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Guardian article about younger managers includes a lot on his routine
But it’s also because modern management is exhausting. At Ipswich, Kieran McKenna would have his coaches present their plans to him for the day at 6am, altering anything he felt wasn’t quite right. That plan would be sent to the staff at the training ground to set up all the various pitches and drills. McKenna would then go to check everything was laid out properly. It was all extraordinarily detailed; everything was marked out, down to where players should stand when they weren’t directly involved and where water bottles would be placed.
During 11 v 11 practice games, McKenna would be the only one who coached. Over his five years at Ipswich, no drill was ever repeated in exactly the same form; repetition and possible staleness were to be avoided at all costs. Little wonder that after a third promotion in five seasons at the club, he felt exhausted, in need of a break rather than taking on an uneven fight in an ungrateful Premier League that could only sap his reserves further
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 22:30 - Aug 29 by pointofblue
It's no wonder he felt he needed a break!
Yes! Exactly. He was exhausted.
And last season his greatest triumph because players joined late, had to deal with t huge pressure, very tough championship, some idiots having a pop at him and lots of bad luck. Managed to steer us through.
Everything that comes is built on the back of his work.
[Post edited 29 Aug 22:32]
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 22:38 - Aug 29 with 4568 views
Its interesting about the no repetitive stuff. One of the grumblings about his coaching at utd was that they were all very borderline schooly and repetitive.
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 22:38 - Aug 29 by FrimleyBlue
Its interesting about the no repetitive stuff. One of the grumblings about his coaching at utd was that they were all very borderline schooly and repetitive.
Yes, the 'school teacher'. I think that tells you a lot about the spoilt primma donnas at United at the time rather than anything about KM.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 22:48 - Aug 29 with 4418 views
unnecessary over detailing. He needs to learn how to ration his energy. Should have trusted his coaches to do what they are paid to do. In all organisations you have to learn to rely on those under you. You can't do it all and it appears he tried to. Ridiculous really. No wonder he was knackered.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 23:14 - Aug 29 with 4247 views
I'll start by saying this - he's 40 years old and it was his first managerial job. He did everything how he thought it should be done and how his character needed it to be done. He was true to himself and that deserves total respect.
I feared KM leaving, but its happened now and we're moving on to a new chapter - thanks to KM
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 23:14 - Aug 29 by mellowblue
unnecessary over detailing. He needs to learn how to ration his energy. Should have trusted his coaches to do what they are paid to do. In all organisations you have to learn to rely on those under you. You can't do it all and it appears he tried to. Ridiculous really. No wonder he was knackered.
How many promotions have you managed your team to in the last four years, again?
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 03:12 - Aug 30 with 3571 views
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 22:32 - Aug 29 by jasondozzell
Yes! Exactly. He was exhausted.
And last season his greatest triumph because players joined late, had to deal with t huge pressure, very tough championship, some idiots having a pop at him and lots of bad luck. Managed to steer us through.
Everything that comes is built on the back of his work.
[Post edited 29 Aug 22:32]
Getting promoted to the PL the year after being promoted was astonishing.
At the start of that season we were more worried about being relegated. The bookies odds of us being promoted were very attractive. And look at the players we had, most have now left and are plying their trade in the championship or League 1. We were up against many strong, recently relegated teams who had lots of money. And we did it with such style, too. It was so exciting.
I rate it the greatest promotion I’ve seen, and by some distance.
Last season was impressive, too, and for the reasons you suggest. However, he had amazing players, Championship stars, and he’d been successful in the Championship before. He knew what to do. Clearly, it exhausted him, and some of the behind the scene stuff, well, I can’t imagine how much that took out of him.
I hope he rests up well, and comes back refreshed and ready to go again for another team. Personally, I hope he goes and coaches abroad - what an opportunity to learn that would be.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 07:41 - Aug 30 with 2992 views
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 03:12 - Aug 30 by Benters
Good luck to him in whatever he does.
100% my fear for him is if he takes another job will it be any less stressful e.g. Celtic would be way worse with the expectations and European football to contend with.
As I have said before I just hope he and his family are OK first and foremost.
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 03:39 - Aug 30 by BlueBlueBluex2
He is right though.
Not delegating was a mistake in itself and if he was exhausted then it could have been avoided.
I suppose you can look at it in several ways. Whilst what he did here was utterly incredible, it also demonstrates a personality that is very rigid, maybe at times even controlling behaviour, but definitely on the autistic spectrum with the intense attention to detail, never wavering from a particular way of functioning.
I used to think he wouldn't do things any other way ( adaptability/ flexibility etc) but I now think he " couldnt" do it any other way. His mental thought processes are extremely high functioning demonstrated by his attention to even the minutest detail, and he never deviated from , what to many, would appear as very rigid, meticulous planning, which would not, by many, be considered as " normal" behaviour, and certainly not sustainable.
Kieran is definitely a wonderful, one off in the game I think, and im sure when he's ready to return he'll have many suitors, but im not sure his mental health will cope with the demands in thd game, given his personality traits.
If it wasn't for the fact that so many people have spoken about this, you almost wouldn't believe it would you.
It has obviously been hugely successful for KM and we have reaped the benefits but you have to ask yourself whether this level of micro management will be sustainable for his long-term career.
I suppose the average length of jobs now might have him thinking that he can work in this manner and have rest periods after each one, but we all know how quickly managers can become the forgotten man when out of the game too long!
