The Manager: Inside the Minds of Football's Leaders

by Carson, Mike

  2. Steel:

  The master of steel builds loyalty through clarity and objectivity, makes good decisions with clear rationale but without apology, takes time in the high-pressure environment to get to the clarity and holds fast to his deeply held beliefs.

  There are no hard-and-fast rules for what the mix is. Instead, the leader needs to see it like a graphic equaliser. With sound, the settings are adjusted to give the right effect for the music, the venue, the audience and the occasion. With leadership, the context is defined by the organisation and its values: the business challenge (the competing needs of task, team and individual), the person involved (does he prefer a gentle approach to feedback, or does he value head-on confrontation) and the natural style of the leader himself.

  Individual managers will also have their own preferences. Leaders are unique too, and have a bias toward empathy or steel. The best ones can dial up either dimension when needed. Gérard Houllier says of himself, ‘I think I’m tough, but I’m a loving person – and you need tough love to win. I can be extremely ruthless, but at the same time I can be extremely generous, indulgent and patient.’ Ancelotti is high on empathy – but there is real steel. Sir Alex is high on steel – but there is real empathy. This is a case of ‘both-and’, not ‘either-or’. No leader will deliver real success without mastering the two.

  CHAPTER THREE

  BEHIND THE SCENES

  THE BIG IDEA

  Time spent on the field is short. How players live their lives off the field – what they believe and how they behave – shapes them as people and ultimately determines the quality of their performance. Players of integrity build great reputations for themselves and their clubs.

  Creating the environment for success is an essential component of a leader’s role. Being able to engage with people one-to-one is, of course, a part of the answer, but there is more to it than that. Having set a vision, a leader needs to ensure his people have a fighting chance of fulfilling it. He needs to address his team’s behaviours since right behaviours will assist on the journey where poor ones won’t. Deeper than that, he has to establish some values which will help his people become self-determining. Deeper still, he may have to address some human needs or risk losing his people along the way.

  These are important issues for leaders. Employees and even directors leave businesses when their basic needs are not being met – sometimes with serious consequences for the organisation and those who remain. Players leave clubs when they are not playing – their need for growth and for belonging is not being met.

  Great football managers meet their players at all these levels. It is a rare skill indeed.

  THE MANAGER

  In the world of football, the name of Arsène Wenger stands for consistency and quality. An eight-year playing career in France included a league title with Strasbourg in 1978–79, but it is in football management that he has really found his purpose. He made his mark during eight years at Monaco, where he built a reputation for developing young talent and led the club to a league title and cup victory. He left the club in 1994, wanting to broaden his horizons, and sought new experience in Japan, where he led Nagoya Grampus Eight to league and cup trophies.

  In 1996, after the departure of Bruce Rioch, Wenger was offered the manager’s role at Arsenal. Seventeen years later, he has established himself as the club’s longest-serving and most successful manager ever. Before Wenger’s arrival at Highbury, Arsenal had finished in the country’s top four places on 16 occasions. In the subsequent 16 seasons, Wenger has achieved that status every time. He is one of only six managers to win the Premier League, which he has done on three occasions – twice as part of the coveted and still rare league and cup double. Most notably, his team of ‘Invincibles’ in 2003–04 won the title without losing a single match – a feat unprecedented in the modern era. Wenger is the longest-serving manager in the Barclays Premier League. He has an excellent reputation among his peers, who admire him for his breadth of knowledge, strength of mind and commitment to his values.

  His Philosophy

  Wenger is known for many clear principles and beliefs. He is committed to internationalism, to youth, to fairness, to high-quality nutrition, to sustainable transfer and wage policies, to entertaining and attacking football and to the purity of the game. That he should embody such rounded and progressive views is especially notable in the light of his small-town origins. Born in Strasbourg in 1949, he grew up in the village of Duttlenheim, south-west of the city, where his parents owned a spare-parts business for cars and a bistro. The region was still emerging from the pain of the war, and Wenger grew up amidst distrust for internationalism, Europe and Germany in particular. However, the young man had a mind of his own, and an accepting spirit. ‘I was always very curious and when I crossed the border [into Germany] I realised they had the same problems as we did. They wanted to enjoy life, they wanted to be happy; they go to work, they go home, they enjoy life like we do. In this way I got an interest and tried to discover more. I realised no one is completely good or completely bad and everybody wants to be happy in life.’ It would not be until 1994, at the age of 45, that Wenger’s work would take him out of his native France, but he soon showed the greatness of mind and breadth of worldview that would define his Premier League years.

  The Challenge: Individual Behaviours

  In Euro 2012, two sides are believed to have been undone by behaviours. Both were powerful, skilful sides packed with top players. Both were regarded as having a good chance of success at the tournament held in Poland and the Ukraine.

