I had foolishly hoped that by watching that film for two hours I might gain at least a glimmer of an answer to my over-arching question 'WHY does RD want to own Charlton in particular, what motivated him in his purchase and what does he want to do with the club? Parts of that question were put indirectly and sometimes in over-verbose ways, but KM only ever vaguely addressed them and was rarely pressed. Perhaps the truth is that she herself doesn't really have any deep understanding of RD's motivation for being involved in a corner of south east London that he shows no interest in visiting. In which case I guess it is hard for her to explain.....the PowerPoint certainly didn't do so. It merely emphasised the mystery.
Until RD explains it himself none of us can be any the wiser. But he is plainly content to allow himself to be perceived as an absent father figure to his distant 'children' who he never speaks to directly and appears to disdain. 'More communication' seemed to be the lesson everyone was trying to ask for. This is fine as far as it goes but until the owner reveals more of himself I very much that it will go very far.
Having been a supporter for 62 years since the age of 8, when my Dad decided it was safe for me to be among crowds of up to 60,000 I've seen a few failed owners come and go so I don't think I lack proportion. RD may not yet be a failed owner, although he may soon be if we get relegated. But his obvious lack of engagement and overt enthusiasm is a new, more corrosive, factor especially as it comes so soon after a long era of exceptional oneness between club and supporters. Unless the man at the top of the pyramid displays more emotional attachment to the club, openly revelling in any successes and showing disappointments in defeats, there is a high risk that when there is no sign of an upward trajectory on the pitch, the slow poison of apathy will spread all the more quickly through the fan base.
Come on RD, leave your bunker, open up, join us, be a Charlton fan!
Just received an e-mail from the Club after some serious chasing up and contacting different angles (quite unbelievably) and at the bottom of their response was this attached;
Just received an e-mail from the Club after some serious chasing up and contacting different angles (quite unbelievably) and at the bottom of their response was this attached;
Just finished watching. Definitely should have been pushed on the fact we've spent £9m on rubbish. And if only Katrien would just admit mistakes have been made in the past.
Certain points where a question was asked such as 'what are you going to to about that' and they responded with 'what would you do' or 'what would you like us to do' was met with silence. Why didn't anyone tell them what we want them to do? (Apart from fuck off)
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
My feeling after that video is that KM's tenure here may not be that long lasting. I get the feeling she might be moved in a sideways promotion somewhere else. Because I honestly do not think it was a very impressive performance from her. I actually wanted it to be. It may well have been a tough meeting to face, but that goes with the territory of the job. Personally, I think highlighting the personal abuse issue was ill judged, I think she would have been much better advised to dismiss it for what it is. I also think trying to proclaim 5 managers in 2 years as progress was a ludicrous decision, when it is clearly evidence of failure to appoint the right person for the job.
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
I have puzzled over this for many many hours and its been a struggle believe me.
As someone who perhaps more than anyone on the receiving end of that reluctance of the club to engage despite a very persistent and positive agenda i find this a little bizarre. Indeed in one of our rare meetings with KM we encouraged her to get out and reassure the fans, and when this finally happened it was too little too late, and poorly done in some ways
The Trust identified the growing crisis of apathy and disaffection we were witnessing to KM, i spoke to a lot of fans as chair, but it also could be seen all over social media; but when we tried to raise it we were denied, and a request drafted collectively by the TB and delivered by myself to discuss the malaise was casually rejected. Despite that we still proceeded positively to a meeting to listen and try and understand those fans, and pressed on for dialogue.
This was received and commented on as a breech of trust, a comment which i found insulting and unfair. I bit my lip in order to give the new TB and chair the best chance in continuing that positive agenda, and they have done a very good job in my view of that since despite difficulties.
My resignation from the TB was due to the enormous energy it took to maintain while being largely ignored by the club and undermined by some, in attempts to try and recapture that fuzzy feeling, to where we were under a Supporters Director. I came to the stage where I could no longer sustain that energy in the face of such clear rejection of those approaches, in preference of a box ticking exercise which the FF had always been restricted to.
In terms of the recent meeting. For me a more genuine approach to engagement would not involve such overt attempts to manage and control meetings like this one. What came out of the meeting was a committment to try and communicate better, but not a lot else and certainly not enough humility in admitting mistakes.
There was also some poor handling of the issues one of which being protest, this is a football club not a bowls club, i dont agree with personal abuse, but expecting fans not to be passionate is just ridiculous.
On the Strategy front
*We are still part of an experiment that brings in cheap unrealised talent, and backs that up with small squads that include little in the way of experienced hands.
