Leadership and Communication
The physical benefits of a sport are obvious, but I believe my
hockey career has helped me develop mentally as well. I have come to
realise that the skills I have developed on the field are directly
transferable to many other aspects of my life and will continue to
benefit me in whatever career path I choose. The sport also continues
to provide a perfect environment to increase my skills further. I am
currently in my final year of my degree and as a result am one of the
more senior players in the club. This has given me a platform to use
my experience of hockey to help younger players improve. This was
particularly evident when I was asked to play for the Leicester
university mixed second team. In the first 35 minutes our academy
team had played some great hockey but unfortunately went into the
break 2 goals down. Our team was not working to its strengths and
were unfortunately being completely outnumbered in midfield. Having
realised this, I faced the task of trying to use my knowledge of the
game to determine a solution to this problem and convey it to the
rest of the team in a manner that would inspire them towards a better
result. All the while I had to continue to respect my role and the
authority of the academy team captain.
In an attempt to solve this problem I proposed
the idea of pulling more players back into midfield from attack, and
playing one of the central defenders in a more defensive position. I
ran the suggestion by our captain first before leading the team-talk
and demonstrating both my communication and leadership skills.
Additionally I took the time to talk individually with players who
would be changing their position thereby confirming that they fully
understood their new roles within the team. This method allowed each
player to quickly adapt to our more defensive structure and focus
more on the need for effective positioning. I feel that by targeting
both the team as a whole and as individuals I managed to greatly
improve our performance. Unfortunately we were unable to win the game
but kept a second half clean sheet and reduced the deficit to but a
single goal. More importantly it provided me with an important
indication of how my own leadership skills can be put to good use.
Furthermore it provided me with the confidence to rely on my own
skills and knowledge to boost the effectiveness of those around me.
By communicating my ideas in a confident and clear fashion I was able
to promote a confidence in the rest of my team that pushed them to go
and do better. It is this ability to inspire that is so crucial in a
good leader.
In the future I would like to take on a more permanent
role and play with the academy team more often. This way I would be
in a position to improve my leadership skills further and develop a
better relationship with the team in order to try and tailor my
skills to the individuals around me. Additionally a degree of
permanence would allow me to use my skills on a longer term basis,
helping to improve people skills over the course of a year rather
that just in a single game. Such a position would help to improve
both my confidence and my organisational skills both which are vital
in developing one's ability to lead.
