Malky Mackay

[The_Kincardine]

On 12/17/2016 at 13:26, Mark Connolly said:

I suppose it depends on how many other candidates there were, and how poor they were.

Have the SFA published any details on how many candidates were interviewed, and what their respective qualifications were?

It doesn't, actually.  The SFA had the option not to make an appointment or to call for more applications. The 'he was the best of a bad bunch' argument has no credibility.

[Mark Connolly]

Just now, The_Kincardine said:

It doesn't, actually.  The SFA had the option not to make an appointment or to call for more applications. The 'he was the best of a bad bunch' argument has no credibility.

I was just responding to the suggestion that he was "the outstanding candidate".

I agree with you entirely that a candidate that poor should not be appointed just because he is the best of those that applied.

[The_Kincardine]

1 minute ago, Mark Connolly said:

I agree with you entirely that a candidate that poor should not be appointed just because he is the best of those that applied.

No chance of an argument then?

[Mark Connolly]

Just now, The_Kincardine said:

No chance of an argument then?

I'm up for an argument, just not on this point.

[bikerbloke]

Here is the job advert.

I see the Performance Director (PD) is responsible "for implementing the Scottish F.A.’s strategic objectives".  And "execution of the performance strategy".

Tried to find the full "Performance Strategy" but without success. Some waffle and buzzwords on SFA site from Regan, but detail of the strategy eluded me. Anyone know where it exists? Or is it a secret, in case San Marino or Gibraltar FAs read it and steal the ideas?

This job advert is full of words like liaise, in conjunction with, contribute to, oversee, while there being no mention of any budget whatsoever. All the waffle words that ring warning bells and clearly is trying to ensure the noses of existing staff are not put out of joint. For goodness sake, this is a Performance Director.. 

Any incumbent is guaranteed to fail in trying to implement someone else's strategy without being given the teeth or the authority to rattle existing cages and drive through the change which is required.

Shame they put up such an important job advert and couldn't get the spelling right. 
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Client:	Scottish FA
Position:	Performance Director
Location:	Oriam National Performance Centre – Edinburgh
Reporting to:	Chief Executive Officer

The Scottish Football Association

 

The Scottish FA exists to promote, foster and develop the game at all levels in this country. Founded in 1873,  Scottish football’s governing body has recently undergone the most radical changes in its history, enabling the organisation to lead the game into a new era. 

A key priority for the SFA is the success of Scotland’s men’s, women’s and age-grade national teams. The SFA wish to appoint a Performance Director (PD) to ensure all aspects of the strategy combine to support players and teams enabling them to achieve their potential.

 

The Role

 

This is a leadership role with responsibility for implementing the Scottish F.A.’s strategic objectives and communicating effectively with a wide range of stakeholders.

 

The Performance Director will be accountable for the delivery of the Scottish FA’s performance strategy and policies  to increase the number of world class players within a culture off winning across the association, its teams and member clubs

 

The strategy and football philosophy underpins the performance of the Scottish F.A.’s elite football academies and programmes including the “Scottish style of play” at elite level.

 

Responsibilities

 

Strategic

Oversee and lead the execution of the performance strategy, its systems, programmes and infrastructure to

 

create a winning culture with world class players.

Lead the development of a world class coaching community encompassing the national team coaches and those working in the Association’s elite academies and performance schools.

Contribute to the creation of a “Scottish style of play” to be emulated at all “age levels” of national representation. 

Responsible, in conjunction with the respective Head Coaches, for all men’s national representative football at all age levels represented including U21, U19 and U17.

Oversee through the Women’s National “A” team coach all women’s national representative football at all age levels represented including U19 and U17.

 

In conjunction with the Performance Operations Manager and the Performance Development Manager, oversee the implementation of the appropriate infrastructure, including elite academies, for the long-term development of elite youth football in Scotland thereby building a pipeline for future sustainable success on the pitch. 

Work with the Performance Development Manager to ensure that the Performance School structure is delivered in line with the overall performance strategy.

 

Leadership

Work with the respective Head Coaches on a “coach the coach” basis to ensure that the performance strategy is enshrined at all “age levels” of the game.

Lead the professional development of coaches in the coaching community associated with the performance Pathway In conjunction with the respective Head Coaches and, where relevant, the Women’s National “A” team coach, manage and coordinate the men’s and women’s football programmes to enable them to achieve the best possible results in relevant UEFA and FIFA competitions. 

Oversee the recruitment of all board approved key football personnel, including coaching staff. Assist the Performance Operations Manager in the continuous professional development of all departmental staff.

