The Toronto Maple Leafs are gradually morphing into an entirely new entity. The Leafs are no longer looking like a “hockey team.” They’re taking on the shape of a corporation.
Monday’s formal announcement of Judd Brackett joining the front office as an assistant general manager (AGM) and Freddie Hamilton as a Chief of Staff suggests that the organization isn’t trying to function like a run-of-the-mill hockey club.
It’s looking more like the way a major corporation would work.
The hiring of Brackett is certainly a hockey decision. It’s a great one, and one that promises to maximize the club’s current resources and those to come.
But beyond that, the team is taking on a business-like structure. That was something that Keith Pelley pontificated about during this press conference following the dismissal of Brad Treliving. Pelley harped so much about having the right structure, then the right people, and finally going through the execution.
It seems Mr. Pelley read the book Good to Great by James C. Collins. If you haven’t read it, you certainly should, even if you’re not necessarily a business person.
Specifically, there’s a passage in the book that uses the metaphor of a bus. Every corporation is like a bus. The good ones have good people riding them and making them run. The great corporations have the right person driving it, with the remaining seats occupied by people who are the best fit for that particular role.
They may not necessarily be the absolute best at what they do. But they are the right fit for that organization and its structure.
That’s what Brackett and Hamilton’s hirings are all about. It’s about getting the right people into spots where they can excel based on their skill sets.
Why do Maple Leafs need a “chief of staff”?
So, what is this chief of staff business all about?
Well, in political circles, a chief of staff acts more like a gatekeeper. The chief of staff shields the most important individual in an organization from all the noise around them. That allows for a better flow of communication and decision-making.
As The Athletic reported, according to Chayka’s remarks, the chief of staff will:
“…support strategic planning and cross-functional initiatives across the hockey operations department while working closely with the club’s leadership group.”
That’s business-speak for a person who will coordinate among the hockey-related ops and then liaise with the higher-ups. So, the chief of staff will be looking to communicate with everyone across various levels. The goal is to eliminate the “broken telephone” within the organization.
The addition of this relatively new position seems to indicate that there was plenty of miscommunication across various levels. Without a centralized channel funneling the information, it seems that time and effort were wasted getting messages across various levels.
Yes, this particular structure doesn’t sound like a hip, sexy hockey-based structure or something. It’s a sound business practice. It looks to foster transparency and accountability at the front office level.
Whether all of this management maneuvering turns into a winning product on the ice, that’s another story entirely.
At the very least, the Maple Leafs are thinking long term. The organization is setting itself up for what could be a full-on rebuild, should things ever get to that point.
Add us as a preferred source on Google