My Soccer Experience

            Soccer has always been my safe place. I started playing soccer when I was three and have had the privilege to play at a college level. It was always a dream of mine to play in college and I have learned so much about myself throughout this journey. I have learned how to lead others and also know who to follow.

            I have had many ups and downs and an overwhelming number of emotions throughout my soccer career. There were days when I was so frustrated with myself that I wanted to give up. I was able to remind myself that the happy days make up for those. My first encounter with leadership was being named captain for my high school soccer team and my other sports, hockey and lacrosse. Being on these teams I observed all different types of people and as a leader, I wanted to find ways to connect different types of individuals. I had players come to me about problems they were facing. One specific day, I had an underclassman approach me and ask me if I could talk to some of her friends who were causing her problems. I was able to talk to her friends and allow myself to hear their side of the story before I made any assumptions. We resolved the issue, and the coach didn’t need to find out about it. That day, I learned that many people want to change their behavior or listen more intently when it is player-to-player, rather than player-to-coach. I brought this knowledge into my college career.

            Communication is key. Communicating both on and off the field is so important to grow team chemistry. Just this year our coach had us watch a video of the Iowa girls’ basketball team talking about how they grew their team chemistry. One highlight that stood out to me was that they were able to just be completely honest with each other. I have observed my college team struggle with being honest with each other. Instead of telling each other what we want on the field, we end up just complaining about it silently. This creates division among our team and the people that complain tend to suck more people into a negative mindset for practice or games.

            There are multiple roles each player has on our team. For example, we have motivators, leaders, competitors, and complainers. The motivators help encourage everyone on even on bad days. They notice when a teammate isn't doing their best and a simple high five can pick a teammate up. Competitors are what create the environment intensely. Sometimes it can hurt the group to have an attitude when a call doesn’t go your way. But the biggest strength is that they push everyone else on the team to be the best they can be. Complainers are what hurt our team the most. Whether the complainers don’t want to work hard, or their teammate is not doing what the complainer expects. Over the past year, we struggled a little with this. Our coach wanted a change because that should not be allowed in a winning environment. He required us to read the book “Hard Hat: 21 Ways to Be a Great Teammate” by Jon Gordon. It tells the story of a student-athlete offering strategies to become a better teammate and enforce a positive team culture. There is no way we can be a winning team if we can’t develop the skill of communication. We discussed the book in a meeting, and everyone participated. We came up with the word “energy vampires”. This means that one person can infest the whole team with just one complaint. We made a rule that complaining had no space in our team and have implemented this standard since that meeting.

              I encountered a time when I thought I should step in when I saw a form of complaining. For example, a freshman fell asleep in one of the first team meetings of the year. I took this as “this meeting is boring and I don’t want to pay attention.” That is the message it sent to the coach and team, and I felt as a leader, I needed to say something. I remembered the skill I learned in high school: player-to-player is more effective than player-to-coach, so I took action myself. I pulled her aside and explained to her that we hold each other to a higher standard, and I don’t want her getting in trouble with the coach. She took it very well and it didn’t happen again. I developed the skills of conflict resolution and communication.

             I have also learned teamwork and resilience. In all transparency, we did not have the best season last year. We faced a lot of adversity. We didn’t win the conference or the conference tournament. It was the first time since 2009 that we didn’t win either of those titles. We all strive for the same goal and sometimes we just don’t earn it. We had setbacks, our leading scorer was out this season and we struggled to overcome the deficit of being down against Concordia in the conference tournament. But after the season, we changed our attitude. Our coach had an end-of-the-year meeting with the entire team, and he was fired up. With his attitude having a turn-around, it fired up the entire team as well. This was right before winter break, and we were going to have a small break from practicing. Every day our coaches or teammates sent out quotes and videos to motivate and get excited for the spring season. We recognize the unsuccessful season, but we can only look forward. Our first spring game we took it to SMSU 5-0. That was resilience.

            This resilience and teamwork played a vital role in improving our team chemistry. Moving forward, we had weekly meetings during the spring season and one meeting that I remember vividly was when we were asked to send our coach a picture of us when we started playing soccer and explain why we were here. Each of my teammates were very vulnerable and we learned so much more about each other. It made us closer. Each meeting we learned so much about each other and stressed creating a family culture. We all love each other. When I am approached by my teammates to work on something, I thank them for wanting me to get better. Our team chemistry is key to our success.

            As I look back at my strengths finder results I saw in my top 5 I had “arranger” and “achiever”. I think these two themes influence me a lot when leading a team to create an empowering team culture. An arranger is described as determining how all the pieces and resources can be arranged for maximum productivity. On the team, I believe I am the arranger when I try to find each of my teammate’s strengths to be the most successful. I ask myself, how can our team use this strength, or weakness, to our advantage? I rely on my instincts and gut feeling of how my teammates may respond, for example, to yelling from a coach. How can I lift them up? On the other hand, achiever plays a prominent role in my soccer career. I am a competitor. An achiever is described as someone with a great deal of stamina and takes immense satisfaction in being busy and productive. This trait is reflected in my view of leadership because I want my teammates to have the same mentality. Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. We can win any game if we have the work rate and passion to do so. This influences my approach to practice or a game every day. I want to motivate my teammates to be better.

            I have learned so many skills while being on a team. I learned communication, teamwork, resilience, and conflict resolution. When I was a freshman, I observed the senior’s leadership style as visionary. They wanted to inspire, and I felt inspired. They lived in the present but believed we could do anything. As I become an upperclassman on my college team, I want to lead by example and lead with expressiveness. I want to enforce that same leadership because once a senior class leaves, we need to step up. To achieve success, we must to the little things. Each year for a team activity we make a vision board together. We cut out magazine articles or words that express what it takes to meet our goals and also what type of culture we want to create. I ask myself as I go into the next season, how can we meet these goals? The first step is showing up. When the whole team shows up to the extra practices on hot summer days makes the difference. We will win a national championship if we believe we can and if we have the leaders to do so. To be willing to give everything you have, for what you want. We can communicate to each other of when we need the teammate to give more and to have those hard conversations. I will be successful in reaching my personal goals by setting objectives that I strive to meet and holding myself accountable when I notice I am lacking in effort. Everywhere I work, there is always some form of a team. We all play a different part, but we all work towards a common goal. I can be the player to coach my teammates, and I can also be open to getting coached. Like I said before, I learned how to lead others and know who to follow.