Opinion Jeff Kennett News, Media etc.


Im actually quite annoyed at the “I’ve tried and had the door shut” from what appears to have been a number of people.

I’ve seen a couple of boards operate where “invited” people were elected, but have always presumed it was due to lack of interest - obviously I was wrong. Is this quite normal in how boards run and members are rarely given the full story and ability to vote.

So strange - who knows amongst the “rejected” who may have done a great job at board level and even President
 
Feb 6, 2004
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Im actually quite annoyed at the “I’ve tried and had the door shut” from what appears to have been a number of people.

I’ve seen a couple of boards operate where “invited” people were elected, but have always presumed it was due to lack of interest - obviously I was wrong. Is this quite normal in how boards run and members are rarely given the full story and ability to vote.

So strange - who knows amongst the “rejected” who may have done a great job at board level and even President
Agree 100%. Also says in the article that we haven't had a Board election for 10 years. So pressure the people to drop out to ensure no accountability.
 
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Im actually quite annoyed at the “I’ve tried and had the door shut” from what appears to have been a number of people.

I’ve seen a couple of boards operate where “invited” people were elected, but have always presumed it was due to lack of interest - obviously I was wrong. Is this quite normal in how boards run and members are rarely given the full story and ability to vote.

So strange - who knows amongst the “rejected” who may have done a great job at board level and even President

The door has been shut on many aspiring candidates over decades at Hawthorn (and presumably other AFL clubs as well).

The logic goes this way -

1. What? You want to stand for the board? We appreciate your interest and devotion to the club but really, we are mindful of the special skills required for the board and Billy Blogs is our preferred candidate and the president is very keen for him to take the place of the retiring Jack Smith. (In other words, we want to put our mates on the board).

2. Do you have any idea of the cost to the club in contesting this election by you putting your name into the ring? Your nomination will cause the club to go to a formal election and this will cost the club $100k or thereabouts. Do you really want to put the club to that expense? It will be on your head.

That’s what would undoubtedly have been stressed to Jennifer Holdstock when she was involved in the meetings with Kennett and H4C and club power brokers that endeavoured to resolve the election issues and the conditions of Kennett’s departure as president. As far as I’m concerned (and I don’t know her more than what’s in the public forum) she’s probably got more balls than the rest of the board put together (and certainly more than Tim Shearer has displayed over the last week during his brief media forays).

As far as I’m concerned, if this election costs us $100k to comply with the democratic process, as dictated by our constitution, it’s the best $100k we could spend.
 
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The door has been shut on many aspiring candidates over decades at Hawthorn (and presumably other AFL clubs as well).

The logic goes this way -

1. What? You want to stand for the board? We appreciate your interest and devotion to the club but really, we are mindful of the special skills required for the board and Billy Blogs is our preferred candidate and the president is very keen for him to take the place of the retiring Jack Smith. (In other words, we want to put our mates on the board).

2. Do you have any idea of the cost to the club in contesting this election by you putting your name into the ring? Your nomination will cause the club to go to a formal election and this will cost the club $100k or thereabouts. Do you really want to put the club to that expense? It will be on your head.

That’s what would undoubtedly have been stressed to Jennifer Holdstock when she was involved in the meetings with Kennett and H4C and club power brokers that endeavoured to resolve the election issues and the conditions of Kennett’s departure as president. As far as I’m concerned (and I don’t know her more than what’s in the public forum) she’s probably got more balls than the rest of the board put together (and certainly more than Tim Shearer has displayed over the last week during his brief media forays).

As far as I’m concerned, if this election costs us $100k to comply with the democratic process, as dictated by our constitution, it’s the best $100k we could spend.
Imagine the current board trying to guilt trip someone this time around over $100k for a board election after they'd just months ago green lit a failed coaching succession plan that looks to have cost the club $900k.
 
People keep sooking about Clarko's $900k.
He was contracted so he had to be paid out. Its not that hard to understand.
Plenty of clubs have done it before us and it will happen plenty of times again.

It only bites now because of the soft cap.
In a normal year it would be 1.2% of revenue.
#perspectiveiseverything
 
People keep sooking about Clarko's $900k.
He was contracted so he had to be paid out. Its not that hard to understand.
Plenty of clubs have done it before us and it will happen plenty of times again.

