Butterss & Board - Crisis Management & NO Vision

[kaos theory]

We have gone backwards over the last few years... No just on the field, but in how the club is run.
- We are losing key admin & management personnel & sponsors
- we have experienced an embarassing on going public fight between GT & RB
- our Footy dept. is barely functioning & held together with shoe stings & duck tape
- we made an abysmal defence for baker
- we are stumbling with no solution & direction on an elite training facility, while other clubs have sorted it out
- current key board & management personnel have lost confidence RB,
- we have no vision on how we will increase reveune & bring sponors,

We are floundering.... and all we see is a crisis management approach by RB and his remaining supporters....a key sign that they are lost and desperate....

We have a credible alternative now, the quality of the people is far surperior to the current board.....

I have finally lost faith in RB to take us forward....time to move on..

[firthy]

Could we convince Butters & Howard to swap places -- or would it just be more of the same in both places.

[chook23]

- we are stumbling with no solution & direction on an elite training facility, while other clubs have sorted it out

John Gdanski responsible at board level ......RB term

"" "" " new ticket

So we may still continue to stumble

[kaos theory]

- we are stumbling with no solution & direction on an elite training facility, while other clubs have sorted it out

John Gdanski responsible at board level ......RB term

"" "" " new ticket

So we may still continue to stumble

It hasn't helped that we have had 5 CEOs and no sub-committe handling the training facility upgrades over the last 5 yrs...

To me, its a sign of poor management that we don't have a focused and unified approach to handling the facility upgrade...also a sign of cost-cutting with no overall business plan and revunue model...

[chook23]

- we are stumbling with no solution & direction on an elite training facility, while other clubs have sorted it out

John Gdanski responsible at board level ......RB term

"" "" " new ticket

So we may still continue to stumble

It hasn't helped that we have had 5 CEOs and no sub-committe handling the training facility upgrades over the last 5 yrs...

To me, its a sign of poor management that we don't have a focused and unified approach to handling the facility upgrade...also a sign of cost-cutting with no overall business plan and revunue model...

agree but gdanski was head of sub-committee and also in his interview this morning lay some of the frustrations and no outcome to Council who changed personal after yearly elections.....

lets hope it can finally be resolved though

[doggerel]

- our Footy dept. is barely functioning & held together with shoe stings & duck tape

Held together with old Wayne Carey videos?!

[Go Sretnias Go]

Many thanks Rod for your hard work over past years - in many ways you and your Board have done a hell of a lot to stabilise/improve our Club by improving it's financial status and removing debt, improving the playing list, gaining finals experience, acheiving record membership in 2006 and doing the hack work on the"redevelopment" of Moorabbin. The re-surfacing of the ground should also be mentioned.

All these things have been plusses for the Club, but now Rod, in 2007 the "wheels have fallen off" - we've lost capable senior staff and general staff, there's the fued with your former friend GT who is now suing our Club, there is the "fallout" with Kingston Council and everything isn't rosy with your friends on the Board. The only media coverage we seem to get these days is negative - nothing promotional and positive which makes me wonder if we have anyone now to look after the media - I suspect not.

So Rod, the time has come for a change it must be said and I thank you for the positives you and your Board have given to the St.KILDA FOOTBALL CLUB. Good Luck in the future and I am sure you will continue to support our Club.

I will be voting for change.

[Brewer]

[SAINTLY73]

Is there a difference between the two groups?

It seems pretty even. All RB needs is a few ex players to make him look good. AT yesterday didn't know much about GW and didn't seem too clued in.
Current board bashing is too easy.

Its easy to put the RB down and question decisions but don't forget Gdansky and Levin have pretty much running it up til now. Its a power grab and thats it.

[riccardo]

Everyone is looking at me wierd, I just burst out laughing at work!

Totally captures the situation!

[kaos theory]

Its easy to put the RB down and question decisions but don't forget Gdansky and Levin have pretty much running it up til now. Its a power grab and thats it.

Oh really???

How easy is it bash other boards of successful clubs with this & make it stick?:
- We are losing key admin & management personnel & sponsors
- we have experienced an embarassing on going public fight between ex-coach & the president
- our Footy dept. is barely functioning & held together with shoe stings & duck tape
- we made an abysmal defence for key player
'- we are stumbling with no solution & direction on an elite training facility, while other clubs have sorted it out
- current key board & management personnel have lost confidence in the president,
- we have no vision on how we will increase reveune & bring sponors

The point is that RB and his current board (those that are left supporting him) have dropped the ball. They are treading water and not progressing a club that has potential to do so much better. Worse, they are sending us backward....What is our reveune projections going to look like next yr...? Do we cut more people to keep a profit going, on a dwindling revenue base?

RB's behaviour is erratic & compromises to our club's future....the only 'power grab' I see going on is coming from him....

[Mr Magic]

Kaos,
Should we assume you are planning to vote for SFF?

If so, is it because you like what they are offering or despise RB?

If it's because you like what they are offering, could you tell me/us what that is.

