As a leadership coach and football enthusiast, I’m as interested in the impact managers have on their teams, as I am in the players’ actual performances on the pitch.

So last week, I went along to the National Theatre in London to see the new play “Dear England”, which retells the story of Gareth Southgate’s eventful management of England men’s football team.

Having read the reviews, I expected to be entertained and indeed I was. The rest of the audience thought so too. It got a standing ovation. I was also curious.

Would I find new insights and inspiration here?

Team Identity

The play takes its title from the open letter Southgate wrote to the public during the pandemic in June 2021, on the eve of the Euros tournament. That piqued my interest in his approach.

He appealed to England fans to support the players and accept that it was important for them to “take the knee” and speak out on social issues. Southgate shared his own personal story and values, pride in his grandfather’s military service, respecting those who had gone before, linking the past to a positive vision of the future.

He did something that I coach leaders to do:

Be clear what you stand for, your values, your identity and

align with your stakeholders around a common purpose.

It’s important, because this shapes who you are, how you show up both at your best and your worst. Research consistently shows that the clearer and stronger a team’s identity, in sport or business, the more successful they are.

For business leaders, stakeholders include: employees, customers, investors, partners, and the wider communities they operate in. For Southgate it was more challenging, as his stakeholders extended beyond the players and the fans. In reality, he was appealing to the whole English nation.

Leadership Impact

Like all leaders, Southgate stands or falls on the performance of his team.

His tenure was marked by consistently good tournament finishes:  semi-final, final, then quarter-final at the 2022 World Cup.

The play follows his journey from missing in a penalty shoot-out, as a player in the 1996 World Cup semi- final to returning as a hero from the 2018 world cup in Russia.  The first England manager to reach a tournament semi-final in 22 years. His likeable young squad created a feel-good factor as the ghost of the nation’s penalty curse was slain with a last 16 shoot-out win.

To do this, Southgate reshaped the culture. A sports psychologist was brought in to help the squad overcome the fear of the penalty shoot-out, create more openness and supportiveness. A sense of pride, belonging and desire developed where previously, players hadn’t relished being called up for international duty. He has broken down barriers, including those with the media, by encouraging the players to be more open, to tell their stories, to own their narrative.

But despite the progress, there is still unfinished business.

Leadership Learnings

England’s men, unlike the victorious women’s team at 2022 Euros, still haven’t won an international tournament in this century. And the penalty jinx has returned.

In the 2020s Euros final, they lost the penalty shoot-out to Italy at home at Wembley. In 2018 when they beat the penalty curse to triumph over Columbia, commentators argued it was about more than just player selection and practice. The success was enabled by a new mindset, a shift in the culture of the team.

Southgate has done a great job with the culture, but I’d argue it was his selection of penalty takers and tactics that contributed most to the defeat against Italy. He held back two young attacking players, Sancho and Rashford until just before the end of extra time. Then he brought them on cold to take decisive penalties. He also selected the 19-year-old Bukayo Saka to take the final penalty. They all missed, and the three young players were subject afterwards to online racist abuse.

What went wrong after so much progress?

Southgate has been criticised for his conservative playing style, whilst having attacking, flair players available in abundance.

To his credit, he accepted blame for the tactics and shoot-out selection, but I’m not sure what he learned from it when I read his reflections on it shortly afterwards. Perhaps it was too early.

He demonstrated his cautious approach, by suggesting that had he gambled earlier with the attacking players, they could have lost before the penalty shoot-out. He tried to justify his confidence in the penalty takers as they had always been the best in training. But they were coming on cold into the heat of the contest. Same with Saka. But it was the final and he was only 19!

Famous management guru, Peter Drucker has been quoted as saying that:.

“Culture eats strategy for breakfast”.

It is now widely accepted that team and organisation culture is key to achieving success in business and sport.

Southgate did a fantastic job in transforming culture but fell down when it came to key decisions.

This is a key lesson from Southgate’s experience:

No matter, how supportive and energising the culture you have created, if you, as the leader make the wrong calls, you can send your people in the wrong direction and miss your goals.

Let’s also acknowledge, that despite all of Southgate’s efforts in engaging with the fans and wider community, the three young players who missed the penalties, received shameful racist abuse.

This reinforces the learning that culture change is very, very challenging:

It’s a journey that takes the type of leadership courage shown by Southgate.

It doesn’t all happen in one football tournament or in one business quarter

It demands persistence, consistent messaging, actions , reinforcing the change

You need to commit to treat your inevitable setbacks as learnings to build on

Gareth Southgate has signed a contract extension to 2024 and will now have an opportunity to build on the foundations he created and learnings as he continues in the role of England manager

What are the leadership lessons you take away from the drama of the England football manager?

If reading this has challenged or inspired you to or you want to explore this some more arrange a conversation with me.

28th June 2023