It only bites now because of the soft cap.
In a normal year it would be 1.2% of revenue.
#perspectiveiseverything

Um, people understand the realities of contract law. People don't like botched succession plans that end up resulting in the loss of $900,000 for zero benefit to the club. This isn't a normal year, the soft cap is a consideration and the club is more financially constrained than in the past because of covid, and now a possible membership contraction - a contraction that potentially exists because of a reaction to the botched handover.

So, yes, people keep 'sooking' about the $900,000 payout for all the reasons you stated. Crazy to think that people are taking umbrage with financial recklessness because of bad governance in a thread that's dedicated to discussing our board and president.
 

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People keep sooking about Clarko's $900k.
He was contracted so he had to be paid out. Its not that hard to understand.
Plenty of clubs have done it before us and it will happen plenty of times again.

It only bites now because of the soft cap.
In a normal year it would be 1.2% of revenue.
#perspectiveiseverything

he gave us that value several times over. Severely underpaid most of his time with us.
 
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Um, people understand the realities of contract law. People don't like botched succession plans that end up resulting in the loss of $900,000 for zero benefit to the club. This isn't a normal year, the soft cap is a consideration and the club is more financially constrained than in the past because of covid, and now a possible membership contraction - a contraction that potentially exists because of a reaction to the botched handover.

So, yes, people keep 'sooking' about the $900,000 payout for all the reasons you stated. Crazy to think that people are taking umbrage with financial recklessness because of bad governance in a thread that's dedicated to discussing our board and president.
How would you have achieved the result without paying out the $900k?
 
How would you have achieved the result without paying out the $900k?
Reality is that only a very delicate handling of Clarkson would have prevented it, and it would have relied on him really wanting to follow the transition through, but even then, with Sam’s connection to the younger group and their strong-willed belief that they were burning a year of their footy career, perhaps it all plays out in a similar way even if Clarkson was across the plan a lot earlier.

Its for this reason the $900k is a millstone around the neck of the club that I’m not sure was avoidable, particularly without the very real chance that we’d have kept Clarko on for his desired finish up date, but we’d have likely lost Sam to another club in the process…. And I’m not sure that would’ve been looked on favorably by anyone at the end of 2022 when Clarkson walks out the doors and Sam is wearing another clubs polo while the media links us to Ross Lyon, Don Pyke and Michael Voss. Media would have a field day with why we didn’t just sign Sam up.
 
Reality is that only a very delicate handling of Clarkson would have prevented it, and it would have relied on him really wanting to follow the transition through, but even then, with Sam’s connection to the younger group and their strong-willed belief that they were burning a year of their footy career, perhaps it all plays out in a similar way even if Clarkson was across the plan a lot earlier.

Its for this reason the $900k is a millstone around the neck of the club that I’m not sure was avoidable, particularly without the very real chance that we’d have kept Clarko on for his desired finish up date, but we’d have likely lost Sam to another club in the process…. And I’m not sure that would’ve been looked on favorably by anyone at the end of 2022 when Clarkson walks out the doors and Sam is wearing another clubs polo while the media links us to Ross Lyon, Don Pyke and Michael Voss. Media would have a field day with why we didn’t just sign Sam up.

On the second point, Luke Hodge spoke about that - he mentioned that there was no perfect way for this to be handled and that we would have been lambasted by the Media had we brought Sam back with the intention of grooming him as senior coach and then let him leave to coach another club anyway.
 

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Reality is that only a very delicate handling of Clarkson would have prevented it, and it would have relied on him really wanting to follow the transition through, but even then, with Sam’s connection to the younger group and their strong-willed belief that they were burning a year of their footy career, perhaps it all plays out in a similar way even if Clarkson was across the plan a lot earlier.

Its for this reason the $900k is a millstone around the neck of the club that I’m not sure was avoidable, particularly without the very real chance that we’d have kept Clarko on for his desired finish up date, but we’d have likely lost Sam to another club in the process…. And I’m not sure that would’ve been looked on favorably by anyone at the end of 2022 when Clarkson walks out the doors and Sam is wearing another clubs polo while the media links us to Ross Lyon, Don Pyke and Michael Voss. Media would have a field day with why we didn’t just sign Sam up.

because we don’t think there wasn’t a ‘third way’?
 
