Tomorrow is National Be a Good Teammate Day. My favorite day of the year!
Whether your “team” is a sports team, work team, church team, or family, tomorrow is an occasion to recognize and celebrate its selfless members—the ones who consistently put the needs of your team ahead of themselves.
But tomorrow is also an opportunity to take stock of the kind of teammate you actually are.
I have come to appreciate that most people genuinely want to be good teammates. They simply don’t fully understand what that means. And that misunderstanding leads them to overestimate how good a teammate they are and underestimate how much being a good teammate influences their individual success.
Until I began studying the art of being a good teammate, I didn’t realize how often I fell short of the standard.
Self-awareness begins with self-reflection, followed by self-assessment and self-discipline. It requires having the humility to look inward, the curiosity to look outward, and the courage to act on what you discover.
Several psychological tendencies can make this process difficult, even for thoughtful, well-intentioned people, including:
- We don’t always see what we’re missing. Ironically, the less skilled people are in a particular area, the less likely they are to recognize those shortcomings themselves. (The Dunning-Krueger Effect)
- We remember our intentions. Because people give themselves credit for what they meant to do, they often judge themselves more generously than their actions justify.
- We instinctively defend our self-image. Most people want to see themselves as capable, fair, and kind. When evidence suggests otherwise, their first instinct is to look for explanations that preserve their positive self-concept rather than immediately revising it.
- We don’t get honest feedback. Fellow teammates frequently avoid difficult conversations, leaving people unaware of how their behaviors frustrate those around them.
- We let our habits become invisible. The behaviors people repeat every day eventually feel “normal.” Since they require little conscious thought, people stop noticing them, even when everyone else does.
These tendencies create a persistent gap between self-perception and others’ experiences, which is why learning about the art of being a good teammate can be so eye-opening.
Most people aren’t trying to be bad teammates; they’re operating with an incomplete mental model of what good teammates consistently do. Once that model becomes clearer, self‑reflection becomes more accurate because people have a clearer standard by which to evaluate themselves.
Without a clear standard, self-assessment tends to rely on intentions, effort, or comparisons with others instead of observable behaviors and measurable impact.
Tomorrow, my website and social media pages will get millions of visits. While seeing that level of interest makes my heart smile, know that I am equally—if not more—moved by the individual who stumbles upon National Be a Good Teammate Day, pauses, reflects on what kind of teammate they are, and then commits to becoming a better one.
Those instances move me the most. Never forget, one individual choosing to be a good teammate can change an entire team. A committed team working together can change anything.
From our team to yours, happy National Be a Good Teammate Day. Make sure you celebrate tomorrow with some Victory Cake.
As always… Good teammates care. Good teammates share. Good teammates listen. Go be a good teammate.
