Building Greatness-Leadership & Softball

The graph above is a depiction of how 3 players, my head coach, a peer, and myself scored on the Leadership Practices Inventory.   

The Plan. 

Devising my leadership improvement plan was not an easy task.  While I scored myself fairly low on the Leadership Practices Inventory, my athletes and those who know me scored me high.  The key to my plan is staying consistent with my players, regardless of how I may feel at any given time.  Because I am close in age to my players, they must understand that it is not my role to be their friend.  Nevertheless, I want them to feel that I am genuinely interested in them beyond the playing field.  It is important that they believe that I am invested in them and the program.  Consequently, the first step of my plan is to ask each player every day, whether at practice or in a game, how they are doing in order to find the high and low points of their day. 

The area that I scored the lowest on was the challenger area. In certain situations, however, I score very high on this scale, albeit not in my role at Smith.  At Smith, I use the most up to date system but I find myself modifying it in order to accommodate lower skill level.  In the future, my new plan of action will be to raise the bar for my players and help them find ways to successfully participate without having to decrease the complexity of the drill.

In addition, my plan will include praising my players more than I do now. Although my players believe I inspire and encourage them, sometimes I can be a bit too sarcastic with them.  I do not want them to think that I am being “mean.”  When addressing an important point, I try to find a way to get my point across in a light- hearted manner.  With my new plan, I will be more direct with some players and reserve my sarcasm for those who can take it.

Overall, my players see me quite differently than I see myself.  As a result, it will be useful to analyze my plan and acknowledge and embrace what I do well and not assume I am doing a bad job.