*Those small squads expose young talent too rapidly as crisis hits when the thin squad buckles, and must be counterproductive a d damaging for their and our future as a club
*Managers who are chosen for their work with youth (we are told) but due to preference of patronage of the owner over experience and proven track record, they don't hang around long enough to have much impact. To me Its probably more accurate that they accept the strategic approach outlined above, and are therefore trusted to do so.
*The club could address this, by increasing the budget which i personally think is pitched unrealistically low, to avoid the continual struggle - for me either to bring in more of that talent to offset the failures, or to mix in more experience alongside them
In terms of expanding attendances, i dont think that can be done without a lot more effort to rebuild trust. Without that fans will not become 'agents of the club' and will not feel the ownership of the club that such a collaboration would require to be a success. I'm not really sure what the answer is to be honest in reversing that.
I dont agree with Murray that its of the past, much as appreciate his sentiment, but sharing a sense of ownership may be part of the answer, meaning comments early this year like the owner will do what he likes are extremely damaging - but are probably the real situation, and will need a lot of work to amend.
Fans also feel undervalued on a very basic level, Miere's joke on this about changing the club charter gives away her ignorance of the importance valuing your customer, and is a lot to do with why we are in this mess, even if her PA were to reply with a standard response it would make a difference. Barring that designate a Supporters Liaison as laid out in League rules (u cant rewrite those) and make it genuine.
I guess what I'm saying is this requires is a big attitudinal u-turn of the deonstrated approach that preceded this meeting.
As for the fans, we have a break now, and choices to consider. If we have a meeting or a survey people may still vote with their feet in whatever direction, although I think one or both must happen at some point by way of response.
Yes, I know people have genuine grievances, but there is currently something distinctly unsavoury about this BB and indeed others. Add to that the embarrassment I felt watching and listening to protesters on Saturday. No problems with "Roland Out", "Miere Out", but when it dropped to gutter level with references to where one might stick the sofa I thought "I'm Off". Add to that the overtly racist anti-Belgian chants and I thought this lot are losing the plot. It had hints of a lynch mob. I've been through thick and thin (more thin than thick, I might add) with Charlton, having followed them loyally for 52 years at all three of their home grounds and I have actively fought many just causes on the fans' behalf, but somehow, the behaviour I witnessed on Saturday, and what I am seeing repeated on many BBs, doesn't quite square with reality. Yes, communications have been poor. No, I don't think Katrien is guilty of deliberately lying, just guilty of being the proverbial "meat in the sandwich". I'm sure Roland has undermined her on more than one occasion and will do so again. I don't think it matters one iota whether it's Katrien or a Varney who is the CEO, ultimately the power resides across the water. For her own peace of mind she may well walk, but her successor will be similarly neutered. Ultimately discontent correlates with results on the pitch. Go on a winning run and play excellent football (which for the first time this season we did on Saturday) and discontent simply evaporates. Return to losing ways and the clamour will return and intensify. All well and good, but where is the Plan B for the board's detractors? Who is going to take over and why? It's my understanding that buyers are currently few and far between at the moment (there are several clubs up for sale, many of which are more attractive than Charlton), so it might be a long time before Roland is dislodged. For all of his faults (and there are many) he has at least kept the club afloat and for that alone I'm grateful, having seen us first hand flirt with extinction in the High Court (saved with 30 minutes to go). I'm sure my views will go down like a lead balloon with many of you, but at least I know I'm not alone in thinking this way. Call us the "silent majority".
One of the best posts I have seen on here for some time and echo's my thought's entirely.
We all know that things have not gone smoothly since RD took us over, but he's still here and continually funding our losses. However people want to spin it, we were in deep shit with the spivs and almost certainly would have gone into administration without RD.
I think dialogue is the way forward and it appears that KM is now willing to engage. As above it made me cringe to see our so called fans giving wanker signs and shouting obscenities to KM. I would love to know how those people would feel if the same was done to their girlfriend/wife/sister/mum by a group of yobs in the street?
I can't believe some of the vitriol spouted on here over the past few weeks. I for one are glad to be one of the silent majority!
I take it you are on a wind up with the third paragraph.
Why would I be?
I take it you condone those actions then?
You strike me with your comments as being very pro the regime.
The woman is fair game for flak quite frankly after the total disregard for the supporters. She opens her mouth and words come out.
Can you not see that this club is falling apart and she needs to be accountable for this, forget all the cobblers blaming everything on Duchatelet, squirrel face cannot be immune to criticism.
Who do you think runs things on a Monday-Friday, or do you think she is on the phone 24/7 to Duchatelet getting instructions.
