And the one thing that has become very clear to me over the course of this year, is that our club could be a case study for how not to run an organisation for maximum performance efficiency.
What we have transpiring right now, is a fascinating episode of The Blame Game playing out. One only has to read Tony’s report on this site or comments made by Phil Rothfield on The Daily Telegraph website today. If you didn’t catch them in this blog, here they are again:
“These are the facts. The board has overseen a major restructure of the Leagues and football clubs and embraced a membership drive which has improved finances by $2.5 million a year.
They are not responsible for the sloppy defence, the lack of discipline with the football or the fact the team only won 10 of their 24 games after starting the season as premiership favourites. That's Daniel Anderson's responsibility. The buck stops with the coach. Always has, always will.”
And furthermore:
“The attack on the Parramatta Eels board for signing Cowboys prop Carl Webb is so far off the mark it’s ridiculous. Only one man made the decision to sign Webb – coach Daniel Anderson. Only one man made the decision to release Feliti Mateo – Daniel Anderson. This poor recruitment is the very reason the club rightly made enquiries with Stephen Kearney”
I was introduced to board members on Saturday, who are keen to get their side of the story across. As you saw, Tony was given incredibly frank answers to the questions he was asked. I have no doubt that the board heavily influenced this Phil Rothfield article, as it was exactly the same “messaging” that was supplied to myself and Tony. Now, in itself I applaud transparency. However, I’m not comfortable with the blame games. Right now, there appears to be a concerted effort at shifting all blame to the coach. However, if you read Tony’s comments about his discussions with the coach, it’s an altogether different story.
The board is also very keen to take ownership of the improved financial results - articles now in both the Telegraph and Herald have promoted this fact. However, there is no doubt that the massive increase in memberships came as a result of 1) a greater push by the NRL in general to drive up memberships and 2) Parramatta’s amazing run of success last year that resulted in unprecedented interest and support for the club. So you can quite easily suggest that the coaches performances to get the club to the grand final, has as much impact on the improved financial result as the administration decisions.
As I wrote in comments on Muttman’s excellent blog about the board structure, part of the cost-cutting, which I’m led to believe was necessary to put us back on a firm financial footing, has resulted in more of the strategy and business decisions being made at board level. We have adopted a flatter structure and essentially removed a layer of management from the club’s operations. It is my view the Eels are significantly under-resourced right now, to effectively run an operation of its size and I believe key skillsets and experience is missing.
It’s the first rule of business - get the right people on the bus, before you trying moving forward.
The second rule is to have clear and focused leadership. When Tony comes back reporting that even the players don’t know who is pulling the strings, that is a real problem. With crucial management responsibility devolved upwards to part-timers on the board, a CEO who’s management responsibilities are spread too thinly across the operation, a missing layer of experienced operational manager, a coach who is not regarded for his inter-personal and communication abilities can someone point to me where leadership in the club is coming from.
It’s coming from nowhere, because a real leader at this point steps up to take responsibility for a failed season. Business leaders own their team’s results. You don’t pass the buck down the line.
When a team is well-led, everybody in an organisation knows their roles. There is no dispute over who is responsible for what. From the President down, everybody is clear about the lines of report and what metrics and outcomes they are expected to deliver. This is when people perform at their maximum capability. When there is clear communication between team members about strategy and direction and everyone is pulling towards the same clear, communally agreed-upon directives.
I see none of this at our club right now. From the board down through the playing group, I see individuals who are working towards a loose, ill-defined goal (winning a premiership) without any clear leadership, planning or communication.
The reality is every body involved in the club should be stepping up right now to accept responsibility. The blame game has to stop. The board itself said they had signed off on Daniel Anderson’s recruitment plan mid-season and no CEO should ever pass blame down down the operational ladder, without taking their share of responsibility.
Right now, the club has already shifted into election mode - I fear decisions are being made around what’s going to achieve results next March, rather than what is in the best long-term interest of the club. To be honest, I’m not inspired, or even encouraged, at any level of the clubs operations right now. Which is not to say, I want the board, CEO, coach or players thrown out. I just want to see this club working functionally, because as we saw this year, unless that happens the entire operation is dragged down and it shows out on the field.
To its credit the board is making itself open to answering questions and I intend to take them up on their offer to discuss the concerns Parramatta fans are voicing here and elsewhere at the moment. I don’t want to see the Eels under-perform like we did this year ever again. I want a see a clear, big-picture vision that the entire operation works towards in concert and with maximum performance efficiency.
Replies
It seems here that the board is distancing itself from DA and not fulfilling the role it needs to do in order to create a united operation.
This is sad reading for me as I still believe DA is the right man for the job.
Faerkal (currently in Madrid)....
if not he has a in at the eels board.
muttman says it right and has great brogs.
well done muttman.
but it could be the'' bourban man'' too, or bert kenny,
who ever wrote it, blame one person anderson, he sacked many in the past two years, what i dont like is danials term ,getting rid of dead wood, clean out hes unwanted players, in he's parra future gold plan.
if he wants the eels to perform better, show the players the way.
if mateo was 10 kgs over weight ,and mateo says he needed to train harder ,who's to blame ,the trainers /coaches and mateo.
also anderson once said he was not over keen on islanders, if thats so, why are so many playing for the eels 3 grades, strange comment, that was in 2009.
it now seems he never did like mateo, or inu, he's to blame for them not performing better..
surely its time ando was paid out, the eels need new staff from the top, its not the players who need to go, in the past booted players performed well in other clubs, and maybe mateo and inu will be stars sooner then later..
Seems spot on. Almost like it's noones fault an everyones fault at the same time - hence the 'blame game'.
It is clear to me that there are 2 things which deliver success in that industry. Poker machines and a successful football team. We had both last year and it worked for this year but I think last year brought with it expectation and pressure which noone from Mortimer to caylo and the security at the leagues to Ozzie were experienced enough and ready to handle.
I hope we focus on the little things next year. Richard Branson wrote an article that was published by the brw recently and he talked about how success starts from the welcoming confident smile from the receptionist at the front office! Seems we have some work to do!
There has developed a habit over the past few years where people WILL NOT accept responsibility for their own actions and refuse to be held accountable for same.
It is a poor reflection on our society but none the less quickly becoming the norm.
The improved financial situation at the club can change very quickly - with the team doing so badly this season and the almost incessant bad publicity, how many of the "new" members will renew their membership?
It could reasonably be expected that as much as 80% of new members will NOT renew.
Had we made the finals and survived 1 or 2 games then the expectation could be that 80% WOULD renew.
A CEO with little or no commercial management experience was always going to be a risky proposition - who recruited and installed him?
Ex players lacking business skills but loaded with passion for the team is also another high risk venture.
Change WAS required but not merely for the sake of change.
No structure = no defined leadership = FAIL = 2010 season.
Your last paragraph concerns me greatly 1 Eyed.
Politicians will always tell the masses they will answer questions, then skirt around the issues with their answers in the hope that people think they actually said something significant.
A true manager (leader) will on rare occassions allow emotion to influence some of his/her decisions but invariably he/she will have the ability to OBJECTIVELY asses the issues and act with experienced judgement.
The problem with egos that have been allowed to become over inflated is that they rarely come back to reality.
With that in mind I see no effective changes on the horizon.
This current debacle reminds me of the last years of the saga of "The House that Jack Built"
Only members and fans from the mid/late 1960's would have any idea of what I am saying here.
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