It’s rumoured that David Moyes’ difficult time as the successor to Alex Ferguson at Manchester United may be coming to an end.
Now I don’t know much about football, but one thing that Moyes did early on led me to think that he would fail. And he may not recover from what he did in his first few weeks in the job.
Very soon after taking over at United, he brought in his own back-room staff, taking the place of some long-standing members of the coaching and support staff. Getting rid of Mike Phelan, Rene Meulensteen and Eric Steele must have wobbled other staff and the players who relied on them.
I thought he made changes too soon. He changed substantial parts of the power plant at the heart of the United machine, which had been built up over many years.
While it may be right to make major changes when you take over a new role, it makes sense to really understand at close range what it is you’re dealing with. Your assumptions about how an organisation works, when you’re standing on the outside, are invariably revealed to be inaccurate when you get on the inside.
I’ve seen this happen many times, so the troubles that beset David Moyes at present don’t surprise me.
Get to know how your new organisation really works before you radically change it.
What do you think? What’s your experience of getting to understand a new organisation?
I think you’re absolutely right. Changing everything at once, including the CEO was a rooky mistake.
More importantly, though, I think the fundemental flaw was that brand MU was actually Brand SAF. No one realised, and thus Moyes was failing before he signed.
In any business it has to work regardless of who’s at the helm, so was SAF really that good?!
There’s a controversial thought.
Chris,
Thanks for your comment.
I think Sir Alex Ferguson’s record stands up to inspection very well, but I agree that perhaps people didn’t understand the uniqueness in his approach.
Matthew
The Telegraph has nine more reasons than me, but they agree on the fundamental flaw.