Storming in a Team

The ‘Storming’ phase in the process of teambuilding is where players try to find their spot in the team, relations are built and authorities are established. The coach is more passive in this phase carefully observing what is going on. For instance, the coach will be looking for a captain during this phase.

I like to share some of my experiences of the storming phase: I will give some examples of problems I had coaching R.C. Hilversum. (Back then I unfortunately did not understand the whole process as described here).

Coming new to the coaching job from coaching the Colts, I brought young raw talent with me to the First XV. Complications:

• The older players were only just discovering their own responsibilities, some veterans just quitted.
• The younger players came from a different background, atmosphere.
• Young players were thrown into the Premier League, scared not to perform.
• I wanted to change the way the first XV played, confusing the established players and given the ex-Colts an leading edge. Of course the ex-Colts understood better what I wanted.
• Because I retired early due to injury, some of the veterans were my old teammates. A situation I could not cope with very well....

I confused everybody by not informing, or explaining the way I wanted to team to play. I then thought it would be better if they would discover things by just doing all the small moves we practised in the game. Also I let the older players try to stamp their authority too much.
Looking back I should have taken more control. I did not have a ‘Norming’ phase......  

More

More on the other elements of the teambuilding process:

• Forming: why you should consider bringing foreign players in your team, by Colin Jackson.
• Norming: appointing a captain, develop a Code of Conduct and plays and scenario's.
• Performing: gameplan, evaluation and goal setting.

Last updated on 18-2-07