Press Cuttings
"GEIF Manager, Grant Hawthorne, reviews the Breakfast Meeting
The speaker was management consultant Humphrey Walters.
Hearing Humphrey Walters' terrifying descriptions of being continually battered by 70foot waves in the South Atlantic you'd wonder why he put himself through such agony. Why would anyone in their right mind volunteer to race the toughest sea route round the world? Simple: Humphrey Walters was a man on a mission. The mission? To test his management theories to destruction.
For those of us who have endured more than our fair share of "management theory", Humphrey Walters' presentation to the May Breakfast Meeting was like a breath of fresh sea air. It's all very well to have a man in a suit telling you how important "teamwork" is, but when that theory has been tested in a life and death scenario it takes on a whole new meaning.
Humphrey was part of the crew of the Ocean Rover in the 33,000 mile BT Global Challenge. The crew was randomly picked from a group of volunteers - an experience which "taught him more about human nature and team-building than 30 years in business". When your "buddy" is, quite literally, your lifeline you don't let him down.
Humphrey said that even the skipper of their boat - a highly experienced navy veteran - acknowledged the ruthlessness of the situation: "never in my life have I seen anything so hostile or with such awesome power. It was trying to kill me and it surrounded me every minute. I am convinced that there will never be a problem so severe in real life that will compare to surviving in the southern Indian Ocean".
Humphrey drew direct parallels between his experience on the Global Challenge and the everyday happenings in modern business: where company survival depends on inspired, sound leadership, personal motivation and quality teamwork. The yachts could be seen to represent competitive organisations, the crew were the employees and the unpredictable oceans were the complex environment in which they operate.
Back on dry land Humphrey has assimilated his experience into MAST his international Management And Skills Training consultancy. The key lesson that the race taught him was in teamwork - assembling, running and maintaining the right team. He also found that it was crucial to know how to behave within a team - that such niceties as punctuality, courtesy and knowing how to apologize can make all the difference.
From the reaction afterwards I think it is safe to say that Humphrey's speech went down a storm. Most of us will never get the chance to test out Humphrey's leadership advice in the South Atlantic (and, let's be honest, who'd want to?) but it gave some real food for thought. I can personally say that I have changed one or two small things in my life as a result.
Humphrey is taking part in the next BT Global Challenge later in the year, but has decided to do only one leg of the race. While all of us will be sitting down to our turkey dinners this Christmas, spare a thought for Humphrey who will be a small dot somewhere in the Southern Indian Ocean. I'm pretty sure he'll be enjoying every minute.
"Is Sam the man for the England job" - The Observer, 19th March 06
Allardyce was one of the first managers to use ProZone, the computer system that tracks every physical detail of a player during a match. He is wired up to an earpiece during games and has consulted the expertise of Humphrey Walters, the business guru Sir Clive Woodward credits as being a big influence in England's 2003 rugby union World Cup victory. The Bolton squad are offered massages, t'ai chi, yoga and Pilates. Some, though, wonder whether his approach is gimmicky and question why he has such a large backroom staff (17 at the last count).
This, though, might just be the normal friction created around match days. 'Steve McClaren told me that Sam is the most popular manager among managers,' says Walters. 'They like him because he's very straightforward.'
Whether his choice of agent will make any difference to the FA's top executives remains to be seen. Allardyce does not need any speculation, but it will not prevent him being able to convince Barwick, or indeed Newcastle, that he has the abilities to take on a high-profile job. 'He is an old-fashioned manager at the same time as being a guy very open to new ideas,' says Walters. 'Very unusual. Bolton had ProZone before the England rugby team did - that's how Clive Woodward latched on to it.' Does he believe Allardyce's flexibility is natural? 'No. Woodward has always been a bit wacky. Sam has trained himself. I think if you asked him he would say he's just good at adapting.'
"The Lions Tour 2005 - Putting the pride into the Lions" -The Observer Sunday June 5, 2005
Humphrey Walters is a leadership and team-building guru brought in by Clive Woodward in 1997 to use his winning business principles to improve the performance of the England team. The coach credited Walters with helping to bring back the World Cup in 2003 and engaged him again in the build-up to the Lions tour. Here Walters explains how he went about his latest task, a 10-day crash course that was very different from working with the England team.
When teams arrive to play England these days there is a sign that says, 'You are now entering Fortress Twickenham'. It was an idea I got from New Zealand when we toured there in 1998. When you get off the bus in Dunedin and walk into the stadium, you are greeted by the words, 'You are now entering the House of Pain'. When I saw it I turned to Clive and said: 'We need something as intimidating as that.'
It goes deeper, though, than just being intimidating to the opposition. It says this is where the England team belong. It helps to build the sort of culture, tradition and togetherness that is a part of all successful businesses. It helps to unite the workforce, even if they spend most of their time playing against each other in club games.
We did this building, too, over the years by always gathering at the same hotel so the players knew this was where they turned up, this was another part of where they belonged. We were able to generate some kind of sameness, some kind of entity. It went right down to the changing room, where we put up plaques with the players' names on. We tried to create a feeling that this was their home. We wanted to create an environment where everyone aspired to join and no one wanted to leave.
I knew straight away that none of this would be possible with the Lions. You are presented with a temporary workforce who have played against each other at club level and for their countries, creating another level of temporary togetherness that is contrary to establishing harmony. There is also the fact that everyone knows this is only for six or seven weeks, after which the players will never again all congregate in the same room. Guaranteed.
