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LET'S start with a universal truth: leaders are accountable, and with those words General Peter Cosgrove, former Chief of the Defence Force, soldier, statesman, Qantas board member and vice-chairman of the Australian Rugby Union launched himself last November into one of his six Boyer Lectures. His topic was "Leading in Australia".
It makes for interesting reading, particularly in view of the many challenges facing Australian rugby, so forgive me if I borrow quite extensively from it.
Leadership accountability, he ruefully acknowledged, was something he learned in his earliest days as an infantry officer.
Interestingly, it was a lesson he was taught by his subordinates.
Having ordered a work detail to wade through chest-deep water on the way to clearing some unruly vegetation intruding on the obstacle course at Holsworthy Barracks, forcing his soldiers to labour while soaked to the skin, he discovered after dismissing them at the battalion stores compound that many of their tools had gone missing.
The cost, he learned to his dismay, would be docked from his pay. Leaders might give orders and they might even be obeyed but that's not to say there won't be retribution from below.
Cosgrove went on to examine some spectacular falls from grace of Australian leaders. "In the main," he noted, "the issues behind these falls could be grouped under a lack of competence, a lack of support or loyalty from those they sought to lead and a lack, or failure, of integrity.
"Of all of these, the last is the most egregious, the most fatal. We so much want our leaders to be unfailingly decent."
Now the general had the bit between his teeth. "It is interesting to observe that many of the modern corporate failures in leadership have come either from a failure of integrity by the leaders in question or, equally obvious, a failure to diligently protect the integrity of the business, which the owners rely on."
Cosgrove then went on to stress the importance of leaders communicating what is on their mind, their vision even. "Leadership uncommunicated is leadership unrequited," he said.
Then the wrap-up: "So my old soldier's advice to my corporate chief executive colleagues is not to see this matter of ethos or pride in the organisation as an adjunct program, as nice-to-have after nurturing the bottom line, but as a vital strategic investment."
Hopefully, unlike General Douglas MacArthur, this old soldier won't simply fade away anytime soon. Australian rugby has too great a need for such men of principle because, quite frankly, the game in this country is balanced on a knife-edge.
Last year can be seen as a disaster. No Australian team made the Super 14 playoffs, there was no real process for selecting who would be awarded Australia's fifth Super rugby licence but rather a sham, while the Wallabies lost five of their six Tri-Nations matches, four straight Bledisloe Cup Tests and even were beaten by Scotland.
None of this might matter if fans at least had been treated to some exciting rugby. Think back to that pulsating 39-35 defeat at the hands of the All Blacks in Sydney in 2000. Sure, the Wallabies lost and that hurt, but only for a moment, because the game had been so wondrously entertaining.
But with rare exceptions the Wallabies Tests -- heck, professional rugby matches generally, were dirges, blighted by incomprehensible refereeing and endless, dreary kicking.
One sensed on the Wallabies' spring tour that even the supposedly smugly complacent northern hemisphere countries had had a gutful of how the game is being played. The moment is ripe for change but, as things stand there is no chance of Australia leading in that. Whatever influence Australia might once have wielded has been lost, squandered in fact. Australia might still be respected on the international rugby field, but elsewhere its voice is sneeringly dismissed.
Of course, if the game is indeed balancing on a knife-edge, a nudge might be all that is needed to tip it in the right direction. As Robert Kitson observed in The Guardian recently, "in the final analysis, the Wallabies were only one missed conversion and one defensive mix-up away from a Grand Slam tour". Elsewhere he observed "a New Zealand-Australia (World Cup) final (next year) would surprise no one".
If that is to happen, Australia must get this year right, starting with the establishment of its fifth Super rugby team. It must find a way to protect the four existing franchises without disastrously disadvantaging the Melbourne Rebels and it will not just be a case of making good decisions. Making them for the right reasons is every bit as important if the mood of disillusionment hanging over the game is to be dispelled.
But how serious is Australian rugby about the integrity of its business and the accountability of its leaders?
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news...-1225820190481
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