But to make you laugh and feel as you are winning the joust, I will contradict myself by saying that in life violence is never the answer.
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
We, as fans, are the ones telling them that there are major problems. Not the other way around.
From the off that question set the tone that it was going to be too nicey nicey without anyone willing to properly ruffle any feathers. Sorry.
Good post razil, but, increasing the budget just means they have to increase the incomings (sales of players and ticket sales) or cut the budget elsewhere, as they have been doing, to increase the on-field/coaching budget. In essence increasing the budget will do nothing but increase their 'factory size'.
Flack yes, personal abuse aimed at her sexual activities and her country of origin
IMO Constructive criticism far outweighs balling at them.
We have no potential buyer in the offing and they have progressed in some areas the club forward.
What we now need to do is be active in trying is to make RD/KM feel that other strategies mainly a Manager rather than a coach would be more beneficial to further there cause.
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
We, as fans, are the ones telling them that there are major problems. Not the other way around.
From the off that question set the tone that it was going to be too nicey nicey without anyone willing to properly ruffle any feathers. Sorry.
No way to run a business - I appreciate your view, we'll agree to disagree.
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
We, as fans, are the ones telling them that there are major problems. Not the other way around.
From the off that question set the tone that it was going to be too nicey nicey without anyone willing to properly ruffle any feathers. Sorry.
No way to run a business - I appreciate your view, we'll agree to disagree.
We're not running a business, we are questioning those who are supposedly running one and are meant to be letting them know how we feel and getting their explanations for it.
Again, this whole 'communication' obsession has just led us to into trying too hard to win them over - it is not going to happen.
Have waited, watched the video and slept on it before commenting. My thoughts in no particular order:
1. Some interesting revelations/deductions e.g. Luzon had clearly lost the plot and there was indeed a plan at the beginning to sell the Valley and move to the Peninsula.
2. I reluctantly concede that KM generally performed well (a couple of well documented howlers apart) for a 31 year old with no football/senior management experience conducting a meeting with a potentially critical audience in her second or third language. The fact that an individual with those qualifications should be nowhere near the CEO role in the first place is probably the biggest single issue.
3. She needs a lot of coaching on body language and Neuro Linguistic Programming if she is ever to be taken seriously in a real job. She will discover this the hard way at some stage, not necessarily here.
4. The strategic plan as articulated seems as laudable to me as anything in the bonkers world that football has become. The fatal flaw is the approach to the coaching and management of the team. You simply cannot succeed for any length of time with incumbents who have no credibility. She is either deluded about this or a consummate liar (or both).
5. KM's faux outrage at the protest is pathetic, as are her attempts to diminish its credibility (2% my arse). That said, we cannot pretend that there is anything other than a range of opinions out there. I went to Crossbars for the first time on Saturday before joining the protest (sorry!) and you would be forgiven for thinking it was a different world. Even around me in the west upper, there was a general lack of awareness and a few quizzical glances at my "get Roland out" poster. I'll leave it to those who have appointed themselves to work out what to do about that. I'm stumped.
6. There is always an element of theatre about these events. KM could no more have come out and promised us the earth than could the Trust or whomsoever on the fans behalf have turned up with a stake at which to burn her. It was always going to be a reasonably well mannered exchange (and rightly so on both sides) despite the wishes of the rabble rousers out there. We are a long way off riding the pair of them out of town. That said, despite the constraints and role playing, I do hope that RM, JJ and anyone else in authority are giving her some direct advice in private.
7. I'm done with the pissing contests between the various elements on this and other message boards. It's tiresome now. Time for people to make up their own minds and act accordingly. It's all about opinions.
Not quite sure what to think now. I have not changed my opinion on Roland's plan and my negative option of KM's suitability for office has intensified although I do begrudgingly admire her balls (if you see what I mean). It may be a while before an alternative presents itself and in the meantime we need to put up or shut up I suspect. "Be careful what you wish for" is a much maligned phrase in regards to Charlton. I can't quite get it out of my head at the moment.
Amazed that the new comms manager is not going to be in place till February? Having agreed that communication or the lack of it was one of the issues going forward, I would have thought that was a major issue. This should have been an immediate priority when KM came to the club, especially when Matt Wright and Jimmy Stone left. In fact Jimmy reminded me on Saturday that he Matt was not here when Roland came...... Why has this been allowed to drag on for so long.? Frankly astonished that Ollie can do so much as he does. Even Km remarked on it in the video.
I understand he is currently employed at the North Pole and is under contract until end of January dealing with Santa's inbox.
