This post is based on a webinar I led focusing on developing a healthy competitive team culture. You can watch that here.

I didn’t grow up in volleyball. Baseball was my sport, and I played nearly everything else you could imagine — football, baseball, basketball, the works. Volleyball, though? That was something I knew only from the occasional pickup game behind the dorms in college, when the sand was too hot and no one really knew what a double was. It wasn’t part of my plan to become a volleyball coach. It just sort of happened.

It started when I began teaching at a school. After school, the volleyball team would be warming up and I would sometimes pepper with them. One day, the athletic director looked over and said, “Hey, you look like you know what you’re doing. Want to coach our middle school team?” Ehh. I wasn’t sure. I had no clue what I was doing. But something in me said yes.

That decision changed everything. What started as a casual after-school commitment turned into a genuine passion. The more I coached, the more I realized that volleyball is one of the most intricate, fascinating team sports there is. Every point is a web of trust, timing, and communication. You can’t hide in volleyball. Every player touches the game, every mistake is public, and every success is shared. I fell in love with that.

Over the years, I became obsessed with one question: how do you build a better team? Not just a team that wins matches, but a team that grows together, competes hard, and develops players who want to keep coming back. I had to figure that out the hard way — through trial, error, frustration, and the occasional miracle rally.

Because I didn’t come from a volleyball background, I had to build everything from scratch. I didn’t have inherited drills or decades of club tradition to lean on. Instead, I had curiosity and a notebook full of mistakes. I started studying how great teams function, not just in volleyball but across sports. I borrowed ideas from baseball and basketball, blended them with my classroom teaching experience, and slowly built systems that worked.

It’s funny to think that my coaching journey began with complete ignorance. But that’s also what made it powerful. When you start without knowing the right way to do something, you pay closer attention to what actually works. You test, you tweak, you listen, and you learn. Coaching volleyball taught me as much about human behavior, leadership, and humility as it did about passing and footwork. And as the seasons went by, I realized I wasn’t just teaching players — I was learning how to coach, how to communicate, and how to build a culture from the ground up.

Finding Your Coaching Philosophy

Every coach needs a compass. Not a playbook, not a clipboard — a compass. Without it, you drift from one season to the next, reacting to problems instead of leading with purpose. That compass is your coaching philosophy.

For me, it took years to articulate mine. Early on, I coached by instinct. I ran drills, gave feedback, celebrated good plays, and corrected bad ones. But something always felt off. I could sense that what I valued most as a coach wasn’t coming through clearly to my players. I hadn’t yet defined why I coached.

When I finally sat down to write my philosophy, it felt like holding up a mirror. Why do I do this? What drives me? What do I actually want for my players? My answer became my foundation: I coach to develop athletes for the next level by reinforcing the fundamentals, using guided discovery to help players learn, and teaching them that mistakes are essential to mastery.

Each part of that statement carries weight.

Develop athletes for the next level doesn’t just mean getting them recruited or placed on a stronger team. It means preparing them to think like competitors, to understand work ethic, and to carry confidence beyond the court. For some, the next level might be varsity. For others, it’s learning to communicate under pressure or lead with humility. My job is to help them get there.

Reinforcing the fundamentals is my constant anchor. I don’t care if they’re 12 or 18 years old, fundamentals win. Serving, passing, footwork, communication — they’re not glamorous, but they separate good from great. I make sure every season includes time to rebuild those basics, even when my players roll their eyes because they think they’ve moved past them.

Then comes guided discovery, which is just a fancy way of saying I ask questions instead of giving answers. I’ll stop a drill and ask, “What do you think this is teaching us?” or “What did you see on that play?” It slows things down, but it creates thinkers. Volleyball is chaotic and fast; the players who can read and adapt are the ones who thrive. I don’t want robots executing commands. I want problem-solvers who understand the why behind every movement.

And finally, mistakes are part of the growing process. I say it until I’m blue in the face: mistakes lead to mastery. If you’re afraid to fail, you’ll never improve. I applaud mistakes that come from effort and aggression. I want my athletes swinging hard, taking risks, and learning from the fallout. A missed serve at 24-24 hurts, but it’s part of the deal. You grow by testing your limits, not by playing it safe.

