List Mgmt. Ben Amarfio - has resigned as our CEO - Thank you Ben

[zoomba23]

He pulls the grammar card out and he scores!!!!!

10 points to Gryffindor

I'm Hufflepuff, fyi. Just making an observation though. It isn't a card, it's just usually a sign that your education is a bit iffy. And following on from that poor education, it makes you more predisposed to... well, you can work it out

 

[Dan]

I'm Hufflepuff, fyi. Just making an observation though. It isn't a card, it's just usually a sign that your education is a bit iffy. And following on from that poor education, it makes you more predisposed to... well, you can work it out

You’ve made me feel very insecure

From now on I’m gonna have to proofread everything I post.

Sh!t

 

[Massive Unit]

This thread has derailed spectacularly.

I would say he has done a fantastic job to keep our sponsors happy for the foreseeable future and maintain the club's 'zero debt' status. That doesn't come easy.

Ben is not perfect. None of us are. When the club executes a huge cull and takes on the dangerous prospect of a rebuild, sometimes things will go wrong even when we make the right choices. It's just the way rebuilds are and it's up to the club and it's players to get through that. Are we being too harsh on Ben? Most of the footy department was in place before he arrived. During his tenure, Only Noble was appointed as senior coach (the right call at the time) so what exactly do we need our CEO to do? Is Ben to blame for the list management quitting? We haven't heard s**t since they left so what exactly was true about the club internally?

We've just got Clarko and potentially his team, just finished a review (yet to action) and we've maintained our relationship with Mazda. All whilst he has been CEO.

He's doing well. He probably should be shifted to focus on the commercial side to maximise his impact but he's not making the club into a rabble. Do we have concrete evidence to backup 'issues' with his position and responsibilities?

Checkout *Essendons CEO for comparison. Ben's smashing them in straight sets.

I'm sure the review will sort out the footy dept things anyway.

The entirety of Carl's tenure saw many frustrating H&A seasons with a vastly superior list and more soft cap space, do we look at his performance?

He is taking on a rebuild whilst trying to keep the club financially healthy. Not easy.

This ^

As I said in an earlier post, Ben has done an amazing job with the commercials. We are financially healthier than ever before in the clubs history and we will only go from strength to strength as we build an asset base.

The glaring hole is the performance of the football department, which I understand reports through to Ben, so the lack of football background comes into question. This is impacted by his ability (or lack thereof) to challenge decisions and strategy within the football department.

This is my primary concern. As amaz199 has said, it can be fixed by surrounding him with people who have strong football pedigree, or possibly moving him into a COO/CFO role and bringing in a CEO with strong football background.

Either way, I'd expect Sonja to work through it with him during the offseason.

 

[RossHenshaw]

Oh this gets better.

Might have been? You can claim family heritage on a maybe?

 

[Hearts to hearts]

It seems people not only struggle to grasp the definition of the CEO role but also the definition of the word racist.

I can’t believe the racism issue is even being discussed here. We are all supporters of the same club here, and I honestly haven’t seen any racist comments here in my time on this forum which is nearly 20 years.

But how on earth criticism of a CEO leads us to the racism debate is beyond me. Next we will be told that we aren’t allowed to criticize players because that’s borderline racist. I mean stating the fact that Spicer recently played one of the worst games I’ve seen from a North player ever, could be construed as racism by some, but surely this rubbish has to be called out.


On iPhone using BigFooty.com mobile app

It’s not valid criticism that got us here. And no offence but it’s easy for people to not see or read comments as racism if it doesn’t affect them, like it’s easy for some people not to see misogyny or homophobia.

 

[the flying ham]

It’s not valid criticism that got us here. And no offence but it’s easy for people to not see or read comments as racism if it doesn’t affect them, like it’s easy for some people not to see misogyny or homophobia.

H2H, we have been if not the worst football club, one of the worst, in the modern area. People querying the CEOs role in this is valid, and the tap-dancing around his role for next year doesn't alleviate the concerns.

