Athlete leadership in sport teams: Current understanding and future directions

Cotterill, Stewart T.; Fransen, Katrien

doi:10.1080/1750984x.2015.1124443

Cited by 108 publications

(124 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…Coaches, for example, need to demonstrate high-quality communication skills in their interactions with players, assistant coaches, club management, and media [8]. Within the team communication is also central to team effectiveness [9, 10], and here athlete leaders (i.e., athletes who occupy a leadership role) have a key role in optimizing communication flow within the team (for a review on athlete leadership, see [11]). Accordingly, an interactionally central position should benefit athlete leaders by facilitating their communication with other team members (both verbally and non-verbally).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Leading from the Centre: A Comprehensive Examination of the Relationship between Central Playing Positions and Leadership in Sport

et al. 2016

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Research aimsThe present article provides a comprehensive examination of the relationship between playing position and leadership in sport. More particularly, it explores links between leadership and a player’s interactional centrality—defined as the degree to which their playing position provides opportunities for interaction with other team members. This article examines this relationship across different leadership roles, team sex, and performance levels.ResultsStudy 1 (N = 4443) shows that athlete leaders (and the task and motivational leader in particular) are more likely than other team members to occupy interactionally central positions in a team. Players with high interactional centrality were also perceived to be better leaders than those with low interactional centrality. Study 2 (N = 308) established this link for leadership in general, while Study 3 (N = 267) and Study 4 (N = 776) revealed that the same was true for task, motivational, and external leadership. This relationship is attenuated in sports where an interactionally central position confers limited interactional advantages. In other words, the observed patterns were strongest in sports that are played on a large field with relatively fixed positions (e.g., soccer), while being weaker in sports that are played on a smaller field where players switch positions dynamically (e.g., basketball, ice hockey). Beyond this, the pattern is broadly consistent across different sports, different sexes, and different levels of skill.ConclusionsThe observed patterns are consistent with the idea that positions that are interactionally central afford players greater opportunities to do leadership—either through communication or through action. Significantly too, they also provide a basis for them to be seen to do leadership by others on their team. Thus while it is often stated that “leadership is an action, not a position,” it is nevertheless the case that, when it comes to performing that action, some positions are more advantageous than others.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Leading from the Centre: A Comprehensive Examination of the Relationship between Central Playing Positions and Leadership in Sport

et al. 2016

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“…To obtain the most reliable measure of leadership quality, we chose to assess a player's leadership quality by taking into account the perceptions of all team members. This procedure is recommended in recent reviews of the field and is preferred to using self‐ratings or to focusing on formal leaders alone (eg, the team captain). Since being a leader does not automatically entail being a good leader (ie, being seen to display effective leadership), we chose to focus on leadership quality .…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Given the potential for athlete leaders to have a positive impact on team success, sports teams are eager to know which individuals display the required and desired characteristics and behaviors to be effective leaders . The present study aims to shed more light on this question by identifying the personality traits and behaviors that distinguish high‐quality athlete leaders from their less able counterparts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…More specifically, both the presence of athlete leaders in the team and their leadership quality have been associated with team members identifying more strongly with their team, being more motivated, and having greater confidence in the team's ability. Furthermore, teams with high‐quality leaders are characterized by greater task and social cohesion, greater resilience when facing setbacks, and ultimately better team performance (for a review on athlete leadership, see Cotterill and Fransen).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Standing out from the crowd: Identifying the traits and behaviors that characterize high‐quality athlete leaders

Fransen

Haslam

Steffens

et al. 2020

Scandinavian Med Sci Sports

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Objectives An emerging body of evidence indicates that, in addition to the coach, athlete leaders within a team are vital for a sports team's success. Sports teams are therefore keen to know which attributes are distinctly characteristic of high‐quality leaders on and off the field. The present study aims to shed more light on this question. Method A wide variety of traits and leadership behaviors was assessed in a sample of 776 athletes, stratified across gender, competitive level, and four sports. The leadership quality of each of the athletes (ie, as task, motivational, social, and external leader) was determined on the basis of the perceptions of teammates using social network analysis. Results Findings revealed that leadership behaviors outweighed personality traits in distinguishing high‐quality leaders from others on and off the field. Providing identity leadership that creates, embodies, advances, and embeds a collective sense of “us” in their teams was found to be a particularly important leadership behavior that characterized high‐quality leaders both on and off the field. Conclusion The fact that leadership behaviors were important predictors of high‐quality athlete leadership (and more important predictors than traits) suggests that leaders are not just born, but can also be made. Our findings therefore highlight the clear need for leadership development programs to target the behaviors that we identified as important predictors of leadership.

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“…As Northouse points out (2015), it is important to conceptualize leadership as a process, but not as a trait or characteristic, occurring in groups and involving influence. Leadership is a fundamental aspect of sports performance, particularly within team sport environments (Cotterill & Fransen, 2016) and has been studied in individual and team sports, in amateur and professional levels and within different age categories for both genders.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Moderation Effect of Athletic Maturity on the Association between Perceived Leadership Behavior and Athlete Satisfaction

Ntomali¹,

Psychountaki²,

Kyprianou³

et al. 2017

IJPS

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Perceived leadership behavior and athlete satisfaction are integral constructs in the multidimensional leadership model. The aim of the present study was to examine the moderation effect of athletic maturity on the association between perceived leadership behavior and athlete satisfaction in synchronized swimming athletes. The sample was comprehensive, as it included all 165 Greek synchronized swimming athletes participating in national championships and elite athletes from the national teams participating in international events. Athletic maturity was classified according to the athletes' category into comen, junior and senior. Athlete satisfaction was measured with Athletes Satisfaction Scale and perceived leadership behavior was assessed with the Leadership Scale for Sports-Perceived edition. The questionnaires were completed at the end of the competitive season at the athletes' training grounds. Results showed that the strength of association between perceived leadership behavior and athlete satisfaction is significantly greater in the senior category as compared to the comen and junior categories. This association proves to be stronger for the dimension of satisfaction with leadership that is adequately explained by the factors of social support and training and instruction. The findings provide support to the notion that athletic maturity is a moderator of the effect of perceived leadership behavior on athlete satisfaction.

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Athlete leadership in sport teams: Current understanding and future directions

Cited by 108 publications

References 56 publications

Leading from the Centre: A Comprehensive Examination of the Relationship between Central Playing Positions and Leadership in Sport

Leading from the Centre: A Comprehensive Examination of the Relationship between Central Playing Positions and Leadership in Sport

Standing out from the crowd: Identifying the traits and behaviors that characterize high‐quality athlete leaders

The Moderation Effect of Athletic Maturity on the Association between Perceived Leadership Behavior and Athlete Satisfaction

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