Everyone has their own ideas about leadership, and there is no shortage of ways to explain or define it.
This way, however, seems better than most: “Good leaders create an environment in which leaders emerge.”
The proper environment within your team can help develop leadership qualities in your players, but the right factors can also provide a leadership platform for players who at first glance seem to have little or no leadership abilities.
Angela Hucles is a former professional women’s soccer player, US Women’s National Team captain, and president of the Women’s Sports Foundation. By all accounts, she is a very effective leader. She is also an introvert.
“Being introverted has to do with how you process thought,” said Hucles. “Introverts tend to be more quiet while they process things, while extroverts tend to speak while they process things.”
Hucles, admits that initially she balked at accepting leadership roles, but the more she understood herself as an introvert, the more comfortable and effective leader she became.
“For me it was understanding my leadership style as well as my role,” said Hucles. “A lot of times, people who are more introverted can feel lost with leadership. For me, being placed in a leadership position allowed me to practice the skills of being more confident, speaking up more when I had something to say, and learning my thoughts and opinions are valuable.”
Within DRIVN’s communication feature, introverts can gain the confidence they need to emerge as key figures within your team, and they can do it by communicating with the team through the chat function. By using chat, players can get their thoughts across to the entire team and coaching staff without speaking up in front of a group, or standing up and giving a speech. In the process, they can learn, like Hucles did, that their opinions and ideas are valuable.
Sometimes, a player will emerge as a team leader based mainly on the volume of their voice and not necessarily by what they are saying. By sheer force of their personality, they drown out others, like perhaps more introverted players, who might have something of quality to offer.
“I remember (former USA teammate) Kate Markgraf saying to me, ‘You don’t really talk a whole lot, but when you do it’s always something that I listen to,’” said Hucles.
Because the entire team can use DRIVN’s chat feature equally, thoughts, opinions and encouragement can be posted by anyone within the group, or sent directly to individuals or small groups of players. A certain equality emerges in the team leadership dynamic.
And in case you subscribe to the old adage attributed to legendary baseball manager Casey Stengel that, “The key to coaching is keeping the five guys who hate you away from those who haven’t made up their minds yet,” coaches can monitor or participate in the group discussions if they choose.
Does your program have an environment from which leaders can emerge?