FWIW commercially we have never been in a better position, Euge balancing the books and giving a foundation for Ben to come in and further improve our off field position. Aa far as CEO resumes go, unless we grab Brian Cook, you would struggle to find someone with a better pedigree for Sports Admin than Ben. And he seems like the type that in order to make an omelette you have to crack a few eggs.

It's refreshing to have someone who can work on building our corporate profile, and do so with an assertive mindset that traditionally the club hasn't had. We have long subscribed to the small battler mentality, and consequently that has impacted our ability to build our profile.

I think the next couple months will demonstrate what the club thinks of Ben and his efforts. If he is no longer at the club you can assume that they were unhappy with some aspects of his performance, and if he moves to a COO role then its a resounding endorsement of his abilities and acumen. Either way, there certainly is a degree of smoke and shadows behind the windows with his role moving forward

 

[The acurate one]

It’s not valid criticism that got us here. And no offence but it’s easy for people to not see or read comments as racism if it doesn’t affect them, like it’s easy for some people not to see misogyny or homophobia.

I had homophobia during one of our many lockdowns- I hated being there. That of course is a joke some may suggest a poor one, I'll say it again. I stopped caring about what others think. Or especially those that don't matter to me.

I seriously doubt though that BA is in the gun due to race, lack of football knowledge has gotten us here. That of course can be learned. He is vey good at the commercial side of the business and that should be his focus.

Same as Patch needs to study under Clarko and take the reins in five years, a master planner that I am.

 

[ferball]

I had homophobia during one of our many lockdowns- I hated being there. That of course is a joke some may suggest a poor one, I'll say it again. I stopped caring about what others think. Or especially those that don't matter to me.

I seriously doubt though that BA is in the gun due to race, lack of football knowledge has gotten us here. That of course can be learned. He is vey good at the commercial side of the business and that should be his focus.

Same as Patch needs to study under Clarko and take the reins in five years, a master planner that I am.

Lack of footy knowledge didn't get us here. Years of topping up and a footy department that was seen as a joke across the industry, then making the decision to draw a line under that, burn the list and footy department and rebuild from the ground up is what's brought us to this point.

 

[ArchKing Carey]

One of the few clubs to make a profit in the last two years with the pandemic on. Signed on new sponsors in an environment where businesses are looking to start saving costs.

On the commercial front he should be applauded. A CEO isn't always liked by their staff especially if he had to make cuts to a department or sit in on various departmental meetings. He has to be brutal at times and be a headkicker.

Now, why are the media trying to remove Ben as CEO when you can see there hasn't been as many calls on Essendon's CEO from the media after their current debacle? He's been there since 2014 too.

 

[The acurate one]

Lack of footy knowledge didn't get us here. Years of topping up and a footy department that was seen as a joke across the industry, then making the decision to draw a line under that, burn the list and footy department and rebuild from the ground up is what's brought us to this point.

Yes it did ya wrong

 

[Bren]

Can we delete this thread and start again?

I will kick it off....

Welcome aboard Ben, i look forward to you making this club debt free!!

 

[Handsome.B.Wonderful]

If it is true that Clarkson stipulated that Amarfio should go, I sincerely hope that has nothing to do with Al’s friendship with David Barham.

 

[travelli]

One of the few clubs to make a profit in the last two years with the pandemic on. Signed on new sponsors in an environment where businesses are looking to start saving costs.

On the commercial front he should be applauded. A CEO isn't always liked by their staff especially if he had to make cuts to a department or sit in on various departmental meetings. He has to be brutal at times and be a headkicker.

Now, why are the media trying to remove Ben as CEO when you can see there hasn't been as many calls on Essendon's CEO from the media after their current debacle? He's been there since 2014 too.

I'm not worried about the results, perhaps more the method. It's easy to say "break a few eggs" but not so when you are the egg.

I'm a worker. I don't like bullying/belittling bosses. I've had them before and it can really run an organisation down. That's why I am loving Sonya's involvement. Healing hurts, getting people on message, moving forward.

