Volleyball Toolbox

Seven Rules for Success and Achievement

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This article was provided by Coaches Network

By Micah Kurtz

Doubt in an individual’s mind is the cancer that kills dreams and prevents individuals from pursuing and achieving their ambitious goals.

Dream big. Starting quarterback. All-state. College scholarship. Academic All-American. Professional career. Encourage your student-athletes to set big goals that might be a bit intimidating.

Once you have given your student-athletes permission to set mountain-sized goals, teach them the recipe to succeed. Teach them to understand the key principals to self-improvement. High achievers don’t focus on the goal that inevitably compares their ability to their competition. Instead, high achievers focus on what they can control. They focus on maximizing their own potential.

By shifting one’s focus from major milestones and comparative status labels to the simple, ever-changing target of maximizing one’s own potential, we allow our student-athletes to remove the doubt associated with whether a goal is possible and focus on something that’s realistic. That is being our personal best.

Focusing on maximizing individual potential also accomplishes something that’s counterintuitive. By removing set numbers, destinations and ceilings, a student-athlete can dream even bigger goals (the student-athlete may have the potential to be a hall of famer instead of just another pro). Many goals equate to a destination that needs to be moved upon accomplishing the goal, but maximizing one’s potential is a lifelong pursuit with mere milestones along the way.

Being the best one can be affords that person with a realistic goal of doing as much as they can to get better each and every day. Focusing on improving in the present while pursuing an ambitious goal allows the student-athlete to enjoy the process of practice and sacrifice. This also allows the student-athlete to live with no regrets so long as they can look back on their athletic career knowing that they did everything they could to maximize their potential.

Here are seven rules for success and achievement that any coach can teach their student-athletes.

1. Chase your dreams and your passions.

Make sure your goals align with daily activities that you enjoy and care about. If you’re not passionate about your craft and determined to pursue your goals, then best-case scenario is that you will quit. Worst-case scenario is that you spend years of hard work pursuing a goal only to obtain it and realize that you don’t really want it.

2. Surround yourself with people you want to be like.

Author Jim Rohn tells us, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” If you need to improve your work ethic, surround yourself with friends who are motivated. If you need to be more positive, find someone who is happy-go-lucky.

To accomplish something great, you must be willing to be different than others. You cannot let everyone else negatively influence you or distract you from what’s important. Surrounding yourself with good influences is directly related to effective use of your time. Individuals in your circle need to contribute value to you, and you need to bring value to the people in your circle.

3. Focus on what you can control.

You control the following: your work ethic, your attitude and how you treat others. Don’t stress about what you cannot control.

4. Set big goals, but focus on maximizing your own potential.

The end goal is a byproduct of the daily work necessary to reach that goal. Become the best at getting better.

5. Embrace discomfort.

Comfort is the enemy of growth. If achieving a goal is easy, everyone would obtain that achievement and it wouldn’t be worth sacrificing for. Between goals and achievement is discipline and consistency.

6. Don’t share your goals with those who won’t support, encourage and help you.

Sharing goals is an intimate thing. You should not share them unless you know the person supports you, or you’re determined enough not to care when people tell you your goal is impossible. The vast majority of people have given up on their dreams, and many of them don’t want to see you achieve your dream.

7. Repeat rule No. 1.

By learning how to chase your dream and pursue your passions, you succeed on a daily basis. You repeatedly find success in your life. Your athletic and academic career will come to an end at some point, but if you know how to chase your dreams, you will be ready to succeed in whatever excites you next in life.

Micah Kurtz (MS, CSCS, RSCC*D, FMS, USAW, NASE-CSS) was named the 2016 National Strength Coach of the Year by the NSCA. He is in his ninth year as the director of strength, conditioning and athletic development at AC Flora High School and serves as the strength and conditioning consultant coach to the nine-time high school basketball national champs, Oak Hill Academy. Luke Kurtz is the vice president of legal affairs for U.S. Sugar. He played and coached professional football for the Corinthians football club in São Paulo, Brazil. Learn more at www.TheAthleteMaker.com.


How to Win the Locker Room

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By Dr. Rob Bell

Dr. Bell is a Mental Toughness Coach and Certified Consultant of the Association for Applied Sport Psychology.  He consults with hundreds of athletes, coaches, and teams and has served as the mental coach for PGA tour winners, USTA Champion, and Olympic Medalists.  He is also the author of several mental toughness books. For more information about Dr. Bell and his services visit https://drrobbell.com/

A team locker room is a sacred place.

