Tom, it was mostly about management. The old [pre Y2K] Team New Zealand dog in the manger trustees did the typical Kiwi thing and instead of playing like a team, they wanted ruler-serf as the relationship between them and Russell Coutts and Brad Butterworth and co.
Russell Coutts and Brad Butterworth and others weren't willing to put up with it so went where they were treated with respect. I'm not surprised. Neither am I surprised that somebody like Ernest Bertarelli could build such a team.
It was a management failure. You could get your business school to take a look at what went on. How to mismanage talent, money and opportunity.
Now, it's off to Portugal by the look of it; from the first suggestions from Alinghi anyway. But I suppose they'll have a conference and figure out the game plan over the next week or two. Larry Ellison has challenged already.
Team NZ had design problems, equipment failure, sailing mistakes, weather communications and decision mistakes. The Alinghi team were as tight as a drum. They looked flawless. Team NZ was all over the map. Not bad, but simply not good enough for the big league.
That's what happens when local rules ruin things - those who can do things attract the local talent. The USA is currently attracting talent from around the world. Iraqis want the USA to sort out their local management problems. We the Sheeple want freedom and respect. Management which doesn't give it is not long for this world.
As with Janet Reno, Joel Klein, Bill Clinton and Judge Jackson attacking $ill Gates, which to me was the marker for the decline of the pre-eminent USA position, I think the loss of the America's Cup will mark a turnaround for Kiwiland. We are going to go down the gurgler now. Hopefully somebody will turn it around by providing the leadership which the sheeple will follow. So far, we are following the leader further into the mire because of faulty beliefs in collectivism, social welfare as a way of life, economic ignorance and nanny statism.
Things have gone okay until now, with 15 years of recovery from the big bust of 1987, which was very big here. But I don't think that will continue.
Then again, anything's possible. If people do the right thing, things can turn around very quickly. A few people have noticed that things are going off the rails.
Mqurice |
