10 Ways to Get Your Players to Lead More this Season

1. Create Layers of Leadership Assistant coaches should each mentor a unit leader. Captains should lead the leadership council and be frequently involved in coach meetings. The leadership council should be tasked with leading a unit. They should have clear commitments to serve, support, connect, and challenge the people within their unit. For this to work, give your players a say in who serves as captain and on the leadership council. Be intentional in the voting by having your team create a job description and select their leaders based on the qualities and behaviors they identified. This makes this less of a popularity contest. Remember: You want the most influential and popular individuals on your team to lead effectively, so you want them on your leadership group.
2. Give Them Opportunities to Lead in Their Units Give the leadership council some say in who they want to lead and mentor, and ask the athletes who they want as their mentor and leader. From these suggestions, you can pick units. The first thing they need to do is make clear commitments about how they will 1) serve, 2) support, 3) connect, and 4) challenge the people in their unit. Other ways to help these units come together and provide mentorship opportunities are.
   • Come up with a group name
   • Room together on trips
   • Team meals together
   • Sit together in the locker room
   • Fun activities together
   • Compete together in practice 
3.  Go to Them for Accountability When you see an individual not meeting your standards, on or off the field, don’t start by challenging that player. Go to the veteran, captain, or unit leader and challenge them to deal with the situation.
4. Allow Them to Co-Create Vision, Goals, and Standards (Manifesto) Ask your team these questions:
   • What do you hope to achieve this season? Identify 1-5 things.
   • What do you hope to experience? Identify 1-5 things.
   • In order to create that experience and achieve those things, what can you no longer tolerate? What must you expect from each other every day? What behaviors will you strive for daily?
   • Then step out of the room and let them come up with your team vision, goals, and standards.
5. Remind Them of Their Standards Finalize this as a document, have them sign it, post it publicly, share it with others, and reference what’s on it daily! When they aren’t doing what they need to do, just remind them of their standards and goals. Give leaders time in the locker room or in a huddle to fix it.
6. Responsibility to Motivate Pre-game speeches are the most overrated aspect of leadership. Instead of spending your time and energy on this, give this to your leaders to decide who will talk to the team before the game and what they will talk about. When the team’s effort is lacking in practice, instead of giving them a fiery pep talk, tell them to huddle together and figure it out, or they will all just go home.
7. Huddle with Your Leaders Daily Your leaders are responsible for having a pulse on the team. Check in with them daily, giving them opportunities to bring you problems and share concerns, but don’t take on the responsibility of solving all their problems. Coach them on how they might be able to solve these issues. But don’t just make these meetings about the bad. Start with the good: Ask them what’s going well? Who needs to be celebrated?
8. Hold Them to the Highest Standard and Point It Out as the Model Your leaders should know they are being held to the highest standard on the team. At the same time, they should be highlighted as the standard. When one of them demonstrates exceptional effort or commitment, like coming into training early, point it out. If they are competing and working hard in practice, stop practice, bring the team in, and point it out as the standard. When setting up a drill, ask the leaders to demonstrate what the standard of excellence should be in the drill regarding effort, intensity, and communication. Help them set the standard!
9. Get Them Speaking Your Language You shouldn’t be the only one sharing your leadership mantras, core values, and standards—get them talking as well. Have them recite the team non-negotiables or team standards. Like 21-time National Championship Coach Anson Dorrance at UNC, have them make a presentation to the team on one of the core values or standards. Know your language, speak it to them daily, and get them finishing your sentences like Monty Williams, who would say, “It’s a get to…” and the players would respond, “Not a got to.”
10. Put Them Under Pressure, Hold Them Accountable With all the support you are offering, if they fail as a leader during the season, give them an opportunity to fix it, but let them know if they don’t, you will need to make a change. Don’t be afraid to fire and hire a new leader, someone who will get the job done.

If all of this seems a little overwhelming, you need to get trained through the TOC Transformational Coaching & Culture Certification. It will help you become a pro when it comes to building culture, and it also saves you a lot of time by providing you with a lot of digital resources and instruction on how to build your culture system manual. Get certified today!