Leadership Research Summary:
- There seems to be some initial evidence that team captains are selected based on non-leadership factors such as team tenure, technical abilities, being the daughter of the club president, or playing position. This is concerning since players expect their ideal team captain to have superior motivational and social skills. Adding to this literature on captain selection, the present study investigates relationships between the reasons for which team captains are selected and their (a) perceived leadership quality; and (b) perceived acceptance.
- To accomplish this, we recruited 450 coaches and 198 players from Flemish football and volleyball teams. Participants evaluated 41 reasons on the extent to which they played a role in the selection of their team captain. Additionally, participants rated their team captain’s leadership quality and level of acceptance. The results consistently indicated that captains who were selected for having good motivational and social competencies were given higher ratings on perceived leadership quality and acceptance by participants. In conclusion, athletes who are motivated, good at motivating others and have superior social skills tend to be better suited for captaincy than those selected based on non-leadership factors.
Leadership Research Implications and Findings:
- First and foremost, the study suggested that selectors should choose team captains based predominantly on their motivational and social skills (i.e., interpersonal skills). Furthermore, based on the results of this study, other pertinent reasons for captain selection that should be taken into consideration depending on the needs of the team are having excellent insights in the game, being a representative of the team and taking the lead in organizing team activities.
- For example, in a season when a team may require more task-related guidance, selectors might appoint a team captain who has excellent insights in the game (i.e., task leadership qualities) in addition to having good interpersonal skills. In order to make this selection, coaches and club management might consider making use of a tool named Shared Leadership Mapping (Fransen et al., 2020b).
- This tool relies on a technique known as Social Network Analysis and can help selectors identify key leaders in the team with respect to different leadership roles (e.g., task, motivational, social and external). Moreover, Social Network Analysis is grounded in the perception of players rather than that of selectors. It therefore increases the likelihood that the identified leader will be accepted by team members, thus, maximizing the leader’s effectiveness. Second, based on the study findings, we also recommend that selectors do not appoint team captains by virtue of central playing position and superior athletic skill.
- Finally, the study emphasized that in order for team captains to be considered high-quality leaders (in general as well as on the four leadership roles) and to be accepted by their team members, they need to express a wide range of leadership behaviors ranging from task-related guidance to good interpersonal skills. This begs the question, does the expertise required from team captains today exceed the potential of a single individual? Indeed, as we mentioned in the introduction, Fransen et al. (2014b) found that only 1% of team captains were seen as the ‘best’ leader on all four leadership roles. Therefore, in addition to selecting a team captain with superior leadership skills, coaches and club management should consider selecting a leadership team consisting of multiple leaders performing different roles and responsibilities. Indeed, research on shared leadership has grown in the last decade as its benefits have become more apparent within the sport psychology literature (Fransen et al., 2017).