideal
for our success. If people were unable to acknowledge and accept what they’re
to bring to the team, it can create a lot of internal friction. We had a team full
of guys who knew what they were meant to contribute, and accepted the fact and
went out and executed it.
There were a lot of similarities between the characteristics
of high-quality teams from Katzenbach and Smith’s research and how we operated
as a group. We were able to transform our common purpose of winning a state
championship into intermediate, more measurable goals throughout the season. We
wanted to win all our tournaments. We wanted to win conference, then win sectionals,
and so on. All leading up to a common purpose. We were also a manageable size,
with the competitive roster never exceeding fourteen people. A more streamlined
group made it easier to get the message across. We also had the right amount of
expertise with our coaching staff (who all had some coaching/playing experience
at a high level), as well as our upperclassmen, who had all been playing the
sport for years. And probably most crucial was our ability to hold ourselves
accountable. It was always a coordinated team effort, and when someone showed
signs of struggling, we all made an effort to keep the structure of the team
strong.
This team had a strong structure and was made up of
high-quality individuals, and that made it the most fun team I’ve ever been on.
I still reminisce about that season sometimes to this day, as the strong
working relationships and team structure made it extremely memorable for
myself, and everyone involved.
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ReplyDeleteI don't know much about water polo. How does one learn to play it? Did your school also have a swimming team? If so, would some students do both, or just one or the other. So I could use some basic background here.
You talked about goals via various tournaments or competitions you wanted to win. But you didn't say anything about practice and how that worked, or any other preparation you did for the competition. Presumably you practiced a lot, but the issue here is whether there was some method to the practice that made the team before better. If so, could you articulate that.
It also would be interesting to know whether your coach changed methods from the year before, where you didn't make the Sectional Finals, or if his approach was essentially the same. Looking for factors that determine success, past failure can act as motivation regarding effort, but it can also change the game plan. So it would be good to consider which of those was more decisive in this case.
Finally, I'd be interested in knowing if you play water polo now and, if not, have you found some other good substitute for that activity.
Water Polo is (in my opinion) the best sport that nobody's really heard about. It combines familiar aspects that are the pillars of other, much more popular sports. There's six field players and one goalie in the pool at a time for each team. The ball is about the size of a volleyball (looks the same too) and you try to pass it around (similar to basketball) and throw it past the goalie into the net (similar to soccer and/or hockey). Most people learn to play through the various amateur club teams, most of which are clustered in middle to northern Illinois (essentially the majority of the Chicago-land area).
DeleteMost high schools have swim teams. In fact, more have swimming teams than water polo teams. It is pretty uncommon to find a water polo player that does not also swim. Swimming for a full season can help build up endurance for the water polo season. You don't have to be a fast swimmer to be great at water polo, but it can give you some advantages during a game. We incorporated swimming into every practice. It was a pretty important part of how we got better physically. Our practice goals were essentially the same. We wanted to practice like we played, with few mental mistakes. We had fun, but at the right times. Efficiency was important. We wanted to make sure we made the most of every opportunity to get better, and it's safe to say that we did.
Probably an important detail that I left out was that after we struggled my sophomore year, the head coach of the team (who had been there for 30-plus years) retired. He was replaced by one of the assistants, who we all knew well. The old coach was very old-fashioned, but lacked some of the qualities that allows people to motivate their team and get them to play hard. The new coach built on some of the old team's principles, but added some of his own style, and we resonated with that. The methods from there on out never really changed, just adjusted to be able to identify what we needed to work on and make the team better.
I am not currently playing water polo anymore. I tried the club team here at Illinois for a little bit, but it just wasn't the same. I do miss those teams I played on in high school a little bit, but I have been able to move on and find other things to keep my occupied, even if they're not related to athletics.