Team Recovery: Moving Past a Hardship

During the cheer year, your team may experience a hardship. Maybe the coach left mid-season; maybe the captain resigned; maybe a cheerleader quit the team (or was even suspended or kicked off). If your team suffered a shift in leadership or team members, it’s important to not let the change affect your team’s performance for the rest of the season. By knowing how to recover, you can move on and learn from the situation to come back out on top. Don’t take it personally. It’s hard, but if someone leaves the team, try not to take it personally. It will only negatively affect your team’s spirit and confidence. Remind yourself that cheer isn’t for everyone and that’s not anyone’s fault! Don’t dwell on the past and focus on moving forward. Don’t gossip. If someone left the team on a bad note, don’t gossip about that person. Your team will get buried in drama and negativity if you start bringing up everything you didn’t like about her or him. While many people do this as a way to cope with hurt feelings, your team should instead be focused on your routine! Learn from the incident. Whatever happened and regardless of whose “fault” it is, everyone can learn from the situation. Did someone leave because they were being bullied? Did someone have a personal problem with the coach? If possible, find out the reason why the person left. If it’s because of a team issue, talk about how such an incident can be prevented in the future. Check out our free eBook The Cheerleading Guide to Surviving Mid-Season Leadership Changes, which has advice and tips for coaches, parents, and cheerleaders. Have a long, intimate chat. In order to fully recover, a team should come together for a chat, with the coach and/or captain facilitating the discussion. Encourage teammates to open up about how they feel about the new changes and what would help them move on. The worst thing you can do is to ignore the situation and act like it never happened. Put all emotions out on the table. Then, everyone should agree to move past the incident after the meeting. Get extra spirited. What’s a great way to fight negativity? Spirit! Start off cheer practice with some spirited exercises or chants. If it’s football or basketball season, think of new ways to incorporate cheers into your routines. Work on team bonding. A necessity for recovery is to take a day or a few hours to work on re-bonding your team. Replace a practice session or schedule a Saturday where the entire team gets together. You can do anything from team building activities to a fun outing at the zoo. Whatever you choose to do, make sure everyone attends. A fun outing will remind everyone that they aren’t just a team; they’re a family! Has your team ever had to recover from a bad situation? How did your team pump up the spirit?