Other than saying they are going to spend more on Football matters and that we have to increase revenues, I don't think they've actually said anything about how they are going to achieve these 2 things, let alone anything else?

BTW, I'm not endorsing RB's Board - I'm just amazed that so many seem to be 'hailing' SFF with absolutely no scrutiny.

Even JeffDunne who has consistantly been RB's staunchest critic is not endorsing SFF with the rabid enthusiasm many on here are. He, along with others including me, appears to be 'cautious' about them because there is a glaring lack of detail contained in their slick candidiature announcement.

[meher baba]

The current board made a monumental and highly controversial decision in 2006 to sack a successful coach (sigh - I know what happens every time I describe GT as "successful": well, all I can say is that anyone who thinks otherwise is either too young or hasn't been supporting the Saints for long enough to know what real failure looks like).

At the time we were told that this was all part of a master plan to "take us to the next level". Now it is clear that the same board is full of disagreements and divisions and some members are about to stab the President and others (presumably including the Football Manager) in the back, aided and abetted by the CEO who helped to egg on the Board to sack the coach last year.

(If the challenge succeeds, then AF will have a pretty impressive-looking cv for a football club CEO: having been instrumental in the demise of the long-term coach and the long-term president within the space of a little over 12 months!!! I think there's a vacancy going among the 12 apostles, Archie!)

Moreover, as the OP points out, the club is now in a bit of a mess, with no clear vision for the future, on or off the field.

The article by Caroline Wilson in the Age today is poison (who was it again who said she was a friend of RB's?). I know some people are upset - perhaps with good reason - by the way in which the challenge has come about, but - now that that article has appeared - what hope does the club have of attracting any major sponsors for 2008 other than to have a clean sweep of the board?

One thing to say for trucking magnates, they deal with a lot of manufacturing and resource companies and surely have the ability to call in more than a few favours.

I can't see that members have any choice now but to vote for Westaway's mob.

However, on the face of it, the role of Gdanski in all of this is worth a bit of a look. If we are looking at a new broom, I wouldn't have thought that it was essential to retain him on the board: surely he is at least as much part of the problem as the solution.

[saintly]

Kaos,
Should we assume you are planning to vote for SFF?

If so, is it because you like what they are offering or despise RB?

If it's because you like what they are offering, could you tell me/us what that is.

Other than saying they are going to spend more on Football matters and that we have to increase revenues, I don't think they've actually said anything about how they are going to achieve these 2 things, let alone anything else?

BTW, I'm not endorsing RB's Board - I'm just amazed that so many seem to be 'hailing' SFF with absolutely no scrutiny.

Even JeffDunne who has consistantly been RB's staunchest critic is not endorsing SFF with the rabid enthusiasm many on here are. He, along with others including me, appears to be 'cautious' about them because there is a glaring lack of detail contained in their slick candidiature announcement.

I am very cautious and and i agreewith you that ...

glaring lack of detail

and your comment

" Other than saying they are going to spend more on Football matters and that we have to increase revenues, I don't think they've actually said anything about how they are going to achieve these 2 things, let alone anything else?"

they certainly have not swung me over.

[Mr Magic]

MB
I think you've summed up my feelings (and probably many other posters) pretty well.

There is a feeling of inevitablility about this and I just hope to hell that this new Board turn out to be a good one for our Club.

[kaos theory]

MM -

1. The new board comprises an impressive list of individuals, which brings a good blend of business, economic, marketing, football & elite sports skills.

2. If you compare the expereinces & skill sets of current board members (those that still support RB) with the challenging board, then individually & collectively the challenging board are way ahead.

3. When the RB board took over, they had very little detail on what and how they would take this club forward - just general & vauge vision statements. This challenger is far ahead of the current board in terms of its vision and professionalism prior to taking office.

4. But most importnatly, the key factor in business and in running an organization successfully is that you need to understand the challenges and problems you face. That is most important. Once you have that, and you have a talented & committed team, and resources to back you up, you are more than half way there to buidling the solution.

Critically, that is what the challenger has done. To date, the current board has done NOTHING to clearly articulate the real challenges & problems that we face, so what are they doing, and what objective are they trying to achieve????

What we are getting from the current board is crisis management. They are fire-fighting, they are in survival mode....that is NOT the way to build our club.

I'm afraid the problem rests with Rob...I have supported him until recently, but not anymore....

[meher baba]

I'm afraid the problem rests with Rob...I have supported him until recently, but not anymore....

Look, I know our midfield hasn't been performing that well lately, but surely they aren't the source of all our problems.

[kaos theory]

Look, I know our midfield hasn't been performing that well lately, but surely they aren't the source of all our problems.

oh, not the great one, I meant the grate one.....

[Oh When the Saints]

Simple really.

RB and GT were a package.


One half of that package was removed.

The other half can't survive in separation ... and so must go too.


They started something together, and must both leave so everything is put to bed.


As able as Rod may be, once he threw his lot in with GT in 1999, he was with him all the way.