Once I clarified these values, everything else aligned. My practices had direction. My feedback became more consistent. My players understood not just what I wanted from them, but why I wanted it. Self-awareness, I learned, is contagious. When a coach is clear on their purpose, athletes sense it. It builds trust. It builds culture.

Your philosophy will evolve. It should. Mine still does every season. But it has to start with honest reflection. Ask yourself: why do you coach? What moments make you feel most proud? What do you want your players to take with them when the season ends? Write those answers down. Revisit them often. When the season gets messy — and it always does — that philosophy will remind you who you are and why you’re here.

Building Systems That Keep You Sane

Coaching can feel like chaos disguised as structure. Between scheduling tournaments, emailing parents, managing rosters, and planning practices, the season can spiral fast. That’s why systems matter. Systems are what save your sanity and free you up to focus on what truly matters — coaching.

When I first started, I reinvented the wheel every week. Every email was written from scratch. Every practice plan was a new experiment. Every parent meeting felt like improvisation. It was exhausting. I realized that the best coaches aren’t necessarily the most creative; they’re the most organized. So, I started building systems.

My first step was automating communication. Every message I send during the season — orientation info, tournament prep, post-tournament reflections — now lives in a folder. Each one is a template I can adapt in seconds. I don’t waste mental energy rewriting the same note ten different ways. Instead, I pour that energy into connecting with my players.

The same goes for practice planning. I built a practice template that fits my philosophy. It includes time for fundamentals, time for game-like scenarios, and time for reflection. Having that framework doesn’t make things robotic; it keeps me honest. I can see, in black and white, whether I’m giving players enough reps, enough challenges, and enough chances to learn through failure. It’s my quality control system.

Systems also help when emotions run high. If you’ve coached long enough, you’ve had the practice that spiraled into chaos — players distracted, drills breaking down, parents hovering, everything off rhythm. In those moments, structure brings you back. I know what comes next because I’ve already designed it. My players know what to expect because the routine is consistent. Consistency breeds security, and security breeds focus.

There’s a myth that systems make coaching rigid. In truth, they make you more flexible. When your foundational tasks run smoothly, you have the freedom to improvise where it matters. You can spend an extra ten minutes working through a serving slump without blowing up your schedule. You can have a real conversation with a struggling player without worrying about the admin chaos waiting in your inbox.

Building systems also signals professionalism. Parents trust a coach who runs an organized program. Players respect a coach who always seems one step ahead. Organization communicates intention, and intention builds credibility. When you’re consistent in how you lead, your team starts to mirror that discipline.

If you’re new to coaching or rebuilding your process, start small. Create one reusable parent email. Build one practice template. Standardize one drill sequence that you can modify across age groups. The point isn’t to be perfect — it’s to eliminate avoidable stress. Every season will bring enough surprises on its own.

A good system is like a silent assistant. It handles the predictable parts so you can handle the unpredictable ones. When your players see you calm, confident, and prepared, they feed off it. The structure you build off the court sets the tone for what happens on it.

Defining Your Team Culture

Every coach talks about culture, but few define it. Culture isn’t something you announce at the first team meeting; it’s what your team becomes when no one’s watching. It’s how players treat each other during a bad practice, how they respond to a tough loss, and how they show up when it’s 7 a.m. on tournament day. Defining that culture is your responsibility. If you don’t, it’ll form on its own — and you might not like the results.

For me, defining culture starts with four pillars: coaching philosophy, team vision, core values, and a mission statement. Each piece connects to the others like gears in a machine.

Your coaching philosophy is about you — your purpose and principles. But your team vision is about them — what you see this group becoming together. Early in the season, I like to cast that vision quickly. I meet my team after tryouts, congratulate them, and then plant a seed: “Here’s what I think we can achieve if we commit.” Sometimes it’s tangible, like reaching the gold bracket at regionals. Other times it’s character-based, like becoming the hardest-working team in the gym. Either way, the vision gives direction.