 

[Kangaroos techno]

LOL You're such a cry baby. Get over it. Apart from ******* and his comment I haven't accused people of anything in this thread. You said Chad is accusing people of racism, but he hasn't accused anyone of anything either. There's a clear difference between valid criticism and being a ******* and its been clearly explained to you but you're still carrying on like a child with this "everyone says criticism is racism" rubbish.

Some people hide racism in s**t criticism, other people have valid criticisms of people of other races that hold up under their own merits, its easy to sus out what is what if you examine the criticism itself.

Correct, he didn't call anyone out personally. He made a blanket statement that suggested that past and future criticisms of BA have a hint of racism attached. You can paint however you like but everyone read it's why several people called it out.

 

[Tas]

This ^

As I said in an earlier post, Ben has done an amazing job with the commercials. We are financially healthier than ever before in the clubs history and we will only go from strength to strength as we build an asset base.

The glaring hole is the performance of the football department, which I understand reports through to Ben, so the lack of football background comes into question. This is impacted by his ability (or lack thereof) to challenge decisions and strategy within the football department.

This is my primary concern. As amaz199 has said, it can be fixed by surrounding him with people who have strong football pedigree, or possibly moving him into a COO/CFO role and bringing in a CEO with strong football background.

Either way, I'd expect Sonja to work through it with him during the offseason.

A CEO needs to understand the fundamentals of the business and how it operates to be able to assess how people underneath him are performing, but he doesn't need to be an expert at every level, he just needs to understand how well they are performing their roles. However, the less you understand about the industry you are in, the more you are reliant on experts in other management roles who are experts in their particular fields.

The three core areas of a football club would be recruitment, development and head coach for on-field performance. Development can be split between physical development(strength & conditioning), skill development and medical(treatment and prevention). You don't slide to the bottom unless you are failing in all three fields at the same time.

Our "serious" problems started to arise when we had Carl Dilena performing too many roles which were meant to check and balance each other. He was our General Manager, CEO and board member. He oversaw bringing in Cam Joyce in 2016 to replace Geoff Walsh as Manager of Football and McMahon was poached from Geelong, who was one of their recruiters, to be our List Manager. Neither of these two had any experience in the senior roles.

We had great upheaval in 2019, Dilena "stepped down" from all his roles and left the club, Joyce and McMahon also were let go.

We brought in Rawlings in 2019 to replace Cam Joyce's role, Rawlings was Eagles List Manager and again, he had no experience in the GM of Football role. This was an appointment by Buckley in June. Buckley would also appoint Ben as CEO in November the same year and Covid hit early the following year.

At the end of last year we brought in McPherson to be GM of Football Performance and Rawlings was moved into a new role called GM of Football Talent, whatever the **** that is. I assumed it oversees recruitment which resulted into the exodus earlier this year, including National Recruiting Manager in Mark Finnigan and Head of Player Personnel, Glenn Luff who was our List Manager since 2018.

There has been a fair bit of instability at our football department, it becomes much harder to assess performance when there is a bit of a revolving door with the leaders. We also had a lack of experience in terms of senior roles, so Ben had to deal with people learning the ropes.

Clarkson is going to come in and replace Noble, I would expect to see more change because from the outside looking in it seems we have recruited a lot of players who need a lot of development work to determine if they will come good or not. I think we identified players with a high ceiling but our player development has been dysfunctional at best where only those who strive to improve get anywhere and in some cases like LDU, he had to get someone external to help his physical development. That is an indictment on the club and it must be addressed.

I don't think McPherson has had enough time to tell if he has done a good job or not, there is going to be lag time between when something is implemented and when you can visibly see change.

We have 16 players on our list who are under 80kg and another 11 between 80 and 85. You might think oh it is only our 18 and 19 year olds that are under 80kg... no. Taylor is 22, 187cm.. 78kg. Scott 22, 186cm.. 77kg. Simpkin 24, 182cm... 77kg. Thomas 22, 189cm... 76kg. Stephenson 23, 188cm.. 75kg. Turner 26, 180cm... 71kg. Some of those in the 80-85kg are KPPs. These players would fit in the Ethiopia vs Somalia AFL teams. I just can't see Clarkson copping this, we are a competitive disadvantage because physically we are at a disadvantage. If you are going to recruit players 10-15kg below AFL standard, you better have a program for them to bridge the gap in 2 years. Not everyone needs to be a beefcake, but our team needs to be able to compete.