Basically, what is said there, when you leave there, leave it there.

Sorry, but here’s the wrong way to win the locker room.

New Buffalo Bills Head Coach Sean McDermott felt that setting the tone of the locker room was important.

Agreed

Coach Sean McDermott is all about “culture” and leading by example. He’s a 3:30AM fitness guy.

Agreed

He is a driven, hard-nosed, accountability coach whose locker room culture begins with him.

Agreed

Coach stated that “this is a business”, so he removed the pool table and video games from the locker room.

Disagree    

Players don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.

Hall of Fame coach, Bill Walsh, set up a fishing tournament amongst his players during pre-season. He stated, a “team that can laugh together, can get serious together.”

Hard nosed, two time Super-Bowl winning coach, Tom Coughlin, spent the very first day of a training camp by having a bowling tournament. He changed his tyrant approach because  he “wanted his players to see him as his grandchildren did.” 

Super Bowl Winning coach, Dick Vermeil was known for his “boot camp” practices and discipline, but only after he started to develop a relationship with his players did he finally reach the pinnacle.

Look, there is nothing sexier than discipline, accountability, hard-work, grit, perseverance, and a culture of excellence.

However, in order to win, coaches have to win their hearts as well. In order to do that, they need to win the locker room.

Here’s 5 ways to win the locker room

Develop a TEAM culture- 

Every coach would agree that when you have players willing to fight for one another, there is nothing more powerful. Practices should be difficult and demanding, but developing team chemistry also takes place in between practices and games. You hang out so much together, that either bonds or cliques get formed in various ways.

Developing a locker room where players can unwind, relax, be themselves, and hang-out is crucial. Who wants a locker room where players simply dash out after showering and changing?

A pool table or ping-pong table encourages players an outlet to bond over a competitive activity that is not directly related to their own sport. The Cornell basketball team that made the sweet sixteen and finished 29-5 all lived together and touted their Super Mario bros. and table-tennis competitions. 

Allow the players to take ownership-

Jeff Van Gundy allowed all minor decisions like where to eat, which music and movie to play on the bus up to the players. He granted them a voice in their own culture.

Have a leadership council-

In all pick-up games, kids self-govern themselves. You can’t break the written and unwritten rules of the court and expect to be welcomed back. A leadership council of players should make decisions on certain disciplines that coach doesn’t have to. That creates more ownership among players and takes more off of the coach.

Orchestrate the cohesion-

Teams become cohesive over the task at hand (winning), or socially (togetherness). Ultimately, task-cohesion is king. However, these task-cohesive teams are only fostered through extremely strong peer-leadership.

Social cohesion is queen. Teams full of mutual respect for one another have more trust and uphold standards within the team. Usually, the best teams have BOTH task and social cohesion. These bonds can be enhanced through scheduled sessions intended to do so.

Foster organic cohesion-  

Yes, it is a business. Winning is a habit. But, allow play to be a part of the culture. Allowing athletes to express themselves through free-play is as old as the cave-man days. We thrive on working hard toward a goal and also having fun along the journey. 

I’ve been in the team locker room at the end of a season with such tears of joy from winning, because they all knew of the effort and sacrifice and bond. I’ve been in the other locker room as well, that tears flowed because the loss was so heartbreaking because of the sacrifice and bond.

If you’re in the game long enough, these moments will happen. That’s life.

The way to a winning team locker room begins way before these moments of joy or heartbreak. It begins with the culture of the team and finding ways to win the locker room.


Approach for Success

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This article is republished with permission. The original article was written by Björn Galjaardt Approach for Success.

The golden egg? Shortcut in becoming successful? A proven model everyone can use? Actually, a little bit of all. The skeptics will stop reading now, however I have to elaborate on the above. It’s an approach that is applied by successful coaches and businessmen in various ways, perhaps some without knowing. It’s called the 4Cs approach.