Then come the core values. These are the nonnegotiables that hold your team accountable when the excitement fades. Commitment. Effort. Respect. Integrity. These aren’t just words for a poster. I explain what they look like in action. Commitment means showing up early and staying engaged. Effort means giving your best even on off days. Respect means no eye-rolling, no gossip, and no disrespect toward refs or opponents. When values are clear, discipline becomes simple — you don’t need punishment when the standard is self-evident.

And finally, the mission statement. This one might sound like fluff until you use it every day. Mine is simple: We will work hard at all times, not just for ourselves, but for each other. Every player on my team can recite it because we say it every practice. It’s not a slogan; it’s a reminder. When I see effort dip, I ask, “Are you working hard for yourself, or for your teammates?” That question realigns the group faster than any timeout.

Culture doesn’t survive without communication. I make sure parents know our mission and values too. I send an orientation email summarizing what we discussed and why it matters. It sets the tone that our program is about growth, respect, and shared effort — not just medals. Parents become allies instead of obstacles when they understand the culture you’re building.

The biggest trap coaches fall into is thinking they can talk about culture once and be done. It doesn’t work like that. Culture is maintenance. It’s revisiting the same ideas in new moments: after a tough loss, before a big tournament, during a midseason slump. You can’t let it collect dust. Every time you reinforce it, you strengthen the foundation.

A team’s culture is like gravity — invisible but undeniable. It pulls everyone toward a shared standard. When it’s strong, players hold each other accountable before you ever need to step in. When it’s weak, chaos fills the gap. Define it, communicate it, and live it. That’s how your team becomes more than just a collection of athletes. It becomes a program.

Communicating Culture and Getting Buy-In

You can have the clearest philosophy and strongest culture in the world, but if you don’t communicate it, it’s just theory. A coach’s vision doesn’t live on a whiteboard; it lives in the words, actions, and habits that echo through the season. Communication is where culture becomes real.

Too many coaches introduce their expectations at orientation, then assume everyone remembers. They won’t. By midseason, the details blur. If you only talk about culture once, you’re not leading a program—you’re delivering a speech. The fix is simple: communicate early, clearly, and often.

After tryouts, I start casting the vision right away. That first conversation matters. It sets the emotional tone. I don’t bury players in rules or logistics—I talk about what we’re going to build together. Then, at orientation, I go deeper. I want players and parents there, because both groups shape the culture. Parents can be your greatest ally or your biggest obstacle depending on how well they understand your mission. I send a follow-up email that same night summarizing our values, expectations, and goals. I include a link to our mission statement and core values document. That transparency builds trust before the season even begins.

Once the season starts, I keep culture front and center. My team recites our mission statement at every practice: We will work hard at all times, not just for ourselves, but for each other. Saying it together reinforces that this isn’t my idea—it’s ours. When effort dips or tension rises, I reference it. One question—“Are you working hard for yourself or for your teammates?”—usually realigns them instantly. Culture doesn’t need to be shouted; it just needs to be repeated.

I also embed culture into written communication. Every tournament prep or recap email includes a short note at the bottom revisiting our core values. Something like: Remember, we respect opponents, we play with intensity, and we control what we can control. It’s a quiet but steady reminder. Parents see it, players read it, and everyone stays anchored.

The key is explaining the why behind everything. Players don’t buy into slogans—they buy into purpose. If they know why we’re doing a drill, why we emphasize communication, or why we celebrate mistakes, they engage differently. It’s not busywork anymore; it’s meaningful. And when athletes feel that meaning, effort follows.

Player buy-in is the holy grail of coaching. Once you have it, everything else flows. You can’t force it, though—you have to earn it. I get buy-in by involving players in defining what commitment, respect, and effort look like. I use a simple Google form at the start of the season asking questions like: What does it mean to be a good teammate? What does working hard look like to you? Then, at the next practice, I read their answers aloud. Those become our definitions, not mine. Later in the season, when behavior slips, I can hold them accountable to their own words. “You said this mattered to you—are you still living it?” That hits deeper than any lecture.

