Gladwell's Line - President Croce caught at helm in Perfect Storm

by Richard Gladwell, Sail-World.com on 15 Nov 2016 After a year or more punctuated with issues that should not have happened, it is perhaps no real surprise that incumbent President Carlo Croce (ITA) was unseated mid-way through what should have been an eight-year term.

Also gone is one of his lieutenants, Chris Atkins (GBR) as Vice President, who remarkably polled 13th out of the 15 candidates.

The litany of issues that occurred on Croce's watch is well known:

- the Dirk de Ridder Appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport against the suspension imposed by World Sailing/ISAF;

- the exclusion of Israeli sailors from the 2015 Youth Worlds and then the revelation that this situation has been ongoing in other events for a couple of years or so;

- the water quality issues in Rio de Janeiro;

- the exclusion of Sailing for the 2020 Paralympics;

- the latest reshaping of the Sailing World Cup, with no events in the Southern Hemisphere;

- the clumsy handling of the issues surrounding the incorporation of Kiteboard into in World Sailing, and the view that Kites had been allocated priority on the 2020 Olympic slate, plus the mixed messages over gender equality and Tokyo 2020 generally.

Then there were the peripheral issues, all of which had an innocent explanation. In response to questions about where various sponsorship monies were going, Croce would have been well advised to have taken a leaf out of his former President Paul Henderson's quote-book and simply replied 'for Sailing.'

Given a couple of facts, it is too easy to join up the dots in a particular direction and get to some sinister destination. One has to be very sure of the facts and have documents or images to back up claims of misdeeds for personal gain, and Croce was justified to be very upset by such insinuations.

Wrong timing
But the President's Address was not the time or place to ventilate these issues. They should have been handled through his communication to the MNA's at the time they first occurred, and directly/publicly with the individuals involved.

To be fair, the softly spoken Italian was let down by his organisation. ISAF Secretary General, Jerome Pels, departed in October 2014, after 17 years with the organisation, having served as the nominal helmsman since June 2008. At that time, Croce was left with no organisational head in place until Peter Sowrey was appointed as CEO in July of 2015. Of course he only lasted a little over five months and then there was another, shorter hiatus, before Andy Hunt arrived.

For too long, and at a critical time, Sailing was left to run on Cruise Control, at a time when it needed a more direct, hands-on approach.

Croce spoke of personal health and other family problems, which happen to us all at some time or another. He faced the difficult choice as the whether to deal with the ones he loved as well as the sport in which he was so involved, which simultaneously has critical issues that demand a President's attention, decision, and action. One of the inherent faults in the then ISAF structure is that there are seven Vice-Presidents, with not a single person designated to step in and act in the President's stead. In the past, this role has fallen to the CEO, but with no CEO in place either, Croce got swallowed up by events while his attentions were required elsewhere.

Against this backdrop, plus the myriad of complexities around making Sailing progress at a reasonable pace - while restricting the collateral damage, Croce would have his work cut-out - even if he was available full-time, fully paid, and living in England where World Sailing is sequestered. The circumstances of his Presidency, in hindsight, made it near mission impossible.

'We have the world record for Committees,' he opined.

Hunt steps on the accelerator
The arrival of new CEO Andy Hunt (GBR) didn't immediately resolve the situation. Hunt seemed to be keen to put his stamp on the organisation, show that a new CEO had arrived and was in charge. Externally World Sailing appeared to go from a state of inertia to taking off like a drag racer, with accompanying speed wobbles, smoke, and burning rubber. In his address, Croce described Hunt's arrival as 'like having a Ferrari engine in a little Volkswagen.'

Hunt's fast-takeoff triggered the process for an attempt at Presidential change. The concern was that World Sailing's management was dancing to the IOC's tune- and that had quite serious implications for the sport and individual investment.

That process started with some disquieted individuals and then gathered some momentum amongst Member National Authorities, and then challengers started appearing for a shot at the Presidential position mid-way through what should have been Carlo Croce's eight-year term.

Former President, Paul Henderson (CAN) was first to declare his hand in an attempt to unseat a sitting President for the first time in World Sailing's recent history, at least.

Then Denmark's Kim Andersen's supporters made it known that their man had his hat in the ring as well. Both were regarded as long shots.

Initially, Croce looked set for a second term, with a cast of 45 MNA's nominating him for another four years. That was just five short of the 50% it proved he need to carry the day in Barcelona in November 2016.

A Comms battle
But the three-way race developed momentum, and while former President Paul Henderson never seriously expected to win he did get a soap-box for his views. Employing his well practiced direct communication skills, Henderson started to make his points.

Kim Anderson to came through as a quieter alternative to Henderson and one would be more acceptable to the MNA's not committed to Croce.

The just concluded Annual Conference of World Sailing was almost the 'Get out of Jail' card that Croce needed. He seemed to get on well with CEO Andy Hunt, and although completely different people, outwardly there seemed to be good chemistry and warmth between the Brit and the Italian who seemed to have settled into a good working relationship. But it was too late.

Carlo Croce's opening President's speech to the Conference while intended to set the record straight on the key points got too much into the personal detail and went 'off- message.'

The underlying theme of Croce's opening speech was that there was another side to many of the issues which had beset his Presidency. Croce made the mistake of letting a few too many cats out of the bag. Such issues should have been left at home or handled at a later time.

But instead, Croce elected to bare his somewhat tortured soul, and the effect seemed to firm up support for a change. Sometimes there things that are better left unsaid. Timing is all important.

