足球教练与企业老板哪个更难做?

More interesting is where the roles differ. Is leading a sports team really as complicated