Marketing
Issue No. 44 - December/January 2008
What footy can teach marketers
by Dr David Corkindale and Dr David Corkindale
Football management, whether it is the AFL or soccer, can be a model for the post-industrial business enterprise where talent is the key ingredient.
Talented marketers are going to be even more necessary in the more difficult business climate ahead, but talent alone is not enough: talent has to be managed well.
For some years it has been fashionable among management writers to promote the idea that hiring talent at all levels is the secret to business success. Some business consultants maintain the top 20 talented people raise operational productivity, profit or sales revenue significantly more than the average employee. This has led to a belief that if you have enough stars you will win and all you have to do is turn them loose and they’ll deliver for you. So, money to lure the ‘best’ talent was found. However, the people at Enron followed this as did Wall Street’s merchant banks, which have recently gone bust.
Also, there are many examples of well-managed groups without ‘name’ talent which have outperformed more illustrious rivals; Adelaide United’s success in beating teams with more stars and lots more money is a classic.
So, having or attracting talent adds little value, and can even destroy value, if you do not have systems in place to make the most of the resource. It is how you manage talent that is most crucial. This is where football can teach us what to do. Sir Richard Greenbury, when he chaired the famous Marks & Spencer retail enterprise, referred to Man United manager, Sir Alex Ferguson as the best man-manager in British industry.
Football as the model
Football management has long appreciated the link between people management, performance and results. Guus Hiddink firstly guided South Korea to fourth place in the soccer World Cup in 2002, then got Australia to a place in the finals in Germany in 2006, for the first time in decades. Hiddink and other successful managers clearly know how to mana...
