(This is the final part of my 3 article series on this subject)
I agree that there are exceptions to this
premise; David Moyes' promotion from “little league” management status (Everton) to the big Leagues (Manchester United), has already been
talked about, memed and blogged to death, so I won’t dwell on the topic. What I would
say though (and this might sound trite with the benefit of hindsight) is that many
people were unconvinced from the on-set that David Moyes was truly the right
man for that job. While his Everton side had done creditably well even
finishing in European places, and while he was hailed as a good manager of very
little resources, there were better managers, like his Everton replacement, Roberto Martinez and Swansea’s Michael Laudrup, both of whom had impressed even more
over a shorter period of time doing great exploits with even smaller teams,
with nowhere near the same level of pedigree that Everton had. If anything Moyes seemed to condemn Everton, a former
great of the English game, to ten years of mediocrity, saddling them with the
satisfaction that they maintained their Premier League status season after
season without aspiring to anything of meaning, including the FA or League Cup.
The tragedy of Moyes’ appointment is that Sir
Alex Ferguson failed his succession planning test. He had a significant number
of assistant coaches, many of whom went on to manage teams in their own right,
and sadly, he wasn’t able to groom a single one of them to take on his old job.
Personally I like Barcelona’s Louis Enrique; I was a great fan of his when he played
for Barcelona and for Spain (For the
record, I do NOT like FC Barcelona: if
they were the last team on the planet I’d just watch netball). But much as I
admire Lucho, I truly question his “great” coaching ability. His time at Roma was a mess and still sticks like a trapped
fishbone in one’s throat. If he had done creditably well there, his eventual
triumph at Barcelona would have felt
slightly, deserved. Like Andres Villas Boas, I feel they had one lucky break too
many and will soon be found out, as Vilas Boas was at Chelsea, but by then it’ll probably be too late or it won’t matter
because he now has “Barcelona coach”
on his CV as well as the medals his team managed to haul in this year.
I’d rather give greater credence to coaches
like Diego Simeone who revived a sleeping Spanish giant in Athletico Madrid and took them to the league title and within 30 minutes
of winning their first ever Champions League title. Or for Roberto Martinez
who’s swashbuckling Everton side did
the double over Manchester United and
the man who he had replaced in the coach’s seat. Or Jurgen Klopp who revived Borussia Dortmund and pulled them to the
summit of the German League two seasons in a row despite stiff competition from
Bayern Munich. In Italy, I admire
Vincenzo Montella who has helped Fiorentina
re-discover their style and swagger on the pitch.
Of this lot, I think only Mourinho truly earns
the title, “special”. His rise from a “smaller” league where he coached three
different teams, to his move to Chelsea,
where he became a household name is well documented. But he fulfills what would
seemingly be my sole criteria for determining who makes a good coach – organic
progression.
I struggle with the idea of an overnight
success.
Imagine the club as a Fortune 500 company with the Coach as the CEO. If it’s a
family owned business, it would not be unexpected if the Chairman (and owner)
decides to name one of his children as the CEO’s successor. However, the
expectation would be that for that child’s ascension to that senior role to be
well received, it usually has to be progressive. Many families (and businesses)
have by now mastered the art of “grooming” their children for senior
management. In fact I believe that some of the leadership programs utilised by
multi-nationals like GE and Ericsson, stem from this approach. The
young heir apparent starts off in a lowly position in a lowly department,
learns the ropes of the business and moves from one department to another
getting better insight into the family’s business. As he moves about he also
gets handed increasing amounts of responsibility until he is deemed to be ready
to take on the mantle of leadership.
In a country short on successful stories of
family businesses surviving from one generation to the next, it is with great
pleasure that one is able to point to Diamond Bank, who’s founder and pioneer
CEO was able to see one of his son’s successfully take over the top job in
2014, several years after the father had left the day to day running of the
firm to younger men.
