Pre-season checklist - team meeting
A new season is knocking on your door and it’s time to get everything ready to hit the ground running.
This week we will dive into some things you should get through early on so that you can focus on your athletes and their work.
Today we will talk about organizing a team meeting as well as what should be included in it.
Team meetings
A well thought through teem meeting with a defined agenda can help you create a draft for what can become an awesome season. In it, you should discuss everything that is important to your staff and volunteers.
Introductions
Every new season has the potential to bring in some new people that will help your club move forward. It can be a new coach, the collaboration with a nutritionist or physio, or someone else who is going to be part of your core team.
It’s always a good idea to introduce those people to everyone in your team before the season starts since this is the most peaceful time of the season for you and your staff.
This is also a good place to review the last season once more and identify things that went well but also stuff that will need some improvement. Now that everyone is back in the game it’s a good time to have an honest discussion before turning your sights on the new season.
Coaching approaches
New coaches might bring in a new coaching philosophy or approach that can introduce a new way of working with your athletes. A pre-season team meeting is the perfect place to discuss new approaches and see how each of your staff can complement each other.
It’s better to have a more thorough discussion now than to have ad-hoc corrections along the way.
Goals and expectations
The start of a new season is like a blank canvas where you can add the general outlines regarding your expectations and goals.
You might want to hit a specific count of members by a certain date, a number of races you want to attend, or define results which you would like your athletes to achieve.
These goals and expectations will then be the guiding light for how you will program the rest of the season when it comes to workout scheduling, social media activity, or something else that will help you achieve your goals.
Volunteer needs
Your main goal should always be to do most of the work that will bring the highest impact for your club. Everything else should be delegated to someone else. There are a lot of people who will help you out and it’s important to get them on board early in the season.
This will free up your time and let you focus on the tasks with the biggest impact while the rest can feel like going on auto-pilot.
These are just some of the things you can put on the agenda for your team meeting. Whatever you think is important to the success to your club and you feel like you could benefit from input from other team members, add them to the meeting.
It doesn’t have to be too formal. A meeting in a bar, a backyard barbecue, or a quick meeting at your HQ can all server as an ideal place for your team meeting. The only thing you have to make sure is that the communication is open and honest so that you can get the best possible start into a new season.
