Team Chemistry: What It Is And How To Build It
About Case Study Authors
Ibex Tactics LLC, was founded by Alex Bolowich & Ben Foodman. Before starting the company, Alex and Ben were working with athletes on an individual basis, helping them improve their mental performance using sport psychology-based interventions. While both professionals had incredible success working with some of the world’s most elite athletes, a significant portion of the time they were unable to help some of their clients due to the poor cultures these athletes were immersed in. As a result, Alex and Ben created Ibex Tactics LLC, which dedicated towards providing science-driven solutions to helping teams build resilient cultures.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION: Team Chemistry Produces High-Performance Teams
PART I. A Highschool Volleyball Team That Lost Group Chemistry
PART II. Understanding The Science Of Communication & Group Performance
PART III. Implementing Tier 3 Communication Strategies For Teams
PART IV. The Before & After Result of Using Tier 3 Services For Our Client
Introduction: Team Chemistry Produces High-Performance Teams
When people study sports teams and how they work together, a common term that frequently comes up is called “team chemistry”. Team chemistry has been defined as “the harmonious and effective relationships, communication, and shared goals that enable team members to work together seamlessly and achieve optimal performance”. Typically, when teams achieve chemistry, this can be exhibited in the following ways: smooth communication, team members performing at fast speeds, high levels of comradery, etc.
Most teams in both sports and the corporate world would love to cultivate team chemistry on a moment’s notice but are unable to do so for two primary reasons: they have a fundamental misunderstanding of what team chemistry really is, and they do not implement strategies that will optimize their team’s ability to create chemistry. So, for this issue of the Ibex Tactics case studies, we want to review a Tier 3 client that we did work with to help them improve their team chemistry and achieve the performance results they felt their organization needed.
Part I. A Highschool Volleyball Team That Lost Group Chemistry
Jane is a high school volleyball coach for one of the top private schools in the state. Her team over the years remained very competitive and would frequently develop athletes that were talented enough to receive athletic scholarships for the major power conferences in collegiate athletics which included SEC, ACC and BIG10 universities. Jane said when should would talk with college coaches, they would frequently tell her how it always appeared that her teams ‘meshed well’ together, and they would ask her for tips that they could use with their athletes. This was some of the feedback that gave Jane the most confidence in her ability to coach at a high level. However, prior to working with us her team was experiencing significant declines in performance. From Jane’s perspective, one of the most notable declines in performance was how the “team chemistry” that her athletes were most well-known for appeared to be significantly diminishing.
Her athletes started arguing amongst each other more frequently, expressing increased frustration with themselves and teammates over the smallest issues. Her athletes started to make mistakes that were uncharacteristic of them, and even worse athletes started showing up late and missing practices. At first, Jane tried reading different sport psychology books to see if she could find any helpful strategies that she could use to improve her team’s chemistry, but this made little difference. Jane started receiving more phone calls from parents who were concerned about the direction of the team, and Jane started to worry about her job security with the AD. Jane started talking with her mentors when one of them connected her to an Ibex Tactics coach that they were friend with. After she learned about how our company helps teams build culture, she felt that our services were the perfect fit for her needs.
Part II. Understanding The Science Of Communication & Group Performance
After speaking with Jane and evaluating what the problems were with her team, we realized that she was going to be the perfect fit for our Tier 3 services. While she had a good introductory understanding of what team chemistry is, she did not have a strategy for how to maintain and enhance her team chemistry. When we dug deeper into her understanding of what culture was, like almost all of our clients she recognized the importance of culture but also had no strategy for how to establish a culture. One particular area within culture that she needed to focus on was developing a better framework around language and communication.
Recently, Jane cited how there was friction between her and her athletes because they were not understanding her “tough love” coaching approach. For the longest time, Jane just assumed that her athletes understood the positive intent behind her messages and saw no reason why her athletes should take things personally. She was especially confused and frustrated now because up until this point, she had never run into conflict with her athletes over her coaching style. All of this was conflicting because she did not want to be in-authentic, but she also wanted to create space for her athletes to express how they felt uncomfortable with her coaching style. We reaffirmed to Jane that she could have the best of both worlds using our Tier 3 system.
Part III. Implementing Tier 3 Communication Strategies For Teams
After completing the initial assessment with Jane, we scheduled our 4 weekly sessions with Jane and her assistant coach to educate them on the Ibex culture pillars system. We typically met with Jane and her coach approximately 2 hours before she began practice with her athletes. Each session lasted about one hour and fifteen minutes. Even though we offered to hold these sessions in-person, Jane wanted to do virtual meetings because of the hectic nature of her schedule, which would allow flexibility to all of us should something change last minute. In each of these sessions, we always established connections as to how our culture pillars system would help her both sustain her “tough-love” culture while also getting more “buy-in” using our tactics. Finally, at the end of delivering our Tier 3 culture pillars system, we gave her a customized tool that she could use
Finally, at the end of delivering our Tier 3 culture pillars system, we gave her a customized tool that she could use to enforce her culture and apply the skills she learned from our service. We then scheduled our standard 2-week follow-up session, where we would evaluate progress that she made to ensure that foundational shifts took place. This session lasted about one hour, and we reviewed all of the questions that Jane had in regard to how she was implementing our tactics. We then used the final few minutes of our follow-up session to explain to her how she could benefit from applying for Tier 2 services and build off the success she created using Tier 3 services. Because Jane was eager to learn more about how we could work with her to customize Tier 2 services to her needs, we had her submit an application to set up an exploration call.
Part IV. The Before & After Result of Using Tier 3 Services For Our Client
Before Jane started working with us, she was experiencing a serious decline in team chemistry. Her athletes started arguing amongst each other more frequently, expressing increased frustration with themselves and teammates over the smallest issues. Her athletes started to make mistakes that were uncharacteristic of them, and even worse athletes started showing up late and missing practices. After she completed Tier 3 services, she reported to us in our follow up call that there was less arguing amongst her team, the athletes seemed to “bond” more with one another and were exhibiting more behaviors that were “supportive” towards each other in high-stress moments.
Many Tier 3 clients are very satisfied with the simplicity of the service, but Jane was hooked and wanted to see if she could increase the “positive intensity” of her team’s chemistry. She spoke with the athletic director of her school and received approval for funding for Tier 2 services as well as financial support from parents to help cover the costs. If you are interested in learning more about Tier 3 services, scroll down below and submit an application form to set up an initial consultation call to see if what we offer is the right fit for your team! We also encourage you to read through the other case studies in Tier 1 and Tier 2 so you can get a sense of what those services are like!
NOTE TO READER:
Alex and Ben wanted to compile their expertise in the Ibex Tactics Case Studies to help teams in the sports and corporate sector better understand how many of the issues they are dealing with are more often than not related to culture. Most teams recognize that culture is an important component of their success, but do not always have the resources or expertise to analyze the complexity of culture. If you are interested in learning more about the services that Ibex Tactics offers to help with culture development, use the contact form below and sign up with your email to receive updates on new services and case studies!
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