On top of this the Lions have no home and no office, and with so long a gap between tours the players find it difficult to locate that sense of history and tradition that I know from my professional background imbues and enhances every great business.
So, to a certain extent, it was what you could call a slightly shambolic mix who came together charged with trying to defeat opposition who have everything going for them - history, pride, a self-perpetuating excellence and the whole country behind them (although the last of these has the potential to be detrimental). The glory of wearing a black shirt makes you a hero, unlike in the British Isles, where, with so many competing interests, rugby doesn't have the same significance.
My job was to build in just 10 days with the players and the management and coaching team some sort of history, some sort of folklore, some sort of belonging in order to overcome the huge disparity that exists in these areas between the Lions and the All Blacks - a name, incidentally, that we stopped using, referring to them instead as the New Zealanders. We didn't want to enhance their brand strength. I encouraged them instead to regard the opposition as being the representatives of two small islands with a population the size of Birmingham's.
There were four core things I concentrated on. I called them the four senses. A sense of reality, a sense of excitement, a sense of belonging and a sense of value and worth. None of these is a technical thing to do with rugby. They are emotional things, because as we all know there is a huge passion in winning teams.
First, the management team had a couple of days together in December last year, and then in April the players came together for two days. Finally we were all together for eight days before the party flew off at the end of last month.
The first time the players met up many of them hardly knew each other - some old, some young, a huge range of experience from Lawrence Dallaglio and Neil Back to Shane Williams, who is a gem of a guy. There were also the national differences - the England players used to a very organised environment, the Irish, a fantastic group, used to something rather different, the Welsh a little intimidated perhaps and the three Scots maybe feeling outnumbered. The only thing they had in common was that they were all sitting around in the same room, all thinking the same thing: 'Oh my goodness, I'm so proud to be here, but is it OK to say something?'
Clive Woodward was completely unknown to some of the players and you could see them thinking: 'What do I say to him?' The first thing was getting them to relax, to let them know it was OK to speak out, and that was part of the ethos of the squad.
Having achieved this we moved on to the four core things, which I had spoken about with Clive. Being the clever man that he is, Clive put together a fantastic film showing great moments from Lions tours of the past that said: 'This is what you're in and the tradition you are privileged to be able to perpetuate.' It was very moving. You could have heard a pin drop when we showed it. Now we can only wait and see what happens. I doubt anyone will be surprised to have learnt that Sir Clive's Lions departed having been prepared differently from any of their predecessors. I would say this, I know, but I believe he has given them their best chance of prevailing against tremendous odds.
"Humphrey & Clive building something to inspire a nation"
Casual observers of the England rugby scene might put the 2003 World cup triumph simply down to the quality of the coaching. There was a perception that the team had reached a new level of professionalism and performance, but had no understanding of how it had been achieved. As Sir Clive Woodward's book Winning later revealed though, the inspiring victory against Australia was the climax of more then two years of meticulous preparation and planning. Its chapters reflect perfectly the nature of a dedicated individual who used his knowledge of the business environment to create a team in his own image. Calm, methodical and efficient, sometimes obsessional, but with a burning desire to win. Clive may appear to have the aura of someone who knows the answers, but he readily admits the opposite is true. The lesson that teamwork was the answer had been learned during his time with Xerox, and later when running his own leasing company.
"Bringing good people and new ideas together in business with spectacular results is incredibly satisfying," he writes. "So rather than re-invent the wheel in England rugby I was quite happy to learn on other people's expertise and creativity when we needed it." Clive's introduction of Humphrey Walters to the England scene was his first move. The next was to ensure that everyone involved in the squad, from manager and assistant coach to kit-man and team doctor, shared his vision that a new elite structure had to be created. Just a few lines in his book indicate tellingly how amateurish the previous approach had been. Ten of the thirteen people who worked with the squad were part- time. Clive recalls how enthused they all were though by the notion of helping to create a new-look England rugby structure. At the first intensive workshop organised to discuss the new ideas, a series of probing questions by Humphrey was the catalyst for the emergence of a strict code of conduct about how the new system would work.
Remarkably, all the ideas came from members of the support and coaching team. "If I'd have tried to mandate even half of these rules as a manager in any other business situation, there would have been a mutiny," writes Clive. The same process of putting probing questions and encouraging open responses was then used to identify each minute element that impacted on a player's day: from leaving home before a match, until they returned. "In one day, the team virtually made the plan that would form the foundation of the way the entire elite England setup would operate, although it would take us many months to implement fully," recalls Clive. I was a very impressive example of how swiftly even a group largely composed of part-timers could be welded into some focused team when encouraged to think creatively and with freedom.
Following a casual meeting with Humphrey, even Clive's vision of what the new England could achieve was then elevated to a further high. "We agreed that we were in the business of inspiration, and that our aim was to inspire the nation," recalls Humphrey. Even they, musing about the future over a drink or two in a Devon pub though, could never have conceived just how spectacularly their dream would come true. Earlier this month, Humphrey realised once again just how wide the impact of last November's triumph had been. "I was talking to about 450 teachers, of whom around 80% were female, so it was anything but what might have been regarded as a typical rugby audience," He says. "All they wanted to talk about was the world cup though, and it made you think how remarkable it was that a small bunch of people had transfixed the nation."