Communication

Liaise with the Head Coaches and professional clubs over issues related to release for international competition and the performance strategy of the Scottish FA. 

Establish excellent relationships with the coaching and support staff of all programmes and with the President, Chief Executive, and Board of the Scottish F.A.

Advise the Board on all matters relating to the effective development of elite football at all levels in the long-term interests of Scottish Football. 

Develop and maintain a successful image and profile for the Scottish F.A. and Scotland teams both in the UK and worldwide and to contribute to communication activity including media briefings and publicity of performance activity within the sport.

Carry out any other reasonable duties as requested from time to time.

 

The Individual 

Experience 
A proven track record in the development and implementation of performance management in football or other sports. Able to demonstrate with specific examples how strategic and other change initiatives have been successfully implemented in order to deliver the strategy goals. 

A proven technical football management pedigree, although not essential, would be desirable in order to have the credibility and experience of dealing with top level clubs, their professional footballers, coaching staff and general management,.

An experienced manager of successful high performance programmes with a proven track record in supporting team and squad management at an international level, and enabling international sporting success. 

Experienced in the leadership of coaches and coaching, and an understanding of good practice in coaching and the identification and development of international talent. 

Experienced in, and with an understanding of modern business practices and the ability to work collaboratively and effectively with the Performance Operations Manager, national coaches and other members of the Perfomance team. Able to demonstrate experience in objective measurement of the various strategic initiatives to chart progress against achievement of the vision e.g. deploying a scorecard of performance measures 

Experienced in the management of staff to ensure their effective performance, operation, work allocation and discipline.

Evidenced experience of using performance analysis, sports science, sports medicine and performance lifestyle services to generate insights crucial to the development of the player.

 

Qualifications & Skills

 

An experienced and effective people manager, with the ability to implement innovative ideas and influence support programmes.

 

UEFA Pro-Licence/Level 5 Coaching qualification or equivalent.

 

Computer literacy and first-class communication and presentation skills are essential in order to build confidence and support for the vision and strategy across all stakeholder groups.

 

It is likely, though not essential, that the individual has had an international career as a player or coach.

 

A willingness to work irregular hours and travel extensively both within the UK and overseas, with overnight stays and weekend work.

 

How to Apply

To apply candidates should send the following: 

Letter of application highlighting relevant experience Up to date curriculum vitae

 

Details of current remuneration

 

Applications should be sent to amilner@sportsrecruitment.com

For a confidential discussion about the role, please contact:

 

Alistair Milner amilner@sportsrecruitment.com 0207 092 6966

[ICTChris]

Where can you read Project Brave?

[ICTChris]

Also, I posted this in the Colt teams thread

It's probably been posted here before but here's an article by Barney Ronay on Icelandic football and how they developed it

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/jun/08/iceland-stunning-rise-euro-2016-gylfi-sigurdsson-lars-lagerback

Good little anecdote from Steven Lennon about Barry Ferguson 

[Mark Connolly]

I see computer literacy is listed as one of the essential skills.

Kris Boyd will be fuming.

[forameus]

12 hours ago, bikerbloke said:

Here is the job advert.

I see the Performance Director (PD) is responsible "for implementing the Scottish F.A.’s strategic objectives".  And "execution of the performance strategy".

Tried to find the full "Performance Strategy" but without success. Some waffle and buzzwords on SFA site from Regan, but detail of the strategy eluded me. Anyone know where it exists? Or is it a secret, in case San Marino or Gibraltar FAs read it and steal the ideas?

This job advert is full of words like liaise, in conjunction with, contribute to, oversee, while there being no mention of any budget whatsoever. All the waffle words that ring warning bells and clearly is trying to ensure the noses of existing staff are not put out of joint. For goodness sake, this is a Performance Director.. 

Any incumbent is guaranteed to fail in trying to implement someone else's strategy without being given the teeth or the authority to rattle existing cages and drive through the change which is required.

Shame they put up such an important job advert and couldn't get the spelling right. 

 

This is actually quite interesting.  Looking at the parts you've picked out, it reads very much like they're bringing someone in not to bring in fresh ideas and change things, but to implement whatever people tell him to.  The bolded part is spot on.  People will continue to be absolutely furious about it being Mackay on a personal level (he makes Trump look good, dontchaknow?) but leaving that and even the suitability for what we think the role will be, this isn't going to be him sitting in a role for a decade and bringing through a glistening plan for the ages.  It's going to be him trying to sell the SFA's shit ideas to the clubs, probably failing, then being punted (or walking) in a couple of years to the sound of the media and everyone else wringing their hands and wondering where it all went wrong.