The more ownership players have, the stronger the culture becomes. When they help define the team’s standards, they protect those standards. That’s buy-in at its best. It’s not obedience—it’s commitment.

Culture communicated well doesn’t feel like a sermon. It feels like alignment. Everyone—coaches, players, parents—knows what the program stands for, how it behaves, and what it values. You can’t control every scoreboard, but you can control the standard your team represents every time it walks into a gym.

Player Development and Mental Toughness

Player development is the heartbeat of any good program. Wins are temporary, but growth lasts. Every drill, conversation, and decision in a season either builds players up or holds them back. The challenge is finding the right balance between pushing hard and supporting growth, between competition and compassion.

When I think about player development, I go back to my core belief: volleyball is a sport of repetition, randomness, and resilience. The best way to train is to give athletes plenty of reps, expose them to game-like situations, and treat mistakes as milestones, not failures.

Every practice I run is designed with that in mind. I want as many contacts as possible—serve, pass, set, hit, repeat. Reps create rhythm and rhythm creates confidence. But it’s not just about volume. The quality of reps matters more than the quantity. I make sure players understand the why behind what they’re doing. We talk about decision-making, angles, timing, and intent. When a player understands why a drill matters, they invest in the outcome.

Volleyball is also a game of randomness. You can’t script it. Balls hit the tape and dribble over. A perfect dig ricochets off a shoulder. A serve that was flawless yesterday suddenly sails long. The best players adapt quickly to chaos. That’s why I incorporate drills that mimic unpredictability—broken plays, oddball scenarios, or imperfect sets. I’ll stop practice and ask, “What did you see there? What should we have done differently?” That’s guided discovery in action. They’re not just learning skills; they’re learning how to think under pressure.

And then there’s the role of mistakes. Coaches who treat mistakes like crimes destroy confidence. I tell my players outright: I want you to make mistakes—as long as they come from aggression, not apathy. A missed swing is fine if it came from a full commitment. A lazy half-swing? That’s what I’ll address. My goal is to make failure feel like feedback. When you remove fear, players start experimenting. They find new ways to score, new ways to lead. That’s where real progress happens.

Mental toughness ties all of this together. It’s the invisible skill that separates teams that crumble from those that claw back. But toughness isn’t about being emotionless—it’s about being composed. I teach players that nerves and doubt aren’t weaknesses; they’re signals. You can use them. When a player misses a serve, I’ll ask, “What’s your next thought?” If they say, “Don’t miss again,” I’ll correct them: “No. Your next thought is where to place the next one.” Direct your mind forward, not backward.

One of my favorite parts of the season is hearing how players talk about their growth at the end. I ask them to reflect—what did you learn about yourself? What advice would you give to next year’s team? Their answers always surprise me. Some talk about trusting teammates, others about letting go of perfection, and a few about learning to communicate under pressure. Those reflections tell me the culture worked. They’re not just better players; they’re better people.

Every coach wants a tough team. But real toughness isn’t born in the weight room or the scoreboard—it’s built in the small daily choices: showing up on a bad day, owning a mistake, celebrating a teammate’s success, and responding with focus instead of frustration. You can’t demand mental toughness; you have to cultivate it.

Player development isn’t about creating stars. It’s about creating competitors who love the game enough to endure its difficulty. When athletes learn to embrace the mess—the bad passes, the shanked digs, the hard losses—they discover the joy in improvement. That’s the kind of development that lasts far beyond the season.

Building Leaders

Leadership isn’t an accident. It doesn’t just appear when your team needs it most; it’s something you intentionally build, nurture, and model every day. The strongest teams I’ve coached didn’t rely on one loud voice—they thrived because leadership was shared across the roster.

I believe every player can be a leader, but not every player leads the same way. Some do it vocally, some lead by example, and others lead through quiet consistency. My job is to identify those tendencies early and help each athlete grow into their natural leadership style.