Confession time. Even I found myself watching the video on You Tube last night after reading this thread with interest and keeping an eye on all the sh*t that is going on.
How on earth is she a CEO? I'll tell you what, I promise never to moan about Levy again. Jeez, I'm sorry that your club is being run by a proper bunch of cockwombles.
At the time of the takeover, I hoped like you all that it would give you a new lease of life. Part of me feels I should be joining CAST and joining the next protest.
Would be great if you would join us and help get us closer to the 3% mark.
The one good thing to come out out this is we have learned that we have an abundance of wannabe Paxmans and QCs waiting in the wings for when the next meeting occurs.
Hope someone is jotting down all the names of those whose only real comments on what is going wrong at Charlton is that some fans in a difficult situation didn't deliver enough hammer blows that they would have done.
In my view the reason the questioning wasnt as strong as it could have been was due the deliberate divide and rule strategy of structuring the meeting the way it was, watering down with randoms, adding the fans forum which is 99% concerned with operational issues like VE, potholes, tickets etc to divert from the bigger strategic questions. Altho i think they still did a reasonable job despite that.
think you are doing the FF members a big dis-service there, do they not have other concerns as well?
Katrien or Katreen tries to look like the wounded young girl too much, but made some good points. She was quite rude to Sid.
Murray made some good points.
I love Steve Avory, my old P.E teacher don't you know.
Jackson looked bored stiff most of it.
Mick was brilliant, no nonsense straight to the point.
Not sure who the little fella on the end was but he wasn't inspiring confidence.
Too many fans seem to think the behaviour during the protests was acceptable. It wasn't.
Sadly the club doesnt understand we were pushed to breaking point and thus protests were inevitable.
I agree the personal attacks etc were threatening and cruel but far worse, that people defend that behaviour... Charlton Athletic Choice TV for example.
Finally Charlton life got tons of mentions... Whilst other pretenders got none.
My impression FWIW is that the Trust did their best, but as I have found at VIP meetings it is very hard to keep probing each answer received to put those on the top table on the spot. There is pressure to move on as you have "had your turn" and ME is next to you wanting to take the mic back. What is really needed is a 1-1 meeting between the Trust and the club, with an agreed agenda in advance.
After the last VIP my mate, a very successful businessman, spoke to Katrien and told her that she needed to change her demeanour and attitude - it was no good her getting defensive every time someone was providing a view or opinion which was different to hers. Obviously she failed to reflect on that advice and we saw more of the same on Tuesday evening.
To me she is a lovely lady, who has fallen in love with the club and wants to do her very best in her role. Unfortunately, through no fault of her own, she has been thrust into the role with no previous experience and I genuinely hate to say it but she is out of her comfort zone and not up to the task.
She will need supporting if we are to rebuild our club up again, so I hope the Trust grasp the nettle and very quickly provide her with the names of fans who can do a good job on target 20,000. I shall still be protesting, but we also need to build up a rapport to convince her that the perceived negative fans are actually what all staff/customers are - ie the clubs best asset.
Finally @JohnBoyUK , I don't know you but your comments above touched a nerve. If ever we get introduced, I owe you a drink. Still hate Spurs though:)
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
We'll have to agree to disagree here. It's a weak question to ask because a smart person wouldn't have answered it. Why risk bringing issues to the table that others may not of thought of? We should have had a focused meeting targeting the key issues and demanding answers but it never happened.
Watched the meeting on the ipad last night even my Mrs who has no interest or clue about football/charlton commented that KM is crap and never actually really answers the question.
The number one issue, and only important one at the moment, has been lost amidst the mass hysteria that has enveloped the more vociferous and activist element of the Charlton fan base. Also, I think this element has been afflicted with a kind of collective false memory syndrome when it comes to previous owners and how open they were with the Charlton fans. The Gliksten brothers would have been turning in their graves whilst that meeting was taking place on Tuesday night.
From the beginning it has been clear that RD is not the kind of owner who is going spend his fortune on players in order to achieve success. It was always going to be a slow progressive building process with a focus on infrastructure. And we have seen evidence of this with significant money spent on the stadium, pitch and training ground.
But we have also seen things that are clearly not working such as the network idea and a host of other admin and gimmicky initiatives.
None of this would matter if the results and performances on the pitch had not deteriorated so badly over the last few weeks. But the general disgruntlement and anger about these performances have been hijacked (not deliberately – it has just happened) by the voices of the people and groups with more widespread agendas (and I am not criticising those agendas or groups) about the new owner.
