New season offers hope

By TOM CLARKE

A leading academic on team leadership, Dr Robin McConnell, says he is impressed with the depth of planning and free thinking of All Black coach Wayne Smith and his coaching team.

The outlook for the future of the All Blacks under the Smith/Gilbert/Thorburn leadership is good, says Dr McConnell, who has been appointed professor of sport at Unitec's school of sport.

His appointment is said to be a first for New Zealand and Australia and one of few such posts anywhere.

His doctorate on elite team leadership, which was based on three years of study and research within the All Black camp, is claimed to be the first doctoral thesis to obtain first-hand research data on the leadership of an international sports team.

Dr McConnell says one of his first observations of the All Blacks was that things within the camp are often quite different from the way they are seen from the outside.

"I think with Wayne Smith, Tony Gilbert and Peter Thorburn, we're getting people who value the All Black tradition but who also value the All Blacks as people and who have a concern for them rather than just as guys who are going on to the field," he says.

"I think they value and have a realistic appreciation, not of the hardness of the players, but of the personal qualities and the unyielding commitment to sport that players need at that level. They're thinking people and that's a critical aspect of a coach.

"This idea of mechanistic coaches who are so authoritarian - it doesn't last for long in terms of winning or developing people."

Dr McConnell is not so optimistic about the All Blacks that he would bet on them for the next World Cup.

But he is encouraged that Wayne Smith is willing to be free thinking and to draw in diverse elements to help, and is impressed with the depth of planning, the attention to detail and the degree of human awareness evidenced by the coaching team.

Dr McConnell is known in international academic circles for his research and writing on sport.

His doctorate on elite team leadership formed the basis of his book Inside the All Blacks, which is now into its third reprint, including a British edition.

It forms the basis of his latest book The Successful Coach, which will be released in June.

Findings from his doctoral research have been used here and overseas and he has worked as a consultant on coaching and team leadership with five national codes - cricket, rugby, netball, hockey and petanque.

His background in education includes teaching at secondary level, being a school principal and later an inspector of schools. He then joined the University of Waikato where he introduced the first paper on sport leadership. In 1994 he became the first senior lecturer in sport management and coaching at Massey University, based at the Albany campus.

Dr McConnell is of Ngati Hine and Ngati Kahu descent, and has done a lot of work in Maori education and Maori sport.

His research interests include Maori leadership, rugby referees, youth coaching and leadership, captaincy and athlete learning styles.