Obviously we like a meteoric rise, stories of
people who rose to the top in one single bound. But the reality is that far too
many are equally looking out and hoping for a spectacular fall from the heady heights to shame,
scandal and infamy.
Why do I champion a more progressive and
organic approach to identifying capable leadership talent and “promoting” them
into higher levels of leadership? It’s about sustainability. The impact of
well-groomed and seasoned coaches on the job is there for all to see. In any
management team, you can always tell who’s been in management roles longest, and
made the most of their time, just by how they react to different scenarios and
manage crises. Andres Villas Boas got fired from Chelsea barely 8 months after he was hailed as the “new Mourinho”.
Lucho Enrique mis-managed Roma so
poorly they were unable to qualify for the Champions League or even mount a
credible title challenge. Barely half a season into his role as Barcelona head
coach, there were already stories of a major rift between him and the team’s
star player and it got to the stage where he was virtually one match away from
being sacked.
Conversely, on the other side of the divide,
Carlo Ancelotti the wise and well-travelled coach of Real Madrid, didn’t feel the need to prove himself to his players,
but invariably he earned their respect and admiration and got the best out of
an unbalanced side. In his first season, the Italian had melded the bunch of
star players into the squad that would finally bring home the elusive 10th
Champions League trophy. In 2006, the silver fox of Italian football, Marcello
Lippi, led a highly underrated Nazionale
to victory at the World Cup. Lippi had garnered experience coaching teams like Juventus, Inter, Atalanta, Napoli, Cesena,
Siena and Sampdoria and this was
brought to bear as he willed his team of underachievers over the finish line.
Need more proof? Luis Aragones (the
cantankerous old man of Spain), led his Spanish national side, Europe’s
perennial underachievers, to their first major senior level victory at Euro
2008. His successor, Vicente Del Bosque, another wily seasoned hand, would go
one further and bring home the top prize in global football, the FIFA World Cup
and in 2012, he’d repeat European success by beating Italy in a thrilling final
game.
As a young man myself, it’s not my intention
to posit that young people be denied the opportunity to aspire to leadership roles.
It’s certainly not my view that young folks can’t aspire to big jobs. But there
is a time tested formula that’s been proven to work. Even in biblical times,
Joseph, David, Daniel, and the Lord Jesus himself all had to wait for their due
time before they could enter into the fullness of God’s ordained ministry for
them. What troubles me is that when this becomes the norm, we may unwittingly
create a sense of entitlement in other young people, and wind up having to
choose from a pool of half-baked young managers who are, incapable of dealing
with the assignments they have received and invariably setting them up for
failure. The resulting effect is that someone may eventually be forced to pull the plug on what is then perceived as a poorly conceived experiment; thus
shutting the door to other potentially better prepared and better suited young
leaders, and denying young leaders, who had taken the time and effort to work
hard, stay relevant and remain prepared. Am I making any sense?
As we seemingly race against the clock of age,
the
21st century has seen the advent of possibly the most entitled
generation of humans there ever will be on the face of this planet. They are
fuelled by an irrational sense of expectation that this world owes them
something. I’m yet to figure out how they came about this conclusion,
but it is high time that someone brought them back to reality, by cutting their
expectations down to size and freeing them from this grand delusion. To allow
them to continue to wallow in this self-centred quagmire, would be to mortgage
our collective future to the hands of "me-first" leaders who’s warped values can
only guarantee one certainty…the mere thought practically makes me shudder.
So what makes a
winning coach? I’d
argue it’s the guy who’s taken the time to hone his skills and develop his
craft. I’d say it’s the guy who believes in the value of providing a first rate
service before worrying what people will pay for that service. I’d
wager that it’s the chap who’s passionate about his job and would rather quit
than have someone rubbish his legacy. It’s the guy who’s taking the time to
build a career and not just seeking to make a name for himself merely for its
sake. For me that’s what makes the professional; the consummate chap whose
arduous preparation sets him up for success.
You don’t have to take my word for
it but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Now tell me; what’s yours?
IamMaverick 25/6-2015 ©
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