Team Chemistry: 30 Elements for Coaches to Foster Cohesion, Strengthen Communication Skills, and Create a Healthy Sport Culture

by André Lachance, Jean François Ménard

Overview

“A must-read!” — Derek Johnson, Director of Pitching, Cincinnati Reds, MLB

What is different about teams that are consistent winners, those teams that always seem to bring their A-game when the stakes are highest? A positive team culture is likely the answer.

We’ve all seen it happen: the team that looks great on paper, or has a league-leading regular season, but can’t pull out the wins or give their top performance when everything is on the line. As coaches and sport leaders what can we do to ensure that we maximize the potential of our athletes and teams so they are successful and continue to enjoy sport? How do we ensure that we coach in a way that benefits the team and remains respectful of the individual?

In their first book together, André Lachance and Jean François Ménard offer tangible and practical strategies to help sport leaders create efficient group dynamics, build team culture, and help a group of athletes to gel. Using the periodic table of elements to organize concepts into a modular framework, the authors have created a powerful new resource for coaches in every sport.

Building successful teams is not as simple as picking the best players: there are specific methods that coaches and leaders use to make their messages stick and to bring out the best in everyone within a group. Consistently, the healthiest team cultures have a huge impact on performance. That is the power of Team Chemistry.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781770416406
Publisher:	ECW Press
Publication date:	04/19/2022
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.64(d)

About the Author

André Lachance is an internationally acclaimed baseball coach who built Canada’s first Women’s National Program and has led the team to second place in the world rankings. In 2019, he was named head coach of France’s National Women’s Team, capturing the European Championship. He was the business and sport development director at Baseball Canada and is an award-winning professor in the School of Human Kinetics at the University of Ottawa. André is based in Gatineau, Québec, Canada.

Jean François Ménard is an internationally acclaimed mental performance expert with a specialty in coaching elite athletes. His clients are proven winners: Olympic gold medalists and Super Bowl and X Games champions. He is the bestselling author of Train (Your Brain) Like an Olympian, founder of Kambio Performance, and travels the globe as a professional speaker. He is based in Laval, Quebec.

Read an Excerpt

Baseball is a great example of working with failure. Did you know that baseball scoreboards display the number of mistakes made by each team? As if making the mistake was not embarrassing enough, it must show on the board as well. Another example is that the best hitters are unsuccessful 7 times out of 10 attempts at the plate. That’s right; a hitter with a .300 batting average is considered an all-star player. Baseball players pocket millions of dollars from failing more than succeeding. In 2019, Los Angeles Angels star player Mike Trout earned $33 million, which is a payout of approximately $70,000 per at-bat. That year he struck out a whopping 120 times. But his failures did not stop him; by accepting the Oops moments, Trout stayed focused and was able to crank the ball out of the park 45 times.

Whether it is playing baseball, becoming a circus artist or putting together a winning team, you must create an environment where failure is accepted and encouraged. You should even celebrate the mistakes. I am not suggesting throwing a party for every bad performance, but bringing in some silliness can help athletes relax and learn to play with mistakes.

André put forth the Oops concept in a brilliant, yet unusual way. One of his childhood heroes was Patof, a clown he idolized on TV. Patof would get in trouble from making blunders and getting caught in slipups. But he would always find a way to bounce back.

André integrated the Oops principle within the national baseball team in creative fashion. After games, the whole team shared their nominees for the best Oops moment of the game. The winner had to wear a T-shirt André had made with Patof’s face printed on it. It was always a funny moment. The concept caught fire. Highlighting the Oops moments, and having a good chuckle about them, created a positive relationship with mistakes. The impact of failure was lowered thanks to Patof. The concept also influenced the team culture. Athletes took more risks and were not afraid of criticism.

From time to time, André would award the T-shirt to coaches so players understood that staff members made mistakes as well. This entertaining post-game debrief was not only about showcasing the Oops moment but also providing an opportunity to come up with lessons learned for the whole team. It became a fabulous team chemistry booster as well.

Welcoming, accepting and celebrating failure must be part of your coaching philosophy. Acknowledge and recognize all efforts and attempts taken by athletes, even if they led to mistakes. That is how teams grow. You do not win games by playing safe. Success comes from going for it. To use a baseball analogy: you cannot steal second base by keeping your foot on first base.