  The power and the danger

  The Dutch national side arrived at the tournament with very reasonable expectations – they had won nine out of ten of their Euro qualifying matches, and had been runners-up in the World Cup of 2010. But they fell at the first hurdle, losing all three of their group games and finishing bottom of their group. Winger Arjen Robben subsequently suggested there had been ‘issues’ in the squad – and that he was not surprised: ‘Of course, there were some internal issues – but we will keep them indoors. We must all look in the mirror.’ From outside the camp, Ronald de Boer, winner of 67 international caps for Holland, was clear on what he believed the ‘issues’ were. He told the BBC website: ‘There were too many egos on the pitch, players who had great seasons, van Persie, Huntelaar and Robben, and overall too many who wanted to be the star of this tournament. Huntelaar and van Persie are not only the top-scorers at their clubs, they are both top-scorers in the Premier League and the Bundesliga, but they’re not playing well [for the Netherlands]. Football is still a team sport. You have to do it together and we didn’t see unity at this tournament.’

  In that same tournament, France reached the quarter-finals – but also appear to have been undone by disunity. Like the Dutch, they arrived in Eastern Europe for the finals on a wave of optimism founded on a 20-match unbeaten run, but something went wrong in the pressure environment of the tournament. Speaking in a French newspaper, and reported by the BBC, then national coach Raymond Domenech (himself no stranger to team disruption) commented to the BBC: ‘A major tournament reveals the strength of a group, a generation. The most glaring [weakness is] their inability to see anything other than their navels.’ Two years previously in South Africa, striker Nicolas Anelka was banned from the camp for insulting Domenech, the players revolted and refused to train, and France finished bottom of their group.

  Managers ask their players to perform on the world stage, and self-belief is a prerequisite for success. But managing the behaviour of a squad of players who believe that they have what it takes is no simple task.

  Howard Wilkinson argues that talented players now stand in more danger from themselves than at any other time: ‘It has become more difficult as the rewards have got greater. The genius now has more opportunities to abuse himself than ever. There’s just no limit. If I’ve got two bob in my pocket and I’ve got ego what am I going to do? What am I going to say? How many people is it going to
affect? Who’s going to notice? Nowadays I can finish a game, get on an aeroplane and fly to New York, act stupidly in a nightclub there, get on another plane, fly back and have it YouTubed immediately. Then we’ve got a big game on Wednesday night ...’ As Wilkinson points out, 50 years ago the same player would have gone out on Saturday night on the bus with his mates. ‘He might have had too much beer, might have got in a fight – but unless it was really serious it wouldn’t get in the paper. The manager would ring the newspaper and say, “Don’t use it, I’ll do you a favour next week.”’

  Not only have the dangers increased, they’ve also become more public. Creating the environment for success – and the behaviour that allows it – has never been so tough.

  Human icebergs

  A simple and popular image is of the human being as an iceberg: only a small part of us is visible at first sight. These are our behaviours – the things we say and do. The huge part below the waterline is our mindset: the things we think, feel, believe, value, need and fear. As we go deeper into our icebergs, we discover the things that drive us. Our behaviours are driven by our thoughts and feelings, in turn those are driven by our values and beliefs and, still deeper, these are driven by our needs and our fears.

  Meanwhile, above the iceberg are outcomes and behaviours. An individual’s behaviour has consequences for himself and others and is a constant preoccupation of managers. If one player behaves badly, it can upset the whole team. Bad-mouthing the manager, squaring up to a colleague on the training ground, drinking too much one night and reporting late or not at all for training the following day – these things all cause ripples in the team. They are at the least distractions – and at the worst, serious upsets. And distractions lead to preoccupation, anxiety and eventually reduced performance on the field. Conversely, good behaviours can have a profoundly uplifting effect. For this reason David Moyes rates former Australia and Everton midfield player Tim Cahill as one of his best ever signings. ‘We had a meeting with him in the chairman’s office at Millwall in London. His character was superb – he was bubbly, hungry, energetic, his eyes were sparkling at the thought of coming. We were all taken by him – his gratitude and his desire to try and do well – and he went on to be a great servant for the club and a good Premier League player over many years. He was a really positive influence in the dressing room.’

  If a manager wants to create great outcomes, he needs to address his players at every level of the iceberg. The most obvious level is at the top: addressing the behaviour head on – ‘Don’t do that again’. But unless the circumstances were truly unique, the player is unlikely to change. If he is tempted to drink too much one night, he will be tempted again another night. What the leader needs to address is the why. Why did the player drink too much? Because he was angry. Why was he angry? Because he was left out of the team. Why did that make him angry? Because above all else he values playing. Why does he value playing? Because he needs to be appreciated. And so on. When we change what’s below the waterline, we also shift the visible part.

  The challenge to the manager then is to get at the stuff that is below the surface for his players – to address them at the level of emotions, values, aspirations, needs and fears. This is how he will get real shifts in the individuals and the team. This is why Wenger is committed to working with emotions, identifying beliefs and motivations, and embedding practical values.

  Getting Below the Behaviours

  The many behavioural challenges are clear. For the leader who can address them, the prize is a smooth-running ship – or at least a club where he can concentrate on the real business of the day: delivering results on the field. We know that behaviours are best addressed below the iceberg waterline, but how?

