The Head Coach of the Army Crew Team at West Point

Introduction

The case talks about the rowing team at West Point, the United States Military Academy. Rowing is a very technical sport, and specifically a team sport. There are no MVP’s or awards to specific players on the team. The team must work together and be coordinated to achieve greatness. If one tries to stand out, the team will be affected negatively and their time will be decreased. The article states “if one member of the crew suddenly tried to out-perform his teammates in a race, the shell would actually slow down because the rowers would no longer be synchronized (Bingham, 2013).”

The sport is extremely competitive, the winner usually decided by a fraction of a second. The team must work in exact unison to win.

Colonel Stas Preczewski is the head coach of the Army Crew team at West Point. He is one of the best coaches and was in his 9th year of coaching the sport. He had advanced degrees in psychology and a Ph.D. in higher education. He also was as a professor in Behavioral Sciences and Leadership at the university. He created two teams of rowers, the Varsity and the JV. The Varsity team consisted of the strongest, fastest and most talented rowers. They were the best athletes on the team. The JV team consisted of the lower 8 athletes, those who were less talented and strong compared to the Varsity members. The Varsity team having the better athletes should clearly be faster than the JV team, but two thirds of the time JV was beating the Varsity team. This is the problem that Coach P is faced with, and must solve before the National Championship.

Problem Analysis

A problem that identifies itself right in the beginning of the case is its interrelations problems. The Varsity players don’t understand their roles as individuals and what being a Varsity player entails. The Varsity team should be the example in all things to the JV team: in technique, strength and interrelations. They fail to do the later, the players are not cooperative; they blame each other for their shortcomings. Coach P stated they “critiqued each other individually on the details of the practice or race.” They didn’t work together as a team. They focus only on themselves, and not on the organization as a whole. In a team conversation with Coach P one player angrily said “I’ve been carrying this boat alone, I am the only guy working hard on every stroke. I feel I’m out there rowing alone (Bingham, 2013).” Right after that another player exclaimed, “I’m the one carrying the boat” (Bingham, 2013). In rowing working together is essential. No matter how much talent or skill the team has, if the team doesn’t work together, they will never win. The article states “the team needs to be single-minded, which means being attuned to one another with the common