STAGES OF TEAM BUILDING

Hey guys it's Kenz again! Today I am going to be talking about the four stages of team building and how they apply to my life.  The first stage is forming. Forming is when the team first comes together and some are excited and some are anxious.  This is like the first gathering where not everyone really knows eachother.  The example I am going to be using today is my experience on my high school volleyball team.  Each year there are always new people who try out and of course the new freshman.  At the beginning of each new season, there is a lot of forming going on.  Everyone is trying to get to know everyone and many of us feel very excited and positive.
The next stage is the storming phase.  After the first week of volleyball, storming always seems to sneak in there and take place.  Everybody seeks out eachothers strengths and weaknesses and we soon start to compare ourselves and our skill.  We all do things our own way right? Well being on a volleyball team, we needed to learn how to compromise and use everyones skill in the right manner.  There was a lot of conflict and arguing that went on during this stage that really disconnected us as a team.
The next stage I am going to discuss is norming.  The norming phase is when we start to realize that arguing and being disrespectful isn't getting us anywhere.  In volleyball, we weren't improving at all when all we did was agrue and compare and we realized that when we were on the court losing.  We decided that when we put aside our differences and came together as a team with unity we got much farther on the court.  This required all of us to gain positive attitudes and to encourage our teammates around us.
The last stage that I'm going to talk about it the performing phase.  This is definately one of the most important stages.  This stage occurs when your team has unified and you act as one.  In this stage you gain respect for your teammates and authorities.  Its much easier and more fun to be apart of a team when you have reached this stage.  When my volleyball team reached this stage after several months, we started to win games and had fun while doing it.  I love being apart of a team and feeling welcomed.  This stage is definately the key to success.
Those are the four stages of team building my friends so I hope you enjoyed!