That starts with conversation. Early in the season, I talk with my players about what leadership actually looks like. It’s not bossing people around or giving motivational speeches. It’s responsibility. It’s influence. It’s how you respond when things go wrong. I tell them, “If you want to lead, start by doing the small things right—show up on time, stay engaged, lift your teammates, and own your mistakes.” Those habits earn respect long before titles do.

Still, I’m a big believer in team captains. Captains act as a bridge between me and the players. They carry the team’s voice into my office and carry my expectations back into the huddle. But I don’t just hand them the title; I train them for it. Once a month, I meet with my captains to talk about what’s happening in the group—what they’re seeing, what I might be missing, how they’re handling conflict. Sometimes they share frustrations; sometimes they share ideas. Either way, they learn that leadership is a skill, not a crown.

The most rewarding thing is watching captains use my words in their own huddles. It’s a surreal mix of pride and responsibility. I’ve overheard players quoting our mission statement or echoing a lesson I taught months earlier. It’s a reminder that they’re always listening, even when I think they’re not. What I say becomes what they say—so I choose my words carefully.

But captains aren’t the only leaders I develop. Every player gets leadership moments. I’ll rotate who runs warm-ups, who leads film review discussions, who gives feedback during a drill. Leadership becomes part of practice, not just a title. When you create that environment, even your quietest player starts to find their voice.

The payoff shows up in tough moments. When we’re down by ten or struggling through a long tournament day, I can see the culture at work. Captains pull the team together, remind them of our mission, and get everyone refocused before I even open my mouth. That’s the dream—not a team that depends on my energy, but one that generates its own.

Leadership isn’t about hierarchy. It’s about ownership. When your players feel responsible for the team’s energy, effort, and behavior, you no longer have to micromanage. They hold each other accountable. They take pride in the standard. That’s when you know you’ve built something sustainable.

A coach’s ultimate goal is to make themselves less necessary. When leadership becomes woven into the fabric of your team, you’ve done more than teach volleyball—you’ve prepared young people to lead in life. That’s the kind of impact that outlasts every season.

Conclusion

Every season begins with new faces, new hopes, and the same big question: how do you build something lasting? After years of learning through mistakes, experiments, and a lot of late-night reflections, I’ve realized that coaching volleyball isn’t really about volleyball. It’s about people.

The sport is just the setting where character, effort, and teamwork collide. Every serve, every mistake, every timeout becomes a mirror reflecting who we are and what we value. Winning is great, but it’s temporary. Growth—that slow, stubborn, beautiful process of becoming better—is what sticks.

When I started, I was just trying to figure out rotations and how to run a middle. Now, I think about something deeper. I think about how to create a culture where kids learn to lead, take ownership, and believe in their own potential. I think about the parent who watches their child light up after making a tough serve. I think about the player who starts the season afraid to speak and ends it running the warmup huddle. Those moments are the real trophies.

If there’s one lesson I’ve learned, it’s that progress starts with clarity. Know why you coach. Define what your team stands for. Communicate your vision again and again until it lives in the habits of your players. Build systems that save your energy for what matters—people, not paperwork. And don’t be afraid to let players share ownership of the culture. Their buy-in is your program’s engine.

As the new club season begins, remember that culture doesn’t happen by accident. You have to design it, teach it, and protect it. Some days will test your patience. Some players will challenge your resolve. You’ll lose matches you thought you should win and win matches you didn’t see coming. But if you’ve built your program on trust, effort, and growth, every season—no matter the record—will be a success.

Coaching is humbling because it never ends. There’s always something to refine, some player to reach, some lesson to learn. That’s what keeps it alive. You’re not just shaping athletes; you’re shaping how they think, how they handle pressure, how they respond to failure. The wins fade, but those lessons follow them everywhere.

So as you head into another season, carry this with you: you don’t need perfect players or perfect plans. You just need a clear purpose, consistent communication, and the courage to stay the course when things get messy. Build a culture that values growth over glory, and the rest will take care of itself.

That’s what I’ve learned since that day the athletic director said, “You look like you know what you’re doing.” I didn’t. But I said yes anyway. And that yes led to the most rewarding education I’ve ever had—the education of a coach still learning, still growing, still chasing the next better version of himself and his team.