I was thinking though.  Why do we actually need someone high profile at all?  Reading that job spec, there's not a whole lot of it that screams to me that they need an ex footballer.  It even says that it isn't essential.  For me, the performance director role should be about putting in a very high level plan that arches over all of Scottish football.  That doesn't need to be Mackay and Regan in a room with a whiteboard firing their way through a crate of fags, it just needs to be someone switched on who has the knack for managing people and processes.  Note, not managing footballers, because I don't think that should be in this guy's remit.  He can put into practice a program that attracts the people that can coach and manage, it's up to the Director to coach and manage them as people.  

So basically, why do they need to get some high-profile (for so many reasons) guy in?  A role like this should be as low-key as possible to give the guy the chance just to get in and put his plans into practice without the media - and some of the less realistic fans - analysing every single move and then greeting when we're not winning the World Cup two years later.  Proper, well-thought-out plans in this sense are going to take 10-15 years to really bed in.  Which brings it all right back to the problem - there is absolutely no chance that Malky Mackay will be anywhere near this role for that timeframe.  He'll be gone in a few years for whatever reason.

[BFTD]

With regard to having a high-profile ex-footballer/coach in the role, the way it's worded makes me think the SFA expect that nobody will take the Performance Director seriously unless they've played/coached at a certain level. In other words, the SFA think they're dealing with idiots at the clubs, who'll be distracted by talk of glamorous places like Norwich or Wigan.

This must be the reason why everyone thinks Regan and Cockwomble are useless c***s - not enough caps.

[HibeeJibee]

5 hours ago, ICTChris said:

Where can you read Project Brave?

Serialised weekly through leaks in the Daily Record.

[Malcolm Malcolm]

On 18/12/2016 at 18:05, HibeeJibee said:

It's this I find most remarkable. Against that negative backdrop - instead of having him start quietly, within 48hrs he's sent into something highly controversial which many will perceive as being about helping OF.

These people are idiots – that's all you need to know

[The_Kincardine]

9 hours ago, forameus said:

I was thinking though.  Why do we actually need someone high profile at all?  Reading that job spec, there's not a whole lot of it that screams to me that they need an ex footballer.  It even says that it isn't essential.  For me, the performance director role should be about putting in a very high level plan that arches over all of Scottish football.  That doesn't need to be Mackay and Regan in a room with a whiteboard firing their way through a crate of fags, it just needs to be someone switched on who has the knack for managing people and processes.  Note, not managing footballers, because I don't think that should be in this guy's remit.  He can put into practice a program that attracts the people that can coach and manage, it's up to the Director to coach and manage them as people.  

Good post.  What makes it all the more galling is that, apart from football, elite sport in Britain has been completely transformed.  One may argue with the ethics and selectivity of it but what has happened is that we've become successful in many sports over the past 20 years and, consequently, there must be a fair number of people who have gained experience in sport-wide transformations.  I'd rather go for a strategic thinker with proven implementation skills in any sporting discipline than an ex journeyman footballer with no credibility.

[bikerbloke]

Gie uz a Performance Director!

This is from 6 years ago (November 2010) when Scotland were ranked 37 on the FIFA rankings. Today 67.

Reading through it, I keep asking 'have we started yet?'

http://renaissance.etellect.co.uk/docs/593//SFA Performance Strategy Executive Summary.pdf and this is just the executive summary, loads more to dig up.

Chances are big Malky will be have to start his new post by being locked in his office for 6 months while he goes through it all.

Edited December 19, 2016 by bikerbloke

[Bairn in Exile]

Ah well, I have salved my conscience and done by bit for the cause. Today I sent an email to Falkirk FC and proposed that should Malky Mackay ever come a calling that they should show him the door. I suggested that he might be better off sending the club a text message instead as that seems to be his forte.

I might be getting ahead of myself but I also asked them to kick out the idea of Celtic Colts and “They Who Must Not Be Named” Colts being admitted into the SPFL, especially at the expense of 2 of the Lowland League Clubs. In a perfect world, no entry at all.

I’m not holding my breath but at least I have tried.

[Hampden Diehard]

16 hours ago, The_Kincardine said:

Good post.  What makes it all the more galling is that, apart from football, elite sport in Britain has been completely transformed. 

I think you'd have plenty people saying that football has been completely transformed too (certainly in England).....but unfortunately that transformation hasn't incorporated an improvement in UK players in terms of quality or numbers (quite the opposite).  

