Simon Barnes writing in the Times about the financial crisis described how change in leadership in the sports arena had led to better performance. He cited Fabio Capello and the turnaround in English football, and Kevin Pieterson and his impact on the cricket team. I am reminded of that giant of football management the Birmingham City boss Trevor Francis who tried to reassure fans that the many years of trying unsuccessfully to get into the Premier league would eventually pay off because “if we carry on doing what we have been doing eventually our luck will change and we will go up.”  The Blues owners were not convinced by this strategy and in due time Trevor was invited to seek his fortune elsewhere.

So is this a time for new brooms in your organisation – do things need to be done in a different way? Does the thought of a new broom worry you because you may be placed on the “loyal but old” broom pile?

I like the story of Andy Grove at Intel: one day he and his senior colleagues walked out of the office and agreed to walk back in as if they were new owners of the business. They then asked themselves “what would we change if we were the new owners? What is sloppy and inefficient? What is no longer fit for purpose? How would we improve the organisation and the brand?” They found lots of issues and started to reinvent themselves.

Is it time to reinvent yourself? If a new broom came into your role what difference would they make? What would they make of your people? Your focus and priorities? Your processes and standards? Where are you vulnerable given the changes that are happening around you in the economy etc?

Could you be that new broom?

Tags: andy+grove, fabio+capello, intel, kevin+pieterson, new broom, simon+barnes, times

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 12th, 2008 at 5:41 pm and is filed under Change, Ideas to Action, Leadership, Purpose and Vision. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.