  Level 1: Build people, not just players

  The iceberg works at multiple levels – and this is how Wenger thinks about the challenge. At the emotional level, he believes players have a huge opportunity to influence society: ‘You can show emotions to people without even talking to them. I can remember a whole period of my playing life when I had good passes from a Russian without ever speaking to him and we shared exactly the same emotions. In the same way, you can dance with somebody without ever talking and you are on the same wavelength because you can feel the music. Sport can be fantastic for that. It lets people share emotions without having the absolute necessity to communicate with words. Emotions can then create inside the desire to communicate afterwards: I would like to know more about this person because I had a fantastic feeling.

  ‘In this way, I think sport can show how the world can live together. In the world of tomorrow, we will all have to live together more and more – and football and big sports can be in advance of society. Seeing 18 nationalities work together at a club, trust each other and create something powerful together – this is very exciting.’

  Wenger’s experience in Japan influenced this thinking: ‘It made me believe that everyone during their education before the age of 14 should ideally try to spend six months or a year in a different culture, because it makes you realise that the way you see life is not the only way. It made me more open-minded. We all need to discover for ourselves that other cultures have other advantages. You will always feel completely at home within your culture, but you know as well that’s not the only way to live. Sport can do that.’

  Wenger’s skill is in addressing the whole human being. He shows his players that he is interested in them as people – not just because they have ability with a football. And at the same time he inspires them with a call to use their gift to help reshape society. We can point to players who have responded to his deeper leadership – and to those who appear not to have done. But the critical point is that he stands by these powerful beliefs and achieves undeniable human and sporting success.

  Wenger’s firmly people-centric approach to leadership sits well in the modern era. Howard Wilkinson gets playfully reminded by ex-players of his traditional style: ‘I get players who used to play for me saying to me now, “Gaffer, you can’t say to them now what you used to say to us!” Now, one answer to that is: “Why not? Is it suddenly not right to tell the truth?” But the smart answer, of course, is that footballers have changed with the society around them. They are more sensitive – so the letter has to be delivered by a different postman. And the good managers do that. It’s not about you enjoying yourself and having a good rant – it’s about the result and how best to achieve it. Today that means more one-to-ones.’

  Wilkinson is undoubtedly right. The more enlightened modern leader sees the need to address the emotional component of his people. But addressing emotions is only the first step.

  Level 2: Establish your values

  In a world where values are constantly in flux, Wenger is known for steering a steady course. He is a clear advocate of the principle of the three musketeers: ‘Sport is about trophies and spectacle; it’s also about values. And in team sports, solidarity is very important. You can see this when individual sports are turned into team sports occasionally – like the Ryder Cup in golf. It becomes a different sport. It adds something by being together, the emotions, going for something together, and suddenly the interest becomes bigger, suddenly it is about “us” and not “me”. Human beings subconsciously understand that alone I am nothing, but in a team I can achieve great things. So a leader helps people understand at a very young age that “together” can give them more than just “me”. It is in a period of your life when your ego is massive – if you are 20, 21, 22 the world turns around you – and that’s a normal developmental thing for a person. But at that age I believe that a leader has a big part to play to give this understanding that, OK, you are important but all together we are even more important. That’s the joy of a team sport.’

  David Moyes is admired as a strong leader but his strength comes from inspiring a value of self-discipline, rather than imposing rules: ‘Discipline has to come from within. If that were not so, I wouldn’t have it myself. I treat people
with respect and I expect the same respect back. If someone lets me down at any time, then it makes the relationship harder to work with.’

  Howard Wilkinson picks up on this theme of setting the tone yourself and inspiring through values: ‘At its best, a football club is a greenhouse, where you can really create a culture. As I watched people, I realised that group behaviours have a massive influence. In football, the manager is the culture. I need to embody what I want to see – in training and elsewhere.’ Like Moyes, Wilkinson found that modelling values reduced the need for rules: ‘My rule was to have as few rules as possible. We worked on the basis of respect, trust, fairness, honesty – and team spirit. Team spirit is acting in a way that gives us all the best chance to succeed most of the time.’

  Wilkinson recalls a moment when he knew that team spirit had really taken hold in Leeds: ‘Four players came to me one Monday – almost a delegation, led by the team captain. I’d been a bit tough on our fantastic goalscorer, Tony Yeboah – all about sharing a responsibility for working to get the ball back. They were saying: “Gaffer, we think you should leave Tony alone. We know when we give him the ball in a goalscoring situation, he scores – so we’re happy with him. We know that the most difficult job is scoring, and he does that.”’ Wilkinson was so happy to see the values permeating his team that he did not mind at all what a less confident leader might perceive as a challenge to his authority.

  The values message is clear. If a leader can both articulate and embody a clear set of values, then his people will not only police themselves – they will eventually stand up and be counted for something they believe in. Achieve this, and there is inspiration for everyone.