Vision - Strategy - Philosophy - Methodology - Recruitment - Talent Development

In professional sports as well as in the World of business, as a company/organisation/club you need to create:

A shared vision - a strategy - the philosophy - the methodology + to connect your recruitment & talent development/pathway to the main strategy - to succeed over time.

In the end of 2014, I arrived to a newly founded club in China, Shanghai SIPG F.C., where we created the football-strategy; “The SIPG Way’. A huge task to build a club and a new strategy from the ground, but also fascinating as we could freely move towards our targets as of no previous culture- or organisational-behaviours in our way.

‘The SIPG Way’ was also our ability to unite the club. From the 1. team to the academy and throughout the organisation. A central question for a leader is: Why do we/the employees go to work? And do the employees understand the ‘big picture’ and do they feel engaged by our shared vision? If not - it’s just a meaningless paper or a time wasting slideshow every 6 month.

I believe we can conclude; we have come quite far in these nearly 4 years time since the foundation of ‘The SIPG Way’. And this past week was a significant step in direction of the future steps as our youth development plan - connected to the main strategy - was finalized and sent out to our 55 academy clinics around China.

Therefore more than 11.000 players, coaches and organisations around China are now connected to ‘The SIPG Way’ working under the same vision and towards the same targets for the future.

In my World; this detailed pathway & shared vision is the only way over time for a professional organisation to succeed.