Football is a business in that most other sports aren't; banging cash into cycling or whatever has allowed the likes of Chris Hoy to treat his sport as a job and improving out of all recognition.  Football has always been a job at the top level and the improvement will never be so marked.

Rugby at the top level is very much now a business and will end up like football sooner or later (how many non-UK born players now represent the respective "home" nations?).

Football clubs don't listen to anyone except themselves, so Mackay will have his work cut out for him.  Can you imagine him wading into Lennoxtown and telling Celtic what to do?  No, me either.  But maybe this is what Scottish football needs.  It certainly needs something.

He, like his counterparts in England, will have to put up with indifference at best and contempt at worst from the clubs.  And we'll continue to spiral down the world rankings.  Celtic's Champions League cash will paper over the cracks at Parkhead; the rest of us will probably continue to evolve even more shite than we are now.

 

Edited December 20, 2016 by Hampden Diehard

[bikerbloke]

57 minutes ago, Hampden Diehard said:

 

Football clubs don't listen to anyone except themselves, so Mackay will have his work cut out for him.  Can you imagine him wading into Lennoxtown and telling Celtic what to do?  No, me either.  But maybe this is what Scottish football needs.  It certainly needs something.

He, like his counterparts in England, will have to put up with indifference at best and contempt at worst from the clubs.  And we'll continue to spiral down the world rankings.  Celtic's Champions League cash will paper over the cracks at Parkhead; the rest of us will probably continue to evolve even more shite than we are now.

 

The clubs don't listen to the SFA because they see an incompetent bloated organisation that is concerned only about serving itself to the detriment of the game. Hiring Malky Mackay to carry someone else's half baked messages around the clubs isn't going to improve that one bit.

Sometimes it is best that some organisations fail totally so that what is needed can be rebuilt from the ground up, disposing of all the baggage. The SFA definitely falls into that category. 

 

 

 

[forameus]

1 hour ago, Hampden Diehard said:

Football clubs don't listen to anyone except themselves, so Mackay will have his work cut out for him.  Can you imagine him wading into Lennoxtown and telling Celtic what to do?  No, me either.  But maybe this is what Scottish football needs.  It certainly needs something.

He, like his counterparts in England, will have to put up with indifference at best and contempt at worst from the clubs.  And we'll continue to spiral down the world rankings.  Celtic's Champions League cash will paper over the cracks at Parkhead; the rest of us will probably continue to evolve even more shite than we are now.

 

This is a good point.  In an ideal world, you'd think that the National governing body would be able to go to the clubs and tell them what they were going to do, but unfortunately it's the other way around.  

Wouldn't agree on the last part though.  We're not going to spiral down the rankings.  We're likely to fall slightly further, then probably rise, then fall, then rise.  It's cyclical.  It's also not totally relevant - at this stage at least - to Malky Mackay.  If we keep the status quo, we're likely to produce players good enough to maybe push us close to qualifying sometimes.  Pretty much the definition of a mid-to-low pot 3, or at worst pot 4 team.  I don't think his actions would see us fall in the rankings consistently, at least in the short term (or any term, as I doubt he'll be there for long enough to be directly responsible).  

[forameus]

3 minutes ago, bikerbloke said:

The clubs don't listen to the SFA because they see an incompetent bloated organisation that is concerned only about serving itself to the detriment of the game. Hiring Malky Mackay to carry someone else's half baked messages around the clubs isn't going to improve that one bit.

Sometimes it is best that some organisations fail totally so that what is needed can be rebuilt from the ground up, disposing of all the baggage. The SFA definitely falls into that category. 

 

I wouldn't say that's strictly true.  The SFA is hardly the shining example, but the clubs don't listen because it's not in their interest to.  The way the organisation is, they don't have to.  They'll send in Malky Mackay to try and carry forward proposals, but they'll probably be well within their rights to say "who cares?"  Does it really affect clubs massively if the national team is successful?  Obviously it's going to long-term, but it's like sending him in to say that if they do X then he'll say it's very likely you'll get Y money in the future.  The clubs know they can get Z money by just looking after their own interests, so why should they go along with the SFA, given they have a choice?  

I don't think they should have a choice though.  The SFA should be the governing body dictating to the clubs.  By all means the clubs have their say in how the game is run, but the main national governing body should always be above all.  

[ICTChris]

I know it's a bit football hipster and all that but here's a presentation on the success of Icelandic football by Siggi Eyjólfsson, who coached the Icelandic women's team and was head of coach education at the KSI