KM is not the problem. If tomorrow we install the universally acknowledged best football CEO in the country it will not make the slightest difference to performances on the pitch if that CEO is not allowed to immediately over rule RD's manager recruitment policy.
On Tuesday KM talked about how they go about player recruitment and how they use various scouts and data analysis (I would love to know more about this; what tools do they use and who decides the metrics and the required scores on those metrics and how they are different for different positions). In my opinion this is working as we have seen a significant upgrade in the quality of the players we saw recruited this summer at good value.
The problem is that nobody has persuaded RD that the same approach should be used to recruit managers and coaching staff. You don’t have the same data analysis tools you have for players but every experienced manager/coach has data that allows you to assess the risk of appointing them. The craziest statement on Tuesday was from RM (I think) who said the most important relationship in a club is that between the owner and manager. This was used to justify RD only appointing managers that he knew.
We had a good result and performance on Saturday and listening to JJ it seems the new guy is implementing new ideas and tactics. He may go on to be a great success. But if he does it will be a lucky appointment by RD since there is nothing in his data/track record that suggests he will be a good manager. You can risk making one speculative managerial appointment every so often hoping he turns into a Mourinho but not 4 or 5 in succession. The next manager has to be someone with at least 10 to 15 years experience. From my viewpoint, that of a non vociferous activist type fan, it is the only important issue at the moment.
Well that was a jolly "talking shop" with lots of first-name use, bonhomie ("tell us about the goal Jacko") and not a lot of substance. The presentation was there to be picked at, for instance "please outline the key objectives over the next five years that will help us meet the strategic targets you have outlined", but all we seemed to get was a glut of questions focusing on operational stuff and things that had obviously been done to death on previous fans' forums. Later there were opportunities to ask about whether £9m on transfers, compared to £1.1m, was reflected on the team's performance and also getting Murray's view on Duchalet's judge of character bearing in mind that his comment about the key relationship in a football club being between the owner and the manager, the former needing to have implicit trust in the latter. Duchalet has sacked three guys he has picked in the last 18 months. Also, If you are going to a meeting with prepared questions, always have a follow-up. The panel was let off the hook on a number of occasions, for instance the initial question about access to the QPR game was allowed to die a death.
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
The opening question was specifically designed to tell us if the club was able to articulate what the problem was. KM repeated her opening thought that it was all about not knowing the strategy, and RM twice avoided the question entirely.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
We, as fans, are the ones telling them that there are major problems. Not the other way around.
From the off that question set the tone that it was going to be too nicey nicey without anyone willing to properly ruffle any feathers. Sorry.
No way to run a business - I appreciate your view, we'll agree to disagree.
We're not running a business, we are questioning those who are supposedly running one and are meant to be letting them know how we feel and getting their explanations for it.
Again, this whole 'communication' obsession has just led us to into trying too hard to win them over - it is not going to happen.
I'll say it one more time. The question was aimed at understanding whether the issue was one of the club not understanding the problem. It was informative in that we learned they didn't really understand it. We took opportunity to help them understand the issue as a result of discovering that.
But more to the point, it explains why their 'solutions' haven't worked for people - it's because they're applying an aspirin to a cut.
The one good thing to come out out this is we have learned that we have an abundance of wannabe Paxmans and QCs waiting in the wings for when the next meeting occurs.
Hope someone is jotting down all the names of those whose only real comments on what is going wrong at Charlton is that some fans in a difficult situation didn't deliver enough hammer blows that they would have done.
I also think that we are also seeing a gap between the general feeling on here and other fans who do not come on here. My dad occasionally reads this site but would never post, and he tends to read the game related threads and stuff do with the team, ie transfers etc. I don't think he was aware of the general feeling of discontent and obviously the regular posters on here are talking about it everyday, reading one another's comments etc.
So generally speaking we (regular CL posters) might have more of a stronger opinion on what needs to be said to KM given (I would say generally negative) feeling on here, but one of the invited fans who doesn't come on here, wouldn't have perhaps sensed or even agreed with the general opinion of those upset.
It's what makes this whole situation and process actually an incredibly difficult thing to manage and probably why KM got the easier ride than she might've been expecting. Someone earlier referenced what they thought were inane questions about Valley Express, but to others this was the opportunity to talk about that.
I am just interested to see what happens if we win at Brum and how that will affect the Ipswich game.
Comments
Until RD explains it himself none of us can be any the wiser. But he is plainly content to allow himself to be perceived as an absent father figure to his distant 'children' who he never speaks to directly and appears to disdain. 'More communication' seemed to be the lesson everyone was trying to ask for. This is fine as far as it goes but until the owner reveals more of himself I very much that it will go very far.
