A successful team I have had the privilege to be a part of was my varsity high school basketball team. We were comprised of only 18 players, but the best players that our school had to offer. In order to make the varsity team you had to be a highly regarded player, you had to prove your worth over freshman/sophomore year. One of the strengths of our team was the depth that we had, I was never a starter but I was skilled enough to be one. Our team would run 10 deep on every given game, that means 10 people would see playing time every game, and we were always pushing each other to get more playing time.
In regards to pushing each other we did so at every practice. Since the skill levels were similar between the bench players and the starters you could never be certain upon your playing time, essentially you had to earn it. This meant practices were like auditions, they were what earned you playing time or limited your playing time, and the competitive practices were one of the largest reasons for our success. I would always go all out at practice to try and earn more playing time, and my hard work was well rewarded. Over the course of the year my playing time gradually grew higher, I was becoming a better player because of the competitive atmosphere, and since I was growing as a player my playing time grew equally in hand.
To relate this to chapter five I wanted to take a look at the structural configurations, and more specifically the simple hierarchy structure. My team had a head coach who was respected and thought of highly. The players were able to talk to him, pick his basketball mind, and learn from his basketball intelligence. He was essentially the power source of our team, without him we would not have been the successful unit that we were. But there was more to the hierarchy then just him, we also had two assistant coaches who were highly respected, and had a ton of basketball experience. The assistant coaches were assigned specific tasks, one of them was specifically a defensive coach and the other was an offensive coach, which really helped with helping our team reach its optimal potential. Without these assistant coaches the head coach would not have been nearly as effective, and ultimately our team would not have been nearly as successful. The last part of the hierarchy were the players themselves, we obviously have the most important role because without us there is no team at all. We needed to be guided in the right direction from our coaches, but ultimately the success of the team was riding on us.
Lastly, Katzenbach and Smith discussed six characteristics of high performing teams in the chapter, and I wanted to note being collectively accountable. My team had a strong sense of accountability within itself, if a player made a major mistake in a game he would take a seat and the next best player would get an opportunity. The depth of the team allowed for a strong sense of accountability. Not only did the coaches enforce this accountability, but the players did as well. If one of the team members let the team down for a particular reason, the unit as a whole would say something to that member. We were able to communicate to each other positives, but also negatives, and we were able to hold each other accountable when something was wroth addressing. All in all, my varsity basketball team made it to the semi finals, which was a huge accomplishment for my school. It marked the first time in over 20 years that my schools basketball team made it that far in the playoffs, and I know and realize that the success came from the structure of the team itself.
Some comments about basketball before getting into the economics. You said your team had 18 players. That sounds like a lot, more than what college teams have. Of course, college teams have walk ons as well as scholarship players. Was there some distinction of that sort on your team? If so, it would be good to describe that further. Being a walk on in college can be a thrill, especially at a big time program. I wonder if it is the same in high school or not.
ReplyDeleteNext, you talked about the importance of practice. Here I want to note that practice early in the season may have a different function than later on and that some players can break down from too much wear and tear. Did any of that become a factor in your team?
You also talked about your own improvement. But the other players should also have improved as well. It sounded like you improved relative to some others, which is how you earned more playing time. Did that improvement depend on just how hard you played during practice, or perhaps on other things as well. (In TV and the movies, they always show this lone guy practicing his shot when nobody else is around. Was something like that a factor here?)
Finally, I'd like to take on your last paragraph. You described that making a mistake put the player on the bench. My interpretation is that the goal was error-free basketball. But sometimes we make mistakes just because we are nervous. Being relaxed encourages fewer errors, in this case. Being up tight can be a cause of mistakes. The structure you discuss would work fine if the players were otherwise relaxed, but it might contribute to their being up tight. So it would be good to discuss how that was managed. It sounds like your team figured this out. But it wasn't clear how it did that.
We had a similar structure to walk ons and scholarship players. We had players who were playing basketball there whole lives, and already had proven their skill was sufficient enough to make the team. We also had players that had not player basketball for their whole lives, they would try out and if they were good enough talent wise they would walk on. In high school I would say it definitely is still a thrill to walk on to the team, it is difficult to do so. My good friend was a walk on, he put so much effort into making the team when he was able to do so if was such an accomplishment for him.
DeleteWe did all improve as a collective unit, but I improved more relatively then some players who started off better then me. I am a very competitive person, and someone who does not like to lose, so I put hours of work in outside of practice so that I could earn more playing time. Some of the people who were better then me in the beginning didn't work as hard as I did, and thus they lost playing time to me.
The goal was error free basketbal,l and since may players all very equal in skill level, if a player was off of his game on a particular day he would play a smaller role to his backup who may be on average a worse player. This would be because if he was turning the ball over constantly and missing all his shots his replacement could provide more value tot to the team simply by not shooting the ball as often/ throwing it away. I suppose our team was never truly relaxes, we never were certain that our playing time was safe, but I think that was a positive more so then a negative. If you look at the best NFL teams they are built similarly to the way I am describing my team, immense competition on a weekly basis.
We had a similar structure to walk ons and scholarship players. We had players who were playing basketball there whole lives, and already had proven their skill was sufficient enough to make the team. We also had players that had not player basketball for their whole lives, they would try out and if they were good enough talent wise they would walk on. In high school I would say it definitely is still a thrill to walk on to the team, it is difficult to do so. My good friend was a walk on, he put so much effort into making the team when he was able to do so if was such an accomplishment for him.
DeleteWe did all improve as a collective unit, but I improved more relatively then some players who started off better then me. I am a very competitive person, and someone who does not like to lose, so I put hours of work in outside of practice so that I could earn more playing time. Some of the people who were better then me in the beginning didn't work as hard as I did, and thus they lost playing time to me.
The goal was error free basketbal,l and since may players all very equal in skill level, if a player was off of his game on a particular day he would play a smaller role to his backup who may be on average a worse player. This would be because if he was turning the ball over constantly and missing all his shots his replacement could provide more value tot to the team simply by not shooting the ball as often/ throwing it away. I suppose our team was never truly relaxes, we never were certain that our playing time was safe, but I think that was a positive more so then a negative. If you look at the best NFL teams they are built similarly to the way I am describing my team, immense competition on a weekly basis.
The structure of your basketball team, while similar to my cross country team which I wrote about in my post, seems nearly identical to my track team. See, with the track team I was a member of, we had long distance and sprints as sub teams, each of which had their own specific coaches, with one head coach that ran the whole program. I found this similar to your offensive and defensive coaches, something I'm sure football players can relate to. While we didn't have this for my cross country team, I did have an assistant coach and we in a way went to the head coach and assistant coach for different purposes, something I'm sure you did as well. While these coaches didn't have specific assigned tasks like offense or defense, their difference in expertise was very apparent to all team members of my cross country team.
ReplyDeleteOverall, great post. I can really relate to it as a former athlete and think you are spot on with your descriptions.