Creating a Purposed Culture

Good morning, CD.

I realized recently that I’ve been part of this community for a long time. It’s odd being the coach of a rookie team again and one of the things that I’ve decided to do is try and be much more purposed in how this team develops.

I know everyone is busy building and designing. If you have a moment, though, I’d like to get some opinions on how someone can develop a purposed culture within your team. The culture of my last team developed over the course of ten years and I’m sorry to say that it was largely developed organically as mentors and students came and went. The flaw in this design is that it is very easy for a culture to turn caustic when you get a parent/mentor/coach/student who stands against the current norms. It took only two years of an overbearing parent to destroy the family that I had built and had to rebuild.

Team manuals are great. We had one. Core Values, Mission Statements, Vision Statements - they are all necessary to a focused organization; but when you get into the nitty gritty of it. . . how do you establish the heart culture, the tribal culture that can hold a team through the good and the bad.

Thoughts?

Best -
Daniel

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Although I am by no means an expert, I can say that back in my FRC days, the most important thing that I felt was that the coaches/mentors were as enthusiastic about FIRST as the students, if not more so. It made it seem ‘okay’ for me to also become excited, which led to motivation to learn, along with a general sense of energy. Also, focusing on the details and small(er) things there were to do helped me and others feel like we were really learning useful skills.

Lastly, nobody turns down free food :slight_smile:

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On our team, we have no manual, but we have grown close because most of us have been on the team for years and years and love what we do there and the people. We have become great friends through school, and the crazy hours at the workshop. These friendships lead to each person wanting to do their best for the team and their teammates. I know thats not a lot of help, but I would try and help facilitate tight friendships across different ages, and among people of the same age.

Also, as stated before, free food.

Culture in any organization is heavily influenced by leadership. People will instinctively mirror the behaviors of respected peers (and especially) leaders, as most people want to conform rather than rebel. Positive culture is a massive soft power productivity boon to any organization.

For better or for worse, organizational culture has a lot of inertia to it, and cannot be instantly changed overnight. For correcting negative culture and conducting “station-keeping” on maintaining an existing positive culture, leadership will need to slowly and consistently keep nudging it into the proper direction with a few clearly defined goals. Leadership must always conduct themselves in the way that they would like to be mirrored by everyone else in the organization.

Here’s a great article that goes into a lot more depth on the subject:

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This, I think, is key.
Every season, revisit this with the entire team. Determine what the team goals are. Do they want to win state? Do they want to make it to playoffs? Do they want to play M:TG and eat pizza? Do they want to be recognized in the school?
Once a direction for the team is established, come up with specific action and behavior items that will lead to these goals. It may be worthwhile to re-adjust at kickoff, making the team’s trajectory match the game and how it lends itself to the team’s perceived strengths.

If you’re worried about your team’s positive culture being eroded over time/by unpleasant individuals, I think there’s two things you can do to protect it:

  • Talk about the team culture. At the beginning of the school year, at the beginning of the build season, at the parent meeting, when a new mentor is thinking about joining the team, etc. Highlight the few most important aspects, and include specific examples. Be very clear about the behavior you expect from all members of the team - students, mentors, and parents alike.
  • Call people out when they speak or act in a way that goes against those expectations. These can be very gentle suggestions/corrections, or more firm ones, depending on the person and what they’re doing (and whether you’ve talked to them about it before). Truly serious issues should be handled by someone with authority (such as the lead mentor); up to and including asking the problem person not to come back. Ultimately, the only way to keep team culture from eroding is to stand up for it.
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I am by no means a leadership guru, but I did give this talk on Goal Setting at last year’s Capital City Classic. It might help in the process of Goal Setting in an FRC context.

Best,

-Mike

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