Little changes in 40 years
In an interview published after a visit to New Zealand in 1975, Carlo Croce's father Dr Beppe Croce said in SeaSpray magazine: 'We now have 74 member nations and lots of communication problems - so we decided to begin personal meetings in various countries.'

Communication is a fundamental issue for any organisation such as World Sailing, and particularly for candidates in a three-way global presidential election.

Despite the dramatic changes in communications technology and the fact that the then ISAF was one of the first world sporting bodies to embrace the interweb, Carlo Croce seemed unwilling to engage directly with the international sailing media.

In the run-up to the 2016 election, Carlo Croce's 'manifesto' came via a PR consultancy also working for World Sailing. In itself that is harmless enough, but it isn't a good look. A personally written email and a few interviews answering the hard questions would have been much more effective.

With only rusty communication channels available, Croce was doomed to fail when he needed to open two-way dialog outside his inner sanctum. The PR-bypass gave a message of one-way communication only and made Croce appear distant.

Unfortunately, the quietly spoken Italian came up against one of the most adept direct communicators in sailing.

In a few nano-seconds, Paul Henderson will usually get most sailing bureaucrats seething. Like few before him, and none since, the rambunctious 81yr old Canadian has a very direct way of talking to people at all levels of the media and sailing public. Even, more importantly, he responds readily to media (and one assumes sailor queries).

Outside World Sailing, other sailing leaders have the same ability to forge off-the-record relationships with media and others, to achieve what the PR managers almost always fail to do.

Any PR Manager or CEO for that matter who treats the media as the enemy, rather than an ally, is an idiot and their organisation is bound to fail - it is just a matter of when.

Croce stepped into this trap several times over the course of the Annual Conference. His comments that World Sailing always had the Rio water quality issues under control was an amazing claim. 'It was not a calculated risk. It was not a risk. We knew exactly where we were standing. We knew we could stop within one hour... if we had the warning from the World Health Organisation ... No-one had even a headache out of the 360 sailors.' However that statement ignores the PR consequences of Rio 2016 organisers calling a time-out on the back of a WHO warning which would have sent world media into a feeding frenzy.

Similarly with the pirouettes over what the International Olympic Committee meant with Agenda 2020 items. What did 'gender equality' really mean? How many events for Sailing there will be in 2020? Where did Kiteboarding fit within the 2020 Olympic Sailing mix? Why was there was an urgent need to 'unlock' the previous Council decision to protect many classes from being subject to change?

Of course communicating this sort of detail is not easy, but some sailing organisations manage to do it. And, without issuing 'good news' media releases, which raise more questions than answers.

The way the Volvo Ocean Race handled the Team Vestas Wind incident and recovery was a model that World Sailing could well follow - including the use of online international media conferences so that everyone got the same information at the same time and had the ability to ask questions and get answers that stacked up. And again, with the way Volvo Ocean Race handled the release of the report into the grounding - a very technical document which Rear Admiral Chris Oxenbould AO RAN (Rtd) traversed with a large media group against a backdrop of a delicate insurance situation and other delicate issues.

Difficult questions have to be asked in media conferences/interviews and answered directly and honestly.

Most organisations get the PR they deserve. World Sailing doesn't need to look too far in the sailing world to see the truth of that statement. In the end, World Sailing and Carlo Croce should not be surprised at the election outcome.

A week is a long time in politics, sailing or otherwise. An earlier unburdening by Carlo Croce to media free of World Sailing's minders might have let him live to see out his term. In his President's address, Croce came across as a very genuine person, who greatly cares for the sport and was trying to do his best.

Unfortunately the sport has grown from the 74 MNA's of his father's era as President back in the early/mid 1970's to over 140 currently; from an Olympic regatta with five classes to the current 10 or 11 events; and around 80 classes each of whom are entitled to hold at least one world championship every year.

World Sailing is quite a different beast from the International Yacht Racing Union of his father's day. Croce was an outsider when he entered the ISAF-lair. He was well known in European administrative circles but was not on any ISAF committees when he won the Presidency against Australia's long-serving David Kellett and Puerto Rico's Eric Tulla. Maybe Croce thought he knew the workings of the ISAF mosh-pit from his seat in the bleachers.

He had a rocky ride almost from the get-go and was not perceived in the wider world of sailing as being in control of the issues (as much as they could be controlled). But either way, Carlo's message had to get out, and that didn't happen.

Hopefully, Carlo Croce will soon realise that personally, he is better off out of the World Sailing orbit. History won't remember his contribution as a failure, rather as someone caught on the helm in a Perfect Storm, and who got World Sailing through the worst of it. He should be remembered as being President at the start of what is hopefully a great era of Sailing.

Whether those who follow can do any better remains to be seen. Words and intentions and fine interviews are all very well, but unfortunately, those involved in sports administration are often harshly judged by their actions and achievements and also the processes they follow.

Aside from the Election battle casualties, the Annual Conference, from an external perspective, seemed to be a success. An outstanding success in fact. Just being able to view the meetings online clears away the smoke and allows the sailing public and media to see the flame and develop an understanding of what is happening and the direction being taken and why.

It was pleasing to see some of the class associations, notably the combined 49er/49erFX and Nacra 17 group having a significant input, and forcing the pace of considered change against some committee or working party who always seem to want more consideration time.

As Croce's predecessor, Goran Petersson (SWE) once wryly noted of ISAF issues: 'Everyone knows the questions, but the answers are more difficult.'

Day 1 of the World Sailing Council - President's Address starts at 15.35min into the video