Having Fun
I have just had the most enjoyable few days coaching the London County Colts team at ‘The Canterbury Festival’.
Our team was very inexperienced and very young. Some players were two years younger than the Under 13 limit, while many were one year younger, and with little, or no experience of playing county age-group Cricket. However, despite the additional handicap of many players not having known each other before Friday, we finished joint top of the 4-team tournament, but lost out to eventual winners, Kent, on the net run-rate rule.
Our peak performance on the final day when dismissing Somerset, (one of the best-run clubs in English Cricket at both senior and junior level) for only 53, and knocking the runs off in only 10.3 overs for the loss of 3 wickets, was a brilliant way to conclude a very special few days. The boys commitment to creating ‘all-round opportunity’ for everyone in the group meant that a mindset of ‘We before I’ developed as the tournament unfolded.
We arrived as strangers and transformed ourselves into a successsful team over the three days. We departed on Sunday evening as good friends after sharing such a meaningful collective experience. It was special to witness, and also to be part of it.
When I coach a team, I like to deploy a theme, in order to enhance the possibility of a meaningful connection developing between people in the group. The theme is designed to be sufficiently broad to allow for personal interpretation. Creating a context where everyone is able to participate equally, and one where all voices are heard, is central to my working philosophy.
I aim to develop in people a greater respect for others, and also for the group as a whole.
Empowering individuals to develop the group culture, and the necessary harmony, is key to successful performance. I believe that when people are committed to something bigger than ‘self’, then quantum leaps can take place in terms of performance. As the coach/learning facilitator, I have found that one can sometimes get in the way, and prevent this all-important healthy group culture from developing fully. If individuals are always focused on the contributions from ‘the boss’, then the critical inter-personal relationships within the group don’t take priority.
Learning to step back and empower the group to develop their own culture, whilst observing closely, can be difficult at times as I have sometimes experienced in me a tendency to want to exercise my authority too often and too early on in the group’s development. When this happens it prevents an energy flow in the group from developing. Standing back, and watching the energy level in the group, and only intervening quietly (when necessary) is the style I have come to realise best supports the team’s performance. This way, it never undermines the Captain, and also the players’ ownership of the team. This happens best (in my experience) when the Coach doesn’t take responsibility for the team’s performance. Interference normally comes about when the Coach is taking the result too personally. If the Coach focuses on the values, and observes the process closely by making sure the values of the team are being ‘walked’ in performance, and not just ‘talked’ at team meetings, then the group becomes a living organism which continues to find ways to expand itself over time.
As a coaching philosophy, this has provided me with a rich harvest in the past few years. I am fortunate, and will be eternally grateful to have been developed by two dear friends and professional colleagues, Dr Ken West, and Dr Ken Jennings, who have mentored my development over many many years. Developing a way of facilitating a successful group process where the experience is meaningful for all who participate in it, is a challenge, but one of the most rewarding experiences I have been able to enjoy.
Ultimately, I want to develop independent-thinking, self-reliant people, who are committed to expressing their uniqueness ‘fully’, but within the framework of achieving top performance for the group as the number one priority.
Our theme for the 3-day event at ‘The Canterbury Festival’ was ‘Have Fun’.
As the process unfolded, it was wonderful to witness the energy in our group continue to support the performance on the field. Our spirit was amazing, and the focus on building further quality in the inter-personal relationships within the group paid dividends.
The group seemed to expand every day, and key contributions emerged from a variety of players, some of them very surprising, such as a newcomer volunteering to bowl the final ‘pressure’ over in a tight game where only seven runs were needed by the opposition. He (Giacomo Grey) took two wickets and secured a result for our team. What inspirational commitment and mental courage from a boy who is relatively new to the game, and had never played at a level anywhere near what he was experiencing….
My thinking is based on wanting players to express themselves more ’fully’ when they play. Being given the licence to enjoy oneself off the field is also key to this. I believe that when people are given ‘full permission’ to be themselves, they are more likely to play to their full potential as opposed to trying to fit into a culture, which can be very restricitive for any individual. The pressure to conform can often constrict an individual to such an exten that he begins to act, talk, and play like someone else, rather than tapping into his own uniqueness as a human being. After all, we are different as human beings, and have different ways of functioning, of playing the game, with all of us having different strengths and weakneses. For me, this is the real beauty of teams – the richness is in the diversity, and as a coach, the thrill of ‘mixing the ingredients’ in a particular way to ensure the strrengths of each indivdual brings out the best in each other.
In my opinion, most players’ Cricket careers are blighted by fear to some degree. Any player who is consumed by the fear of making a mistake, or by the fear of how they may be judged, is likely to under-perform relative to their human potential. Of course, the mental challenge is to be able to deal with any such distraction, hence my belief that having ‘fun’ is central to dissipating the possibility of fear becoming a destructive factor in performance. When a person is rrelaxed and having fun, I believe they perform better.
I know from personal experience, how much better I played in the latter stages of my career once I learnt to embrace the mental challenge of Cricket by being less affected by wanting to achieve technical perfection, or by what others thought of me or by what others may be saying about me off the field during the performance process. Maturity plays its part, as once an individual becomes more comfortable with who they are, they are less likely to be insecure about the approval of others.
For young cricketers, this is a poignant point. I have noticed how the influence of modern day coaching and some over-zealous parents can impact on a young player’s performance. Some are very inhibited, and become ‘world-class’ in practice nets, but third-class in a competitive match environment, when the stakes are higher. I often wonder to myself how much fun some of these young players are having when playing the game…
How often do you see young players playing the game with a broad smile on their face? Or senior players for that matter?
When I re-formed London County Cricket Club in 2004, 100 years after WG Grace led the club, the slogan which accompanied our promotional literature was ‘Resuming Play’. Subsequently, I have maintained this, because I am on a mission to re-introduce the ‘playfulness’ into people’s mindset, and performance, in order to enhance the individual and the group’s possibility of experiencing improved performance.
One of London County’s aforementioned Professional Mentors, Dr Ken West, developed a wonderful acronym for a mindset designed to enhance learning, called P.A.C.E. which has helped me both as an individual to derive more form each and every learning experience available to me, and also others who I provide mentoring support to.
P.A.C.E. stands for being Playful, Accepting, Creative and Empathetic in relationship with oneself, in order to extract the most from an experience. If one allows resistance to enter the fray, (either through fear, or other means), then a learning experience becomes more limiting.
The Fun Team
The challenge is to find the fun, and be as creative as possible, when finding solutions to any difficulties encountered, whilst being honest but never too hard on oneself, and accepting whatever life throws at us, and to respond to as best as one possibly can.
London County Colts had fun this weekend, and paced themselves well. And so did I !!
It has been a brilliant Easter weekend.