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 07:55 - Aug 30 with 2905 views
Without a doubt he was hard working, but (admittedly based on these paragraphs), to an experienced business leader this could indicate a leaning towards micromanagement and not necessarily 100% trust in his reports if he feels he has to check and approve training plans etc. and all have to meet his very high standards.
One of the toughest lessons to learn in management and leadership is trusting in your direct reports that they understand what the team is trying to achieve and are capable of supporting those aims fully.
New leaders often earn roles because they were excellent individual contributors, so their instinct under pressure is to fall back on doing the work themselves rather than directing others to do it. Delegation feels slower and riskier than just handling it personally, especially early on when they haven't yet calibrated how much they can trust their team's judgment.
Perfectionism compounds this. Inexperienced leaders frequently equate their own standards with the only acceptable standard, so they either avoid delegating meaningful work or delegate it but then re-do or heavily rework what comes back; which defeats the purpose and burns even more of their time. There's also often an unspoken fear that delegating and something going wrong will reflect on them personally (100% true in football where the manager almost always carries the can individually for team failure) which pushes toward over-control rather than trust.
The above leads to a workload that scales with role size instead of shrinking, because they're carrying both their own job and a shadow version of everyone else's. Over time that's a direct path to burnout long hours, constant context-switching, and no real capacity buffer.
I do wonder how much support KM got and/or accepted and the loss of some of his key coaching staff periodically impacted this.
Like I said, I am only basing this on what was written in those 3 paragraphs and is not intended as a criticism of KM as he carried enormous pressure on young shoulders with the clubs rapid ascent.
[Post edited 30 Aug 8:22]
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 08:00 - Aug 30 with 2846 views
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 23:14 - Aug 29 by mellowblue
unnecessary over detailing. He needs to learn how to ration his energy. Should have trusted his coaches to do what they are paid to do. In all organisations you have to learn to rely on those under you. You can't do it all and it appears he tried to. Ridiculous really. No wonder he was knackered.
Yes, the more I read about how KMc worked the more concerning it sounds.
It goes without saying the MASSIVE respect for him, thanks to him and love for him that I think all Town fans feel, and he should be very, very proud of what he achieved - a top, top football manager and human being.
But there are great risks to self and family from working like this for an extended period, and oversight really ought to be preventing that from happening again. I hope that the extremely lucky next club to employ him makes sure that that oversight is in place.
Good work by Philogene...... GREAT WORK BY PHILOGENE!!!
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 23:14 - Aug 29 by mellowblue
unnecessary over detailing. He needs to learn how to ration his energy. Should have trusted his coaches to do what they are paid to do. In all organisations you have to learn to rely on those under you. You can't do it all and it appears he tried to. Ridiculous really. No wonder he was knackered.
Have to agree with you.
As a manager if you cannot trust those below you, and feel the need to do everything yourself, something in the structure is badly wrong.
It is an interesting insight, and if that is the story of the new breed of managers I can't see any of them having longevity - burnout is inevitable.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 08:17 - Aug 30 with 2722 views
I'm not for one moment questioning the legitimacy of this article. However with regards to the 'No drill was ever repeated', I find this hard to believe. Our band of brothers often spoke about repetition in a positive way, knowing where each other would be at all times.
KMc was extremely hard working. People from the training ground have personally told me numerous times his eye for detail and work ethic was second to none. Most often first in and last to leave and we both reaped the successes because of this.
I don't know what happens at too many other clubs but I would imagine many of these young coaches are exactly the same though. Small margins and gains are what set apart the good from the very good.
I haven't spoken to anyone since GON has been in charge but I would imagine he's equally as hard working. Time to get behind him fully as not keep dragging up the past in my opinion.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 08:19 - Aug 30 with 2699 views
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 00:41 - Aug 30 by Libero
How many promotions have you managed your team to in the last four years, again?
Makes no difference. Management and leadership has a consistent set of inter transferable skills which can be recognised across different industries, the differentiation tends to just be industry knowledge and skills. Core leadership ability is consistent.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 08:31 - Aug 30 with 2606 views
To me that shows a lack of trust in his coaching staff and the kind of micro management that can’t be good for a persons health.
Hopefully he’ll learn from his experience here and have a better work/ personal life balance in his next job.
Sometimes I think about the frothing lunatics I’ve put on ignore, who will have kept replying to me again and again, but I don’t even realise they exist.
Will forever be grateful for what he did for us, I hope for his own sake that he finds a more sustainable way of working going forward. Important to remember this was his first managerial job, you wouldn't expect anyone to get it 100% right straight away.
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Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 10:19 - Aug 30 with 2122 views
Want to know how hard KM worked for us? on 23:38 - Aug 29 by wiltshireblue
I'll start by saying this - he's 40 years old and it was his first managerial job. He did everything how he thought it should be done and how his character needed it to be done. He was true to himself and that deserves total respect.
I feared KM leaving, but its happened now and we're moving on to a new chapter - thanks to KM
I hope he rests up and is happy, whatever he does
[Post edited 30 Aug 1:19]
I managed for a while at Amazon. I know that is a swear word for some people. But, they expected three things (actually millions of things 😀) but condensed in to three. 1) Manage your area 2) manage your team 3) manage yourself. There wasn’t a hierarchy in these, you were expected to interleave them.
KM needs to learn to manage himself, maybe he hasn’t had the right example previously? Maybe he was so keen to set the example when he first arrived and couldn’t then ramp it back. Maybe delegation is a challenge for him, it is for so many. Maybe maybe….
He was awesome, but still has development areas. I truly hope for his sake he tries a different approach, maybe only a tweak here or there, and is super successful in his next role.
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