Having been a supporter for 62 years since the age of 8, when my Dad decided it was safe for me to be among crowds of up to 60,000 I've seen a few failed owners come and go so I don't think I lack proportion. RD may not yet be a failed owner, although he may soon be if we get relegated. But his obvious lack of engagement and overt enthusiasm is a new, more corrosive, factor especially as it comes so soon after a long era of exceptional oneness between club and supporters. Unless the man at the top of the pyramid displays more emotional attachment to the club, openly revelling in any successes and showing disappointments in defeats, there is a high risk that when there is no sign of an upward trajectory on the pitch, the slow poison of apathy will spread all the more quickly through the fan base.
Come on RD, leave your bunker, open up, join us, be a Charlton fan!
Certain points where a question was asked such as 'what are you going to to about that' and they responded with 'what would you do' or 'what would you like us to do' was met with silence. Why didn't anyone tell them what we want them to do? (Apart from fuck off)
In my view the guy that opened from the fans' side of the table set the wrong tone by outlining how the meeting would be run and then asking Katrien what she felt were the fans' main issues. Just tell her. Finally, there were clearly people there with individual agendas, namely; " the Crossbars fiasco has turned my footballing life upside down". Ok, but not for this forum. And then we had "VIPs feel disenfranchised and the club should do something for them". Bollocks, I was a VIP once, felt it was a good deal, was happy to sign-up to it and didn't expect anything once it had concluded.
The upshot was that the panel was never ruffled, one guy said absolutely nothing, Katrien had an easy ride and kept a smile on her face and Murray just sat there playing with his phone. I wasn't there on the night or involved in the process so can't comment on how the fans' side of things was organised and prepared but feel that this was a massive opportunity that was wasted.
Because I honestly do not think it was a very impressive performance from her. I actually wanted it to be. It may well have been a tough meeting to face, but that goes with the territory of the job. Personally, I think highlighting the personal abuse issue was ill judged, I think she would have been much better advised to dismiss it for what it is. I also think trying to proclaim 5 managers in 2 years as progress was a ludicrous decision, when it is clearly evidence of failure to appoint the right person for the job.
You may disagree, but I think that's hugely significant. If you cannot define a problem, it makes it pretty tricky to solve it and pretty tricky to be sure it's still solved later on. To me what it betrayed is that they genuinely didn't know the answer, and that speaks of a team trying desperately to be understood but giving nowhere near enough energy to seeking to understand. No wonder supporters feel disenfranchised.
Leaving the soft stuff to one side, if you're running a business and don't know your market you are likely to fail.
As someone who perhaps more than anyone on the receiving end of that reluctance of the club to engage despite a very persistent and positive agenda i find this a little bizarre. Indeed in one of our rare meetings with KM we encouraged her to get out and reassure the fans, and when this finally happened it was too little too late, and poorly done in some ways
The Trust identified the growing crisis of apathy and disaffection we were witnessing to KM, i spoke to a lot of fans as chair, but it also could be seen all over social media; but when we tried to raise it we were denied, and a request drafted collectively by the TB and delivered by myself to discuss the malaise was casually rejected. Despite that we still proceeded positively to a meeting to listen and try and understand those fans, and pressed on for dialogue.
This was received and commented on as a breech of trust, a comment which i found insulting and unfair. I bit my lip in order to give the new TB and chair the best chance in continuing that positive agenda, and they have done a very good job in my view of that since despite difficulties.
My resignation from the TB was due to the enormous energy it took to maintain while being largely ignored by the club and undermined by some, in attempts to try and recapture that fuzzy feeling, to where we were under a Supporters Director. I came to the stage where I could no longer sustain that energy in the face of such clear rejection of those approaches, in preference of a box ticking exercise which the FF had always been restricted to.
In terms of the recent meeting. For me a more genuine approach to engagement would not involve such overt attempts to manage and control meetings like this one. What came out of the meeting was a committment to try and communicate better, but not a lot else and certainly not enough humility in admitting mistakes.
There was also some poor handling of the issues one of which being protest, this is a football club not a bowls club, i dont agree with personal abuse, but expecting fans not to be passionate is just ridiculous.
On the Strategy front
*We are still part of an experiment that brings in cheap unrealised talent, and backs that up with small squads that include little in the way of experienced hands.
*Those small squads expose young talent too rapidly as crisis hits when the thin squad buckles, and must be counterproductive a d damaging for their and our future as a club
*Managers who are chosen for their work with youth (we are told) but due to preference of patronage of the owner over experience and proven track record, they don't hang around long enough to have much impact. To me Its probably more accurate that they accept the strategic approach outlined above, and are therefore trusted to do so.