 

[Kangaroos techno]

It’s not valid criticism that got us here. And no offence but it’s easy for people to not see or read comments as racism if it doesn’t affect them, like it’s easy for some people not to see misogyny or homophobia.

It's just as easy for people to see it when it doesn't exist either. Own personal experiences bringing it up because of a "vibe".

There are multiple sides H2H. The sooner people understand there are more viewpoints than their own (some legitimate) the better.

 

[Massive Unit]

We have 16 players on our list who are under 80kg and another 11 between 80 and 85. You might think oh it is only our 18 and 19 year olds that are under 80kg... no. Taylor is 22, 187cm.. 78kg. Scott 22, 186cm.. 77kg. Simpkin 24, 182cm... 77kg. Thomas 22, 189cm... 76kg. Stephenson 23, 188cm.. 75kg. Turner 26, 180cm... 71kg. Some of those in the 80-85kg are KPPs. These players would fit in the Ethiopia vs Somalia AFL teams. I just can't see Clarkson copping this, we are a competitive disadvantage because physically we are at a disadvantage. If you are going to recruit players 10-15kg below AFL standard, you better have a program for them to bridge the gap in 2 years. Not everyone needs to be a beefcake, but our team needs to be able to compete.

Just on this, there was a comment made the other night by Corr who said that they didn't have a nutritional program when he got there, but they do now. WTAF????

 

[Tas]

Just on this, there was a comment made the other night by Corr who said that they didn't have a nutritional program when he got there, but they do now. WTAF????

Yeah, it is unacceptable really.

I hope Clarkson comes in and has a hard look at development standards and just give feedback on the changes we need to make to get back to being one of the best in the competition at developing young kids.

A problem we probably had in the past was attracting experienced people in the senior roles, hopefully Clarkson has a lot of pull in terms of getting in some good quality people.

 

[Kangaroos techno]

Just on this, there was a comment made the other night by Corr who said that they didn't have a nutritional program when he got there, but they do now. WTAF????

Wouldn't surprised me if it was stripped during covid budget cuts.

AFL clubs are notorious for not having permanent nutritionists/dietitians. We had a young dietitian that was part time and split her role across the VFL team. Segal did help too (registered APD) but his main focus was strength and conditioning. Some clubs get away with a couple of basic nutrition workshops to help educate the players but that's it.

A lot of the times AFL teams will use a fresh graduate as work experience because they jump at the chance to work in an AFL environment. And that's the extent of their diet program.

From memory GWS was one of the first to hire a legitimate full time dietitian (probably because they had a bigger cap).

I'm shocked it isn't a regular full time position across the clubs (some surely do by now). Especially now teams have VFL and AFLW included. You could hire one individual to cover all 3 teams and put a heavier emphasis on first year players - nutrition 101, cooking classes, meal ideas, supermarket tours, etc.

 

[Carlos Herrrnandez]

I feel a bit for Sam Bingley - the NMFC’s Chief Commercial Officer and on what appears to be the same level as BA.

Great commercial success getting attributed to Benny! What is Sam, a joke to you?

 

[The acurate one]

A CEO needs to understand the fundamentals of the business and how it operates to be able to assess how people underneath him are performing, but he doesn't need to be an expert at every level, he just needs to understand how well they are performing their roles. However, the less you understand about the industry you are in, the more you are reliant on experts in other management roles who are experts in their particular fields.

The three core areas of a football club would be recruitment, development and head coach for on-field performance. Development can be split between physical development(strength & conditioning), skill development and medical(treatment and prevention). You don't slide to the bottom unless you are failing in all three fields at the same time.