On the second point, Luke Hodge spoke about that - he mentioned that there was no perfect way for this to be handled and that we would have been lambasted by the Media had we brought Sam back with the intention of grooming him as senior coach and then let him leave to coach another club anyway.
Clarkson even said that his leaving the club was always going to be a difficult thing for both parties to do cleanly.
 
find some way to ‘refresh’ Clarko who admitted he’d become stale. We hear about sheedy but he clocked a premiership at his 17th? Year at Essendon?
So just keep him? That was your big plan to transition?
 

Pardon the interruption, but I ran for the Bulldogs board a few years back on an anti-pokies ticket. The club did everything to shut me down, including having CEO Ameet Bains ring me complaining that the election would cost the club $$$ . They censored my biography in the AGM election material . After my speech the other candidates spent a long time attacking me fir having the temerity to run for the position.

I only got a handful of votes but I’m glad I did it. We need more fans on club boards I hope you sling Ms Holdstock a vote. Footy clubs are democracies , if you are a member you’re as much a part of the club as Kennett.
 
find some way to ‘refresh’ Clarko who admitted he’d become stale. We hear about sheedy but he clocked a premiership at his 17th? Year at Essendon?

Continuing to suffer through terrible seasons because Clarko needed his mojo back would have been the worst choice we could make.

Sheedy isn't a great example either, because he won a single premiership with a side that should have probably won 3 or 4.
 

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Continuing to suffer through terrible seasons because Clarko needed his mojo back would have been the worst choice we could make.

Sheedy isn't a great example either, because he won a single premiership with a side that should have probably won 3 or 4.

yea cos as hawks fans we turn our nose up at just the one premiership. Esssnedon 2000 didn’t manage the salary cap well.

anyway isn’t the vibe we need a few years of early draft picks from low finishes? And Clarko was keeping us in mid table no mans land? For mine if 20-21 were our down years we had the good fortune to not be able to witness it in person at theMCG

and I wish all the best for Sam. Maybe the second best coach going around at the moment
 

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So just keep him? That was your big plan to transition?

excuse me for not doing a neat 180 once the handover was announced. As I said before the best bit of this is Kennet didn’t get to be in the search for clarkos replacement - the footy dot engineered it
 
Feb 6, 2004
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People keep sooking about Clarko's $900k.
He was contracted so he had to be paid out. Its not that hard to understand.
Plenty of clubs have done it before us and it will happen plenty of times again.

It only bites now because of the soft cap.
In a normal year it would be 1.2% of revenue.
#perspectiveiseverything
But Jeff stated that we didn't have to pay it out.

And before you respond I know that we had to pay it out, but Jeff thinks otherwise and has said it to the the media.
 
yea cos as hawks fans we turn our nose up at just the one premiership. Esssnedon 2000 didn’t manage the salary cap well.

anyway isn’t the vibe we need a few years of early draft picks from low finishes? And Clarko was keeping us in mid table no mans land? For mine if 20-21 were our down years we had the good fortune to not be able to witness it in person at theMCG

and I wish all the best for Sam. Maybe the second best coach going around at the moment
That's very optimistic of you, Pessimistic, but there's not much to suggest he was magically going to snap out of the 2017, 2019, 2020 & 2021 trend (2018 the outlier).
 
Um, people understand the realities of contract law. People don't like botched succession plans that end up resulting in the loss of $900,000 for zero benefit to the club. This isn't a normal year, the soft cap is a consideration and the club is more financially constrained than in the past because of covid, and now a possible membership contraction - a contraction that potentially exists because of a reaction to the botched handover.

So, yes, people keep 'sooking' about the $900,000 payout for all the reasons you stated. Crazy to think that people are taking umbrage with financial recklessness because of bad governance in a thread that's dedicated to discussing our board and president.

The club tried to make it work but it didn't.
Sam wanted to be senior coach in his own right and the club didn't want to lose him to Collingwood.

It has zero to do with bad governance or financial recklessness.
Its simply a commercial decision.
 
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