*The club could address this, by increasing the budget which i personally think is pitched unrealistically low, to avoid the continual struggle - for me either to bring in more of that talent to offset the failures, or to mix in more experience alongside them
In terms of expanding attendances, i dont think that can be done without a lot more effort to rebuild trust. Without that fans will not become 'agents of the club' and will not feel the ownership of the club that such a collaboration would require to be a success. I'm not really sure what the answer is to be honest in reversing that.
I dont agree with Murray that its of the past, much as appreciate his sentiment, but sharing a sense of ownership may be part of the answer, meaning comments early this year like the owner will do what he likes are extremely damaging - but are probably the real situation, and will need a lot of work to amend.
Fans also feel undervalued on a very basic level, Miere's joke on this about changing the club charter gives away her ignorance of the importance valuing your customer, and is a lot to do with why we are in this mess, even if her PA were to reply with a standard response it would make a difference. Barring that designate a Supporters Liaison as laid out in League rules (u cant rewrite those) and make it genuine.
I guess what I'm saying is this requires is a big attitudinal u-turn of the deonstrated approach that preceded this meeting.
As for the fans, we have a break now, and choices to consider. If we have a meeting or a survey people may still vote with their feet in whatever direction, although I think one or both must happen at some point by way of response.
The woman is fair game for flak quite frankly after the total disregard for the supporters. She opens her mouth and words come out.
Can you not see that this club is falling apart and she needs to be accountable for this, forget all the cobblers blaming everything on Duchatelet, squirrel face cannot be immune to criticism.
Who do you think runs things on a Monday-Friday, or do you think she is on the phone 24/7 to Duchatelet getting instructions.
But to make you laugh and feel as you are winning the joust, I will contradict myself by saying that in life violence is never the answer.
From the off that question set the tone that it was going to be too nicey nicey without anyone willing to properly ruffle any feathers. Sorry.
We have no potential buyer in the offing and they have progressed in some areas the club forward.
What we now need to do is be active in trying is to make RD/KM feel that other strategies mainly a Manager rather than a coach would be more beneficial to further there cause.
Again, this whole 'communication' obsession has just led us to into trying too hard to win them over - it is not going to happen.
1. Some interesting revelations/deductions e.g. Luzon had clearly lost the plot and there was indeed a plan at the beginning to sell the Valley and move to the Peninsula.
2. I reluctantly concede that KM generally performed well (a couple of well documented howlers apart) for a 31 year old with no football/senior management experience conducting a meeting with a potentially critical audience in her second or third language. The fact that an individual with those qualifications should be nowhere near the CEO role in the first place is probably the biggest single issue.
3. She needs a lot of coaching on body language and Neuro Linguistic Programming if she is ever to be taken seriously in a real job. She will discover this the hard way at some stage, not necessarily here.
4. The strategic plan as articulated seems as laudable to me as anything in the bonkers world that football has become. The fatal flaw is the approach to the coaching and management of the team. You simply cannot succeed for any length of time with incumbents who have no credibility. She is either deluded about this or a consummate liar (or both).
5. KM's faux outrage at the protest is pathetic, as are her attempts to diminish its credibility (2% my arse). That said, we cannot pretend that there is anything other than a range of opinions out there. I went to Crossbars for the first time on Saturday before joining the protest (sorry!) and you would be forgiven for thinking it was a different world. Even around me in the west upper, there was a general lack of awareness and a few quizzical glances at my "get Roland out" poster. I'll leave it to those who have appointed themselves to work out what to do about that. I'm stumped.
6. There is always an element of theatre about these events. KM could no more have come out and promised us the earth than could the Trust or whomsoever on the fans behalf have turned up with a stake at which to burn her. It was always going to be a reasonably well mannered exchange (and rightly so on both sides) despite the wishes of the rabble rousers out there. We are a long way off riding the pair of them out of town. That said, despite the constraints and role playing, I do hope that RM, JJ and anyone else in authority are giving her some direct advice in private.
7. I'm done with the pissing contests between the various elements on this and other message boards. It's tiresome now. Time for people to make up their own minds and act accordingly. It's all about opinions.
Not quite sure what to think now. I have not changed my opinion on Roland's plan and my negative option of KM's suitability for office has intensified although I do begrudgingly admire her balls (if you see what I mean). It may be a while before an alternative presents itself and in the meantime we need to put up or shut up I suspect. "Be careful what you wish for" is a much maligned phrase in regards to Charlton. I can't quite get it out of my head at the moment.
