I have now been a member of the FLS programme for 3 months. In that time, I have met with my mentor Vic Luck on 2 occasions alongside having continuous email correspondence. In our first meeting, Vic and I outlined clear objectives that I wanted to get out of the programme. These were that I wanted to gain a better understanding of what it was to be a great leader. I wanted to be a leader who inspired others to lead and I wanted to learn how I could be the driving force behind that. I also wanted to gain a better understanding of how and why I currently lead in the way that I do and what improvements could be made to my on court contribution but also to my life away from the court within my role at my law firm.
Vic was able to provide me with a detailed philosophy behind the programme and introduce me to the 360 review tool. He encouraged me to ask my peers within my team as to how they view my leadership and what improvements did they think I could make personally in my role as Captain to guide the team. Following the meeting I distributed questionnaires to my team mates asking them to be as honest, open and as frank as possible in their evaluation. I found the feedback invaluable. It allowed me to see whether the way in which I viewed my leadership was actually in fact being received positively by my team mates in practice. Vic also came down to a game to watch my leadership in action. This was then followed up by a feedback session alongside my Head Coach. I found this particularly helpful as it gave a full circle approach. We were able to talk about his observations from the game but my Coach was able to provide input as to my behaviours and contributions on a daily basis. This provided a 'full circle' approach. From Vic, my Head coach and my team mates feedback, I have developed some action steps over the next few months to continue my journey of 'leading' with purpose and my goal of always striving to be better as we continue our quest for the Netball Superleague Championship title.