Before you build a team. Build this first.

Ouch! That stung…

My first memory of teamwork was a painful one.

Back in 1988, I was left behind by my Football Team Coach. He chose to make room in the car for another teammate - someone he believed would “have more impact in the game.”

I was under 13 at the time, part of an age group defined by varying levels of physical development and confidence - factors that often shaped the outcome of competitive matches more than skill alone.

My personal challenge was confidence.

In training, I trusted myself and delivered consistently. But in competitive matches, my confidence wavered and I was less adventurous - more concerned with not losing, than find a way to win.

So there I was, left on the roadside, watching my teammates drive away. A 30-minute walk home gave me time to feel the embarrassment, shame, and deep disappointment sink in. In that moment, the idea of "team" seemed to evaporate. Like someone had drawn back a curtain and revealed a harsher more gut-wrenching truth: my place in the team was conditional. I wasn’t essential. I was expendable.

Whilst the memory still evokes emotions in me, I recall that it also started my journey to try and understand more about team dynamics; what does a real team look and feel like?

Foundations before team growth

By the time I’d reached college in 1992, I’d also started a home self-study Sports Psychology diploma because I’d taken a role as a Football Coach. The diploma introduced me to frameworks and models for developing team cohesion and goal setting; frameworks like Tuckman’s Stages of Group Development (Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing) were referenced a lot by top Coaches - but when I reflected on my experience at age 13, something didn’t quite fit.

We weren’t professionals. We were kids with a shared goal: to win a string of games and become league champions. What we lacked wasn’t motivation or talent. We lacked something more basic — a foundation.

Looking back, what we needed resembled something closer to Hackman's Model of Team Effectiveness, where key elements emerge either by design or by accident:

• Compelling direction: A shared vision for how we wanted to play — a playing philosophy.

• Enabling structure: Commitment to training and to building real connections between players.

• Supportive context: A willingness to learn and be coached, with the belief that we could improve.

• Shared mindset: Respect for everyone’s contributions, regardless of skill level, and a collective sense of pride in wearing the team shirt.

These are the building blocks that come before Tuckman’s stages. Without them, teams struggle to grow.

Psychological safety: The invisible glue

And that Team Coach? I can't even remember his name or what he looked like. I only remember how he made me feel. In that single moment, he took away something vital: psychological safety.

He showed me that I couldn't count on belonging - that mistakes or inconsistencies might cost me my place. That I’d be judged, even humiliated, rather than supported.

You might assume this experience made me guarded or cynical. But strangely, it had the opposite effect.

It made me intentional. It made me conscious of the way I treat others who want to join my team.

Because long after tactics are forgotten, people remember how we made them feel.