Why are you people surprised at the Redskins performance? The Redskins average a fraction over seven wins per season. They have been that way since 1992. They are trending five wins this season — 66 percent better than last season.
Hail to the Redskins!
To hear fan rants on sports talk radio, fixing this team is a matter of dumping Robert Griffin for Colt McCoy. Or firing Jim Haslett. Or signing Haynesworth or Hatcher to fix the pass rush. Or lets fire the coach again.
Wrong on all counts.
The key to fixing Washington lies at the very top where flawed thinking begins.
The Redskins will not become a Super Bowl team until Daniel Snyder becomes a Super Bowl-caliber owner.
This will never happen while Snyder rents his football strategy from every new coach he hires. Fire your coach and change the strategy. Take Jay Gruden, for example.
The ‘Skins hired Gruden to “fix” Robert Griffin while keeping the West Coast Offensive scheme. The Gruden flavor of that offense is not the Shanahan flavor. Snyder abandoned the Shanahan strategy for one that would transform Griffin into a version of Andy Dalton.
Who thought that was a good idea?
Daniel Snyder must build a Washington Redskins strategy that he owns.
Strategy beyond football. Strategy that drives the entire fan experience. Strategy that drives genuine competitive advantage. Strategy that wins titles, increases value and burnishes the brand so no outsider can redefine it. Strategy that survives coaching changes.
London Fletcher: Redskins Environment Not ‘Conducive to Winning’ « CBS DC http://t.co/V0EuLVKLV8
— Anthony Brown, The RedsCommander (@RedsCommanders) November 25, 2014
Strategic thinking does not come easy to most people.
Fortunately, there are consulting firms and people who are good at it. Here are a few Mr. Snyder should talk to.
McKinsey & Co.
McKinsey is the foremost firm guiding Global 1000 corporations navigate challenge and change. As they put it, “Many companies fail to distinguish a strategic review from the annual budgeting process, or lack adequate processes for strategic planning. We have a set of core capabilities and tools that can help clients strengthen their strategies at the enterprise level.”
Other companies like Boston Consulting Group, KPMG, and Bain, to name a few, operate in this space. None creates football strategies. We are beyond that. They create strategies to build contenders on the field and management excellence in the front office.
Jack Welch
The retired chairman of GE made the company the world’s leading corporation. Its stock value grew 4000 percent in his time. Welch is the gold standard of effective business leadership.
He was a hard man to work for, yet people wanted to work for him. He demanded his business units achieve first or second-place market share in its industries or he would sell them off. That was a real threat.
Also real was Welch’s eye for executive talent. He rewarded top performers handsomely while firing the bottom 10 percent of his management every year.
That’s motivation!
Welch was ruthlessly intolerant of inefficiency and ineffective methods. One wonders what he would make of the Redskins’ method of sourcing talent.
GE named Welch vice president of strategy before he rose to chairman and CEO.
Other leadership coaches could include Steve Ballmer, the new owner of the LA Clippers and former CEO of Microsoft or a service chief of any branch of the U.S. Armed Forces.
Ballmer brought strategic cohesion to Microsoft’s product development. For quite a long time, Microsoft was the world’s leading technology innovator in spite of its complex nature.
No group defines strategy like the military. Senior leaders train to be strategic thinkers adept at force deployment and support structures that ensure every campaign leads to a win.
Those Redskins teams of the ‘80s, that young Dan admired while growing up, were consistent with the U.S. Marine Corps. Teams built as a Broadway cast — with a famous name and all those little people – do not win Super Bowls. The ‘Skins do come with plenty of drama, though.
Nothing changes for the Redskins until Mr. Snyder becomes genuinely good at strategic planning.
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