When it comes to sports, team success isn't solely reliant on the skill of individual athletes; it's about the magic that happens when a team clicks. To make that happen, coaches and athletes need to understand that team building isn't just about fun games; it's the necessary foundation that turns a group of athletes into a unified team working toward a common goal, enhancing their performance, and fostering a winning culture.

And often, helping team members see the results of their activities afterward with their coaches, could be the link that brings it all together.

This article explores how team building games aren't just for a quick dose of team spirit, and they aren't only done by youth sports teams- even the best teams in professional sports take the time to promote a winning culture. Likewise, spending an afternoon with your youth teams or teenage athletes can enhance communication skills, collaboration, creativity, adaptability, and leadership qualities.

Three things that can be gained by team building activities:

Trust:
Building trust within a youth sports team can be one of the most important cornerstones of a strong foundation for your organization. Many athletes take on a, "me, me, me," mentality, even when it comes to team sports and it's often created by the belief that they are better equipped to do X themselves, rather than rely on a teammate. When choosing the right team building activities for your players, consider games that will help them with learning to rely on one another.

Creating a Positive Culture + Roles:
There's a difference between having a negative team culture and not having a team culture at all. Creating a positive culture will help build camaraderie between teamates and foster a winning culture. When everyone understands the role they play on a team, it helps direct them, give them purpose, and keeps everyone happily moving along.

Relationships:
Athletes that feel deeper connections to the people they are surrounded by are more motivated to perform well because they understand it's important to play for one another.

Three great activities for teams to promote communication skills, leadership skills, team spirit, and fun:

Show your age:
The team will gather in a close knit circle where they remain silent while they go around and each teammate says their age, birth month and date. Once all of the players have spoken, they will line up along a wall while remaining completely silent and put themselves in age order from youngest to oldest based on the information they heard prior. All athletes should have their back to the wall the entire time, unless they are moving up or down the line and they may only communicate using non-verbal cues.
Promotes: communication, trust, leadership, teammwork.

All Together Now (Push Up):
The team will work to perform one push up, in unison but with a twist. Only one teammate will have their feet and hands on the ground, and every other player will have their feet elevated on another teammate. Once everyone is in place, they will communicate however necessary to make sure the whole team performs one single push up at the same time.
Promotes: communication, teamwork, leadership.

The Chain: Not just a great Fleetwood Mac song
Coaches will provide the team with construction paper and glue sticks (or tape) and a simple instruction: create a paper chain for the next 10 minutes. It is up to the athletes to communicate and coordinate how the paper should be ripped, the size of the links, and who will be responsible for what tasks.
Promotes: communication, teamwork, trust, leadership.

Looking to build the trust, confidence and culture of your team this season?

Debriefing: What did we just learn?

One of the focal points that is often missed during team building games, is understand what the athletes just did while working as a group. What went well? What didn't? What did we not anticipate?

Let's take The Chain activity for example:

The only verbal instructions you should have given your players, was to take the construction paper and glue sticks and create a paper chain. There was no direction on how they should be cutting paper, what the width should be and how tight the chain should be. As the athletes continue to work, keep observing but do it in silence.

When you're taking it in, you may notice some teenage athletes exhibiting leadership qualities you never noticed before. Maybe they are instructing their teammates to rip the paper a certain way so they all match. Perhaps another athlete noticed some of the players not doing anything and enouraged them to form small groups so each group would have a task to complete.

Once the time is up and the chain is complete, lay it in a straight line on the ground and see how they did. There are a few learning opportunities from how the paper chain looks.

Does it look like a group of athletes that used effective communication to make sure all of the links are the same size? Or is there a section where it looks like a few players went rogue and didn't pay attention to what the rest of the team did?

The visualization of the chain in front of them is an example of what you want their team to be: A cohesive group of individual chains that link themselves together to form something stronger than if they played alone. And if a few links decide to ignore the common goal, ignore the communication from their team members and make their links how they want; the chain no longer holds cohesiveness.

Benefits of proper team building activities:

• Teamwork for players that might not typically work together on the field, court or ice. This increases the number of new connections and unity on a team.

• Changing their environment from their usual practice field forces them to find new and different methods of communication.

• Brings out leadership skills in players you may have otherise not have expected it from.

• Understanding how your teammates think and work in different elements can help down the road during in-game problem solving.

• You're learning about your team by observing in different situations to see who can handle pressure, who can take instruction, who needs more direction, and how your communication style works for them as a whole.

As you can see, the opportunities and benefits of why team building should play an important part for your team this season are plentiful. While you may have stumbled upon this article looking for a fun way to shared experiences with new teams you may be coaching, you'll walk away with a new perspective and understanding that it's so much more.

Kristin Tullo is a certified strength and conditioning and sports psychology coach that has been working with athletes for ten years. Using her background in Social Work and former athletic career, she now helps athletes maximize their athletic potential through mental and physical strength.