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| Steppe change: how Gareth Southgate became a management guru in Russia | |
| (about 7 hours later) | |
| A new guru looks set to take his place on the speaker circuit: England manager Gareth Southgate. To the surprise of many, a team containing few household names and no superstars has emerged under his leadership, playing good football. A bunch of supposed no-hopers is now daring (indeed being encouraged) to dream. | A new guru looks set to take his place on the speaker circuit: England manager Gareth Southgate. To the surprise of many, a team containing few household names and no superstars has emerged under his leadership, playing good football. A bunch of supposed no-hopers is now daring (indeed being encouraged) to dream. |
| This represents a reversal of the English football fan’s experience over the past two decades. We were always meant to benefit from the gifts of a “golden generation”. As each tournament drew near, the speculation would rise. Was Beckham/Owen/Rooney fit? Could Gerrard and Lampard play well together? Would tensions between club rivals be smoothed over in the greater national cause? Invariably, the answer to these questions was “no”. The team offered less than the sum of its parts. The golden generation did not have a Midas touch. | This represents a reversal of the English football fan’s experience over the past two decades. We were always meant to benefit from the gifts of a “golden generation”. As each tournament drew near, the speculation would rise. Was Beckham/Owen/Rooney fit? Could Gerrard and Lampard play well together? Would tensions between club rivals be smoothed over in the greater national cause? Invariably, the answer to these questions was “no”. The team offered less than the sum of its parts. The golden generation did not have a Midas touch. |
| I don’t know if Southgate is familiar with the work of Boris Groysberg, a professor at Harvard Business School, but his approach could almost have been inspired by the professor’s research. Groysberg and colleagues studied the performance of more than 1,000 “star” Wall Street financial analysts over an eight-year period, and came to a striking conclusion: transplanting high achievers into a new setting rarely went well. It turned out that the supposed stars depended to a great extent on the teams and networks they were part of at their original employer. | I don’t know if Southgate is familiar with the work of Boris Groysberg, a professor at Harvard Business School, but his approach could almost have been inspired by the professor’s research. Groysberg and colleagues studied the performance of more than 1,000 “star” Wall Street financial analysts over an eight-year period, and came to a striking conclusion: transplanting high achievers into a new setting rarely went well. It turned out that the supposed stars depended to a great extent on the teams and networks they were part of at their original employer. |
| In others words, success was really a team effort and not down to the individual gifts, real or imagined, of the star. Grosyberg published his findings in 2010 in a book called “Chasing Stars – The Myth of Talent and the Portability of Performance”. | In others words, success was really a team effort and not down to the individual gifts, real or imagined, of the star. Grosyberg published his findings in 2010 in a book called “Chasing Stars – The Myth of Talent and the Portability of Performance”. |
| Southgate and his England team seem to have grasped this lesson. Gone are the indulgent excesses of the golden stars. In has come understatement, modesty, and a sense of collective effort. Perhaps the answer to Britain’s chronic productivity problems is to be found on the playing fields of Russia. | Southgate and his England team seem to have grasped this lesson. Gone are the indulgent excesses of the golden stars. In has come understatement, modesty, and a sense of collective effort. Perhaps the answer to Britain’s chronic productivity problems is to be found on the playing fields of Russia. |
| But hang on a moment. We should not speak too soon. Defeat and disaster may be only 90 minutes away. And we have been here before: for a time, when England’s performances picked up under former boss Sven-Göran Eriksson, many felt we had found a management guru then, too. | But hang on a moment. We should not speak too soon. Defeat and disaster may be only 90 minutes away. And we have been here before: for a time, when England’s performances picked up under former boss Sven-Göran Eriksson, many felt we had found a management guru then, too. |
| The Swede’s minimalist utterances were taken to be a sign of great wisdom. In fact the minimal statements mainly reflected the limitations of his vocabulary and imagination. In the 2002 World Cup in Japan, when England were drawing 1-1 at half-time in their quarter-final with Brazil, the players were hoping for a rousing team talk. “We were expecting Winston Churchill and instead we got Iain Duncan Smith,” one player observed at the time. That player’s name? Gareth Southgate. | The Swede’s minimalist utterances were taken to be a sign of great wisdom. In fact the minimal statements mainly reflected the limitations of his vocabulary and imagination. In the 2002 World Cup in Japan, when England were drawing 1-1 at half-time in their quarter-final with Brazil, the players were hoping for a rousing team talk. “We were expecting Winston Churchill and instead we got Iain Duncan Smith,” one player observed at the time. That player’s name? Gareth Southgate. |
| I have only seen Southgate up close once, almost 20 years ago, when his Aston Villa team were staying at the same hotel as me in Newcastle. He was first down to breakfast, shaved and respectable. What a nice young man, I remember thinking. How well behaved. | I have only seen Southgate up close once, almost 20 years ago, when his Aston Villa team were staying at the same hotel as me in Newcastle. He was first down to breakfast, shaved and respectable. What a nice young man, I remember thinking. How well behaved. |
| England may have only two more games left in this current World Cup. But perhaps they will surprise us all again, and go beyond the quarter-final stage for the first time since 1990. If so, Southgate’s future as a management guru will be assured. And if he needs a role model he couldn’t do better than the late Bill Shankly, the great Liverpool manager, who also had a gift for getting the best out of people and encouraging teams to perform. | England may have only two more games left in this current World Cup. But perhaps they will surprise us all again, and go beyond the quarter-final stage for the first time since 1990. If so, Southgate’s future as a management guru will be assured. And if he needs a role model he couldn’t do better than the late Bill Shankly, the great Liverpool manager, who also had a gift for getting the best out of people and encouraging teams to perform. |
| “Football is a simple game based on the giving and taking of passes, of controlling the ball and of making yourself available to receive a pass,” he once said. “It is terribly simple.” | “Football is a simple game based on the giving and taking of passes, of controlling the ball and of making yourself available to receive a pass,” he once said. “It is terribly simple.” |
| • Stefan Stern is co-author of Myths of Management and the former director of the High Pay Centre | • Stefan Stern is co-author of Myths of Management and the former director of the High Pay Centre |
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