Hope someone is jotting down all the names of those whose only real comments on what is going wrong at Charlton is that some fans in a difficult situation didn't deliver enough hammer blows that they would have done.
Katrien or Katreen tries to look like the wounded young girl too much, but made some good points. She was quite rude to Sid.
Murray made some good points.
I love Steve Avory, my old P.E teacher don't you know.
Jackson looked bored stiff most of it.
Mick was brilliant, no nonsense straight to the point.
Not sure who the little fella on the end was but he wasn't inspiring confidence.
Too many fans seem to think the behaviour during the protests was acceptable. It wasn't.
Sadly the club doesnt understand we were pushed to breaking point and thus protests were inevitable.
I agree the personal attacks etc were threatening and cruel but far worse, that people defend that behaviour... Charlton Athletic Choice TV for example.
Finally
Charlton life got tons of mentions... Whilst other pretenders got none.
After the last VIP my mate, a very successful businessman, spoke to Katrien and told her that she needed to change her demeanour and attitude - it was no good her getting defensive every time someone was providing a view or opinion which was different to hers. Obviously she failed to reflect on that advice and we saw more of the same on Tuesday evening.
To me she is a lovely lady, who has fallen in love with the club and wants to do her very best in her role. Unfortunately, through no fault of her own, she has been thrust into the role with no previous experience and I genuinely hate to say it but she is out of her comfort zone and not up to the task.
She will need supporting if we are to rebuild our club up again, so I hope the Trust grasp the nettle and very quickly provide her with the names of fans who can do a good job on target 20,000. I shall still be protesting, but we also need to build up a rapport to convince her that the perceived negative fans are actually what all staff/customers are - ie the clubs best asset.
Finally @JohnBoyUK , I don't know you but your comments above touched a nerve. If ever we get introduced, I owe you a drink. Still hate Spurs though:)
From the beginning it has been clear that RD is not the kind of owner who is going spend his fortune on players in order to achieve success. It was always going to be a slow progressive building process with a focus on infrastructure. And we have seen evidence of this with significant money spent on the stadium, pitch and training ground.
But we have also seen things that are clearly not working such as the network idea and a host of other admin and gimmicky initiatives.
None of this would matter if the results and performances on the pitch had not deteriorated so badly over the last few weeks. But the general disgruntlement and anger about these performances have been hijacked (not deliberately – it has just happened) by the voices of the people and groups with more widespread agendas (and I am not criticising those agendas or groups) about the new owner.
KM is not the problem. If tomorrow we install the universally acknowledged best football CEO in the country it will not make the slightest difference to performances on the pitch if that CEO is not allowed to immediately over rule RD's manager recruitment policy.
On Tuesday KM talked about how they go about player recruitment and how they use various scouts and data analysis (I would love to know more about this; what tools do they use and who decides the metrics and the required scores on those metrics and how they are different for different positions). In my opinion this is working as we have seen a significant upgrade in the quality of the players we saw recruited this summer at good value.
The problem is that nobody has persuaded RD that the same approach should be used to recruit managers and coaching staff. You don’t have the same data analysis tools you have for players but every experienced manager/coach has data that allows you to assess the risk of appointing them. The craziest statement on Tuesday was from RM (I think) who said the most important relationship in a club is that between the owner and manager. This was used to justify RD only appointing managers that he knew.
We had a good result and performance on Saturday and listening to JJ it seems the new guy is implementing new ideas and tactics. He may go on to be a great success. But if he does it will be a lucky appointment by RD since there is nothing in his data/track record that suggests he will be a good manager. You can risk making one speculative managerial appointment every so often hoping he turns into a Mourinho but not 4 or 5 in succession. The next manager has to be someone with at least 10 to 15 years experience. From my viewpoint, that of a non vociferous activist type fan, it is the only important issue at the moment.
But more to the point, it explains why their 'solutions' haven't worked for people - it's because they're applying an aspirin to a cut.
So generally speaking we (regular CL posters) might have more of a stronger opinion on what needs to be said to KM given (I would say generally negative) feeling on here, but one of the invited fans who doesn't come on here, wouldn't have perhaps sensed or even agreed with the general opinion of those upset.
It's what makes this whole situation and process actually an incredibly difficult thing to manage and probably why KM got the easier ride than she might've been expecting. Someone earlier referenced what they thought were inane questions about Valley Express, but to others this was the opportunity to talk about that.
I am just interested to see what happens if we win at Brum and how that will affect the Ipswich game.