COMPETENCE in sport can be seen as a high level of achievement, performance or athletic ability. One could break this down in 3 domains, namely; technical, tactical and physical skills. Each skill has its own definition. In that way a model can be created and adapted to each sport specifically. To define skills under each domain it is advisable to create a soundboard to test the understanding of each skill. This is important to certain age groups, further developed drills and most important a rating system. In the sport water polo, what does ‘eggbeater kick mean’ and how does a really good ‘eggbeater’ kick look like? Working with a rating system (known as RPE), it could develop a clear understanding that not every ‘eggbeater kick’ is a good kick. For younger age groups, a poor technique could be compared with a beginning athlete, new to the sport, while a perfect technique could be compared with, for them, a well-known athlete. In summary; define skills and make the athlete understand how the execute them. Here lies the basis in how to teach the specific skill and later on combine this skill to move into game based drills. “Any fool can know. The point is to understand” – Albert Einstein

CONFIDENCE in sport could be ‘the degree of certainty individuals possess about their ability to be successful’. Although there is still ongoing research about the measurements of confidence and performance, many measuring tools are commonly used daily. Evaluation forms, one-on-one conversations and self-reflection. A research in 2012 amongst professional athletes, showed an increase of confidence that was equivalent with the increase of their performance. Arguably process and product (in results) could improve through various methods like coach relationship, team mates, competition, feedback from externals, etc. The 4Cs could be connected to one and another and perhaps a balance would see improvement in confidence as it could do in competence. A coach should be aware of the athletes confidence and their strengths or weaknesses during training. Mistakes in a game are actually made in training and can affect the confidence of the athlete. “When you have confidence, you have fun. When you have fun, you can do amazing things” – Joe Namath

CONNECTION in sport is the quality of interaction with peers and staff to promote and engage meaningful and positive relationships. In a coach-athlete relationship you could ask the following question: do you trust the coach and what does trust mean? Instead of specific interaction styles or behaviors, the coach and athlete could target the perceived quality of coach-athlete relationships. Is there room for emotions, cognition’s like commitment and behaviors in sport context? In a peer-to-peer relationship what is the social impact and social preference. Passing the ball to a peer because of a strong connection between the two athletes, instead of passing to someone else. Some data shows that a positive social environment with an effective coach would lead to an increase of positive engagement in the entire team. Meaning that there are more or stronger connections between athletes. Even in individual sports, an athlete interacts with their support group (e.g. trainer, coach, strength and conditioning coach, peer-training-partners, etc.). Coaches play a vital role in getting the ‘person beyond the player’. “A good coach can change a game. A great coach can change a life” – John Wooden

CHARACTER in sport can be defined by moral development and sportspersonship. It’s the engagement in pro-social behaviors and avoidance of antisocial behaviors. Mostly voluntary positive actions in order to help, add value or benefit others. There actually is a tool to measure character, called the ‘Prosocial and Antisocial Behaviour in Sport Scale’. A famous coach had to announce the team for the Olympics. With the last spot available it was character over ability that helped making the final decision. For all athletes there is a certain expectation, even in business we see leaders instead of managers. It doesn’t mean they cannot manage, but we expect more positive shaped characteristics together with traits of (working towards) excellence in ability. Even though we all have formed a certain character, game-based practice situations will show a true persons’ self. “Sports do not build character, they reveal it”. – John Wooden and Heywood Hale Broun.

SUMMARY

The using the 4Cs is a suggestion for high performance frameworks that can lead to success. It’s used to optimize coach and athlete development in defining ‘effective’ coaching and performance. Interdisciplinary frameworks using the 4Cs have led to many international successes. Nevertheless, it’s up to the coach, athlete and the support staff to deal with implementing the aspects of competence, confidence, connection and character. Tailoring to the needs of the training cycle, culture, level and performance goals. By starting with the 4Cs, no matter what age, gender or influence (e.g. equipment, financial blackening, etc.) by making a start and creating clear lines of communication in expectation and interaction, it will change your and the athletes’ performances.

PS I highly recommend reading ‘Coaching better every season’ and ‘Routledge Handbook of Sports Coaching’.


Help Your Female Athletes to be Perfectly Brave

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This article was contributed by Coach Dawn Writes

By Dawn Redd-Kelly, Head Volleyball Coach at Beloit College.

By I was listening to one of my favorite radio talk shows (1A on NPR) and they were discussing women in the tech industry and one of their guests said something that I’ve been saying for years, which continues to be backed up by research:

Girls are socialized to be perfect, while boys are socialized to be brave.

Those of us who work with female athletes have to acknowledge this difference.  Not doing so could put you in the group of coaches who expect drama because you work with women and who don’t challenge their female athletes to be their best selves.  I get more into it in my book and when I come to speak to groups, but understanding this bit about socialization will help us to be better coaches.

How can we handle it?

