Real-Life Decision Making -- Solution
You keep the current coach and risk embarrassment.
After careful consideration, you decide that it's not worth the risk
of breaking up a winning team to replace their coach. You reason that you
can wait until the end of the season. After all, the media hasn't learned
of the coach's poor behavior yet. If you bring it to the coach's attention,
maybe you can prevent that from happening.
You ask the current coach to meet with you. You explain that you and the
other executives know what he has been doing, and that you plan to replace
him at the end of the season. The coach is upset and claims that you are wrong.
Within two months, the media discovers embarassing information about the
coach. It becomes front-page news.
The team is embarrassed and the coach has been exposed. That means he can't
get another job when your organization fires him.
What's more, because of the poor image that this coach's actions
portray of your organization and team, the prospective coach that you had
been negotiating with decides he doesn't want to be associated with you.
You've lost the only other option that you had.
It takes a while, but you finally do find another coach. He's not
as good as the one you wanted, and the team begins to lose games more frequently.
Your record is destroyed and the blow to your reputation will take a long
while to repair.
"It's tough to hire the best and most appropriate professional staff
to do this important job," says Gayle Fenton. She is the director of student
athlete services at a university. "I have made a couple of mistakes in the
past with candidates that sounded wonderful, and then were found to have no
work ethic. It's also not easy to fire people."