Table of Contents

Introduction xiii

Section 1 Creation

Building a Healthy Culture, Learning about the Team and Establishing Strong Values

1 Kilometre Zero 3

Establishing guidelines to build a strong foundation for your team

2 Brand 11

Coming up with a brand to make your team unique

3 Team Cycles 19

Exploring the different team cycles: birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and beyond

4 Staff 30

Choosing the right personnel for your team

5 Welcome 38

Making people feel safe by creating an inclusive environment

6 Oops 47

Embracing failure and turning mistakes into learning opportunities

7 Leader(of the)Ship 54

Leading by example in everything you do

Section 2 Communication

Providing Appropriate Feedback, Addressing What Matters Most and Understanding the Team's Needs

8 Pygmalion 67

Improving your interactions with athletes to have a positive effect on their performances

9 Your Coach 75

Receiving feedback on how you perform as a coach

10 How Are You? 82

Assessing an athlete's current state to get a pulse of what's really going on

11 P.R.P. 90

Exposing the different types of feedback to use when addressing a situation

12 Debrief 97

Improving post-game debriefs to ensure the team takes away important lessons learned

13 Win/LDSE 106

What to say and what not to say after wins and losses

14 5:1 114

Asking questions before giving advice to optimize the quality of your feedback

15 Lego 120

Highlighting the process [instead of the result] to foster growth and development

Section 3 Collaboration

Forming Robust Cohesion, Connecting Authentically and Supporting Each Other

16 Sociogram 129

Becoming more aware of the connections between your athletes

17 Get Personal 137

Going out of your way to learn about each and every individual on the team

18 Buddy System 143

Creating a support system to form stronger bonds among teammates

19 Inner Teams 150

Breaking up the larger team into smaller ones to increase individual productivity

20 Be a Clown 158

Showing openness and being attentive to build greater connections

21 We 165

Getting social support to increase comfort and become reassured

22 Together 173

Using fun, purposeful and out-of-the-box type activities to foster team chemistry

23 Extra Mile 181

Showing that you care by offering a tad more of your time and energy

Section 4 Coordination

Implementing Ground Rules, Managing Critical Situations and Doing Things Differently

24 Black Box 191

Identifying the problems within the team and addressing the elephant in the room

25 Crisis 200

Staying calm within the storm and coming up with strategies to weather it

26 One-On-One 209

Making individual meetings as productive and meaningful as possible

27 Hatchet 218

Cutting someone from the team using respectful and professional strategies

28 Hashtag 225

Having clear rules about phone use and content shared on social media

25 Goal Getting 234

Challenging conventional ways of setting goals

30 M?P 242

Recognizing various types of accomplishments within the team

Conclusion 251

Acknowledgements 253

Editorial Reviews

To become the best decathlete in the world, you must surround yourself with coaches who think outside the box and who are ready to do things differently. If you don’t, chances are, you will end up like your competitors. This book is all about that; it dives into concepts beyond traditional coaching methods. Team Chemistry represents very well how my coaches operate: keep an open mind, challenge the status quo and get creative to find a competitive edge.” — Damian Warner, Decathlete, 2020 Olympic Gold Medallist

“Sport leaders play such an important role to ensure team success. My favourite coaches weren’t only great technicians and tacticians; they communicated clearly, instilled confidence and cared about the players. Team Chemistry will be a valuable part of a coach’s toolkit.” — Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, guard, New York Jets, Super Bowl LIV champion

“Lachance and Ménard show us that building team chemistry one athlete, one staff member, one practice, and one day at a time is about more than just the results on the scoreboard. It is a skill that coaches at any level can learn and their book provides the tools to do so. Team Chemistry will become a trusted resource for coaches in every sport.” — Danielle Goyette, three-time Olympian, eight-time World Champion, Player and Coach, HHOF 2017

“I have been fortunate enough to work with and observe many talented coaches, the vast majority of them possessing great content knowledge and ability to teach their craft. However, the highly successful coaches were the ones who also invested their time and bandwidth in building a truly superior culture. Team Chemistry provides the tools and techniques to help sport leaders foster an elite culture, a culture of respect and responsibility that will in turn help players and staff reach their optimal performance. A terrific book that both aspiring and veteran coaches should read and put to use.” — Kai Correa, Coach, San Francisco Giants, MLB

“Creating a healthy culture goes hand in hand with developing how you play, your tactics and strategies, and might even be the most important part of a coach’s job. Just like the players we work with, coaches can always improve. Team Chemistry enhanced my thinking in this space and provided me with new ideas for creating the best environment for my players, my staff, and myself.” — Bev Priestman, Head Coach, Team Canada Women’s Soccer, 2020 Olympic Gold Medallist

From the Publisher