Our "serious" problems started to arise when we had Carl Dilena performing too many roles which were meant to check and balance each other. He was our General Manager, CEO and board member. He oversaw bringing in Cam Joyce in 2016 to replace Geoff Walsh as Manager of Football and McMahon was poached from Geelong, who was one of their recruiters, to be our List Manager. Neither of these two had any experience in the senior roles.

We had great upheaval in 2019, Dilena "stepped down" from all his roles and left the club, Joyce and McMahon also were let go.

We brought in Rawlings in 2019 to replace Cam Joyce's role, Rawlings was Eagles List Manager and again, he had no experience in the GM of Football role. This was an appointment by Buckley in June. Buckley would also appoint Ben as CEO in November the same year and Covid hit early the following year.

At the end of last year we brought in McPherson to be GM of Football Performance and Rawlings was moved into a new role called GM of Football Talent, whatever the * that is. I assumed it oversees recruitment which resulted into the exodus earlier this year, including National Recruiting Manager in Mark Finnigan and Head of Player Personnel, Glenn Luff who was our List Manager since 2018.

There has been a fair bit of instability at our football department, it becomes much harder to assess performance when there is a bit of a revolving door with the leaders. We also had a lack of experience in terms of senior roles, so Ben had to deal with people learning the ropes.

Clarkson is going to come in and replace Noble, I would expect to see more change because from the outside looking in it seems we have recruited a lot of players who need a lot of development work to determine if they will come good or not. I think we identified players with a high ceiling but our player development has been dysfunctional at best where only those who strive to improve get anywhere and in some cases like LDU, he had to get someone external to help his physical development. That is an indictment on the club and it must be addressed.

I don't think McPherson has had enough time to tell if he has done a good job or not, there is going to be lag time between when something is implemented and when you can visibly see change.

We have 16 players on our list who are under 80kg and another 11 between 80 and 85. You might think oh it is only our 18 and 19 year olds that are under 80kg... no. Taylor is 22, 187cm.. 78kg. Scott 22, 186cm.. 77kg. Simpkin 24, 182cm... 77kg. Thomas 22, 189cm... 76kg. Stephenson 23, 188cm.. 75kg. Turner 26, 180cm... 71kg. Some of those in the 80-85kg are KPPs. These players would fit in the Ethiopia vs Somalia AFL teams. I just can't see Clarkson copping this, we are a competitive disadvantage because physically we are at a disadvantage. If you are going to recruit players 10-15kg below AFL standard, you better have a program for them to bridge the gap in 2 years. Not everyone needs to be a beefcake, but our team needs to be able to compete.

Well said and football knowledge comes from experience. No other way to achieve it. Like any job really.

I also think the players that you mentioned need to take ownership of how they prepare. Patch said we're not fit enough again. Not sure how many times that needs to be said.

 

[Massive Unit]

I feel a bit for Sam Bingley - the NMFC’s Chief Commercial Officer and on what appears to be the same level as BA.

Great commercial success getting attributed to Benny! What is Sam, a joke to you?

Fair point Carlos. I have no idea how much can be attributable to Sam or Ben, but collectively they are delivering on the commercials.
FWIW, Sam is a ripping bloke too. Always enjoy having a chat with him.

 

[ArchKing Carey]

I'm not worried about the results, perhaps more the method. It's easy to say "break a few eggs" but not so when you are the egg.

I'm a worker. I don't like bullying/belittling bosses. I've had them before and it can really run an organisation down. That's why I am loving Sonya's involvement. Healing hurts, getting people on message, moving forward.

I agree, but what I felt Ben probably played hard ball was a reduced soft cap and reduces revenue streams during the height of the pandemic and had to make hard decisions which rubbed people the wrong way. He may have questioned the need for a lot of things or the way things were done to be able to identify cost efficiencies.
There isn't any evidence of bullying other then hearsay and media driven spin.

 

[Dan]

View attachment 1486810

If you close your eyes and tap your feet together….you can believe anything to be racism…

 

[blackshadow]

If you close your eyes and tap your feet together….you can believe anything to be racism…

**** me dead mate you've really let your redneck colours show.

You must be pretty insecure about your place in the world for your racism to shine through here.