Being on the Team vs. Being a Teammate

[Thoughts NOT just for athletes….]

- Compiled by John Leonard from InSideOut Coaching by Joe Ehrmann

• Being on the team benefits your personal goals and ambitions.
• Being a teammate benefits the goals and ambitions of your team and your teammates.

• Being on the team can make you a bystander.
• Teammates intervene in the lives and actions of their teammates.

• Being on the team involves personal effort.
• Being a teammate involves the efforts of every player.

• Being on the team means doing what is asked of you.
• Being a teammate is doing whatever is needed for the team to succeed.

• Being on the team can involve blaming others and making excuses.
• Being a teammate involves accepting responsibility, accountability, and ownership of the team's problems.

• Being on the team makes you "me-optic," asking what's in it for me?
• Being a teammate makes you "we-optic," asking what's in it for us?

• Sometimes players on the team are drawn together by common interests;
• teammates are drawn together by a common mission.

• Sometimes players on a team like one another;
• teammates respect one another.

• Sometimes players on a team bond together because of a shared background or compatible personalities;
• teammates bond together because they recognize every player is needed to accomplish the goal of the team.

• Sometimes players on a team are energized by emotions;
• teammates energize one another out of commitment.

[Editor’s Note:  When I was a swim parent (and not coaching at the time) I always felt like I was part of the team… but in retrospect, this article reminds me I wasn’t always a good teammate.  I wish I had thought about it a little more back then.  Guy Edson]