Good leadership is not only knowing the right decisions to make, but crucially, understanding the right time to take those decisions.

This distinction can literally make a good decision into a bad decision.

The longer I reflect on the NZRU’s head coaching mishandling, the more it reeks of mismanagement, and the more it creeks like a badly damaged ship under strain in treacherous waters.

You only need to work back from the growing cause-and-effect post the All Blacks comeback victory at Ellis Park to perceive of the incoherent recent decision making process.

As I write this on Sunday night, the NZRU is in the continuation of that process, deciding the All Blacks head coaching future of Ian Foster. After parking this decision until the team’s return to New Zealand in another strange public messaging performance, the consequences of their indecisiveness are starting to become more entirely laid bare.

We can gauge this landscape when analysing the lack of an astute timing take in their decision make.

If the NZRU sacked Foster right after the Irish series, which was the correct time, although there would have been some consternation, a clean slate for Razor Robertson, Jase Ryan, and Co. would have been decisively created.

Potential hypotheticals would have been limited because the sequence of bad results clearly indicated the only way to go playing up was through a clean out.

It is now abundantly clear Jase Ryan is transforming the All Blacks forwards, and is a significant reason why light is at the end of a dark tunnel. The forwards are beginning to reassert their excellence, opening a wider door for the backs, where there remains plenty of room for the entire unit to grow.

If this specialist forwards role was the only real pertinent issue, then the decision is simple. Foster stays, and after the result in Johannesburg, there is a renewed sense of purpose, with a hopeful horizon and positive trajectory.

However, if Foster remains the issue, removing him after this victory recklessly opens the door to creating further complications—with players, and a possible cloud of doubt for the incoming Robertson. Good leadership should have known these hypotheticals into the future and have taken the right decisions to remove the possibility of steering right through it.

I am confident if Razor had led a coaching team to the Republic, given the singular positive translation through Ryan as exemplar, this change-for-good impact would have only been magnified.

A new coaching unit would have then surged after the decisive leadership change post the playing fortunes reversal in the second Springbok test, where growing momentum and an engaged public sentiment would have communicated this has been the right direction for the All Blacks to take.

If I am Robertson right now, and I know I am on the cusp of the All Blacks head coaching dream gig, I am concerned I am walking into a hornet’s nest, where I don’t necessarily have the dressing room, as the conversation is shifting. Given the proximity to the 2023 Rugby World Cup and the need to maximise time, maybe I stay clear, allow the smoke to settle, give it a little over 12 months, and let the results make it abundantly categorical in France.

The longer this melodrama extends the right time to take this decision moves into increasingly contentious territory.

The NZRU effectively made this scenario a reality when only bringing in Jase Ryan, and not putting a full stop on the Foster narrative.

This is why the lack of clarity—which as Isa Nacewa I believe rightly intimated on Sunday night’s, The Breakdown—appears indicative of an apparent behind-the-scenes shafting of Foster, and I would add, doesn’t align with an intentional flourishing change movement. It doesn’t reflect a clear leadership plan that understands the destination is often defined by the journey’s course.

In my own estimation, probably for the first time in any Foster head coaching reign, he has appeared most viable. The players are seemingly fully in his corner. They have gone through the fire with this man, watched him stand up for the group, appeared to push through the other side together—and now you want to pull the pin?

The lack of decisive leadership then means you’ve created this potential now.

Of course, objectively this is only one test, and the requirements to get to the top are nowhere near confirmed, but because of the horrible timing of the NZRU’s undertakings, they have removed a clear line of justification between any sacking cause-and-effect.

It’s a little like disciplining a child weeks after they’ve done something wrong. It not only rings hollow, but will likely do the opposite of good. It won’t make sense. It will be confusing, even disturbing. All of which underscores the leading line of this piece, and the lack of recent leadership.

In my opinion, the NZRU is nearing a no short term win category, if they are not already right there.

If they sack Foster now, they have potentially set the next guy (presuming Razor) up with a hypothetical scenario creating a narrative where Foster just needed more time, with his last result proving any thesis right. But the right guy should have been given this South African platform to shine, underscoring the vital importance of the right timing, especially when the future is so close in France.

On the other hand, if they retain Foster, basically because of this one result, in my view, they don’t objectively have the best coaching set-up for the national team, which means if their goal was to move to this direction, they have effectively led themselves in the opposite direction to achieving through mismanagement.

All round craziness!

At a larger applicational level, most everyone with any penchant for leading will take practical solace from their own cognitive aptitude when peering into other specific leadership contexts.

What can separate the good from the great is not only grasping the right decision to make, but empathetically interpreting the correct time to decisively take it.

The All Blacks head coaching saga is the latest example in leadership gone wrong.

I have been all-in on Scott “Razor” Robertson since we lost in the semifinal of the Rugby World Cup in 2019. It was time to be brave and make change. The NZRU ostensibly admitted this mistake when very recently appointing Razor’s sidekick. My consistent public pronouncements have had this long term pattern.

However, probably for the first time, although I believe that previous course of action still remains an opportunity lost, I am beginning to consider whether change is as practically feasible now without blowing the All Blacks cultural situation up, thereby poisoning the waters should Robertson be called in.

If taken, Foster and the players will have some understandable consternation, even feelings of betrayal after the comeback-from-the-dead victory at Ellis Park, underscoring the leadership mishandling of the All Blscks board that effectively punted after the Irish series.

The emotion of the win at Ellis Park has certainly helped Foster’s bid. A close two-point loss would have made the next movement easy. If the NZRU had decided to only keep Foster because of the timing of the South African leg, they will need character backbone and leadership savvy to communicate a new direction. There will be some blowback. They must ride that storm, because they can see the sun on the horizon.

Otherwise the chaos may have just started, and nobody who supports the All Blacks should think that is the way forward, irrespective of who has the head coaching portfolio.

What Say You?

For this record, I still want to see some pretty bad break-dancing in Paris come late 2023!

iamjonnyking