Stages of Team Growth in Tennis Training

SUBMITTED BY JOEVALCEDO MAY 15, 2013 - 3 WEEKS 6 DAYS AGO

Stages of Team Growth in Tennis TrainingBy Jose Villanueva Alcedo, M.B.A./T.M., Continuous Improvement Consultant

Training for tennis requires a team approach in order to achieve realistic goals. Like team building, industry recognizes four stages that the team has to undergo before performance. These stages should be understood in any team effort, such as Tennis Training, which involves a team with members: trainee, mentor/coach, and parents/family.

Stage 1 – FormingThe participants have so many unknowns to face. The forming stage is the time for the members to explore the boundaries acceptable before they become comfortable to develop a teambehavior. Like a hesitant swimmers, they stand by the pool, dabbling their toes in the water. This is a stage of transition from individual to member status, and of testing the leader – the mentor.It is in Forming stage that the members, (trainee, mentor, parents) experience feelings of excitement, anticipation, optimism and pride. At the start, the trainee and parents have lofty aspirations forperformance. Since performance is not seen, the members develop suspicion, fear, and anxiety about the job ahead. Members become impatient and opens up issues to the leader-the mentor.Progress is slow at the Forming stage due to ongoing distractions. It is important that the mentor explains these behavior and state of affair to the parents and trainee at the beginning of training.

Stage 2 – StormingThe most difficult stage for team building is probably Storming. It is the stage where the members jump in the water, thinking they might drown. In tennis, the trainee is afraid to continue because the tennis balls go into various unexpected places in and out the court or out the park. Realize that the lack of progress should not be a roadblock. Resistance to training methods and drills from trainees develop at this stage. Setting up some achievable goals and intermediate milestones for the trainee to meet should be encouraged. The leader – mentor should understand and recognize the accomplished milestones.

Stage 3 – NormingLike swimmers, team members especially the trainee and parents, realize that they are not going to drown, they start getting serious to go ahead with the training. At this stage, the trainee starts to like the training and the team with the parent and mentor. This is now a great opportunity for the mentor/coach to spend more time in practice and drills. If the coach is using DMAIC tennis technique, as used by SCV Tennis Aces in Santa Clarita, CA, USA, the norming stage should be a perfect time to start DMAIC – a Continuous Improvement technique to reduce uncontrolled variation in tennis shots.At this time, improved feelings and displayed by better attitude of the members start to surface. This includes sense of team cohesion, a common spirit and goals, fun, more energy as the trainee sees significant progress.

Stage 4 – PerformingBy this stage, the team (trainee, mentor/coach, parents) has settled its obstacles and clarified their expectations. Although the team has established confidence and started to trust each other, it is important that they should know the harder work ahead. This is the stage where the team recognizes their strengths and weaknesses. The mentor/coach should do an objective analysis of the trainees’ progress on the strengths and work on the weaknesses.

More DMAIC drills and practice should be done at the Performing stage. Competitive games should be encouraged at this stage. The mentor/coach should be aware that Performing stage is achieved in a short time; other times it may take months. It is normal that each trainee follows a certain learning curve. Understanding these stages of growth should keep the team (trainee, mentor, parents) from overreacting to normal problems and setting unrealistic expectations that only add to frustration. Because there will be another tennis player out there who can bit your trainee does not mean defeat.

By nature, humans are pre-wired to compare with each other. This is not always good because this prevents continuous improvement to work. That is why the teams (trainee, mentor, parents) goal should be to compete the trainee against her/his potential.

For more, contact: SCVTennisAces@yahoo.com

Courtesy article by www.YouKaizen.com and Betterist at http://betterfly.com/josealcedo