Reflection:
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I have always been just another member of a large track team. Maybe one who performs decently well, or one that always shows up to practice, but never one to show much more leadership than by example. I do not like to be loud and assertive, instead, I would share my ideas with someone else who felt more comfortable in the role. I have always felt like I have earned a more authoritative spot on the team, but my voice never seems to make it out of my head. So, this year, as I am getting more comfortable with my position on the team, I planned to observe the effective and ineffective leadership styles among my team’s designated leaders. Among the entire track team at MSU, there are multiple smaller special team groups based on events. My event being the pole vault, we have just fourteen members following the direction of one coach and two coach-elected leaders. With such a small group of competitive athletes, there are obvious cliques between those who get along better and those who are strictly just teammates. This makes team bonding difficult and poses problems when outside activities are organized. Not to mention the obvious challenge when trying to merge the boy’s team with the girls to create a more dynamic atmosphere. Our two team leaders are of the opposite gender which most likely was selected to help with balance. Unfortunately, our coach decided to split our practices into two groups which happen to be split nearly perfectly by gender. One of our leaders uses a louder method of leadership. She has leadership traits that are more efficient when she acts like a dictator and demands control over the group. The group successfully listens to her because the chaos is shut down with her instructive control. Additionally, she is very friendly, so she has a personal relationship with everyone which helps bring the team together. She is the best person to help merge the cliques among us. Our other leader is quieter and is a brilliant communicator. He makes sure everyone is heard and shares bigger concerns with our coach to ensure we are all on the same page. He does a good job of being assertive when needed but mostly is a companion. He is a dependable leader and uses his experience to mentor the rest of us. These traits have adapted to work well for our team, some of us need the assertion to keep us on track and others need a companion that we can count on to help us. They are very different styles of leadership, but I think that even with as small of a group as we have, we need more than one leadership style to ensure that everyone is content. We have another teammate who is a leader not by label but by example because he is very quiet. We all respect him for his work, but he is not as accountable in a setting that requires a leader because he does not speak up. The group gets lost in side conversations and other distractions that a lot of time gets wasted when we are trying to complete workouts. I have learned that our group requires a louder leader, but not someone who is overly controlling. Multiple leadership styles would be effective for my team; however, I believe our team requires more than one person to share different approaches in order to successfully organize my team. This experience allows fulfillment of the leadership competency Values and Teams levels two and three.
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