  • If you’ve got drama on your team, girls are taught that they’ve got to be “perfect” and perfect girls don’t fight…so they internalize. They form cliques.  Instead, empower them to have difficult conversations with the people involved, that’s the brave thing to do.
  • Maybe you’ve got a talented player who’s afraid to acknowledge they’re the go-to person, that they’re the best player on the team. After all, perfect girls don’t lift themselves up above their teammates.  What can you do? Reframe their role as a role.  The team needs them to fill that role just like the team needs other players to fulfill their roles.
  • Beyond these two things (because there can be so many scenarios), constantly having these types conversations about your expectations (of how to handle conflict, of accepting your team role, etc.) are a great way to lay the foundation of your team culture.

Dismantling years of ingrained socialization won’t happen overnight, but if the coaching staff is committed to their player development in this area, eventually you can move the dial.  And once our players are comfortable taking risks and being brave with their teammates, I believe their athletic performance will follow!

 

Are you tired of walking into practice and seeing lackluster effort from your players?  Have you had it with trying to get your female athletes to care about the team as much as you do??

Click here to find out more about Coach Dawn’s eBook: Motivating Female Athletes

Comes with a FREE PowerPoint presentation called Guarantee Your Success: Using John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success To Increase Your Team’s Cohesion.

    


Personality Traits of Successful Athletes

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This article is also found on the Coaches Toolbox, a collection of free resources for coaches of all sports

You probably don’t agree with all of these and would change the wording on some of them, but my hope is that this stimulates your thinking on how you can more clearly define and list for your athletes what you feel leads to success.

We all have our own definition of success. I like John Wooden’s definition: “Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.”

Or, you could use some of these as ideas for your athletes in a system similar to Jon Gordon’s One Word concept from his book One Word That Will Change Your Life

A starting point for creating your own list…

DRIVE: Desire to win or be successful; sets and maintains high goals for themselves in athletics; responds positively to competition. Desires to attain athletic excellence.

AGGRESSIVENESS: Believes one must be aggressive to win; will not allow others to push them around in competition.

DETERMINATION: Willingness to practice long and hard; often works out willingly by themselves; persevering, patient, and unrelenting in work habits. Works on skills until exhausted.

GUILT-PRONENESS: Accepts responsibility for own actions; accepts blame and criticism even when not deserved; willing to endure physical and mental discomfort.

LEADERSHIP: Enjoys the role of leader and may assume it spontaneously; attempts to influence or direct others in a postiive way.

SELF-CONFIDENCE: Have unfaltering confidence in themselves and their capacity to deal with things; handles unexpected situations well; speaks up appropriately for beliefs to coaches and players.

EMOTIONAL CONTROL: Tends to be emotionally stable and realistic about athletics; will rarely allow feelings to show and performance is not affected by them; not easily frustrated by bad breaks, calls or mistakes.

MENTAL TOUGHNESS: Accepts strong criticism without feeling hurt; can bounce back quickly from adversity; does not need excessive encouragement from the coach.

COACHABILITY: Receptive to coaches’ advice; considers coaching important to becoming a good athlete; accepts the leadership and cooperates with authorities.

CONSCIENTIOUSNESS: Tends to be exacting in character, dominated by sense of duty; will not attempt to bend rules and regulations to suit own needs; places the good of the team above personal well being.

TRUST: Accepts people at face value, believes what the coaches and teammates say and does not look for ulterior motives behind their words or actions; tends to get along well with teammates.

The Way to Victory

Victories of life are won not on the fields nor in the marts where the deci­sive struggle takes place, but in the obscure and forgotten hours of prepara­tion. Success or failure lies in the hands of the individual long before the hour of final test comes.

In the higher fields of success there are no accidents; we reap precisely we they have sown and nothing else; they do well precisely what they have prepared to do and they do nothing else well.

The world puts its force into us when we put ourselves in right relation with it: Experience makes us constantly wiser if we know how to rationalize it: Time deposits all manner of treasure in our imagination and memory, if we hold the doors open.

Nothing is lost upon a person who is bent upon growth, nothing wasted on one who is constantly preparing for their work and life by keeping eyes, mind, and heart open to nature, people, books, and experience. All things that we have seen, heard, known and felt come to our aid at the critical moment to make our thought clear and keep our illustration luminous, our speech eloquent and inspiring.

212–The Extra Degree

If you haven’t seen the video below yet, I think it is worth three minutes to take a look at. It drives home the point that success is not that far away and why it is important to continue to give that little extra effort to get there!

Make sure that your speakers are on before you click on this image…