The key to any team sport is the team. You can have players will excellent fundamentals and implement great tactics but it all comes down to the cohesion of the group. There is the rub. Build cohesion without forcing it on everyone.

First, it is necessary to understand where exactly cohesion or chemistry comes from. Scientifically speaking, people identify with groups based on the emotions they elicit. So the initial step in building chemistry is to make everyone feel comfortable. Then, once people relax they can open up and build relationships which is all cohesion is - a relationship with a purpose.

One of the best ways to relax everyone is to force everyone to identify each other on the team. By this I don’t mean memorizing names but acknowledging each person as a component of the group. This is done through nicknames. As long as the title revolves around a positive circumstance a powerful trigger has been created that instantly links in a person to a group and a good feeling. What more can you ask for?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 30th, 2008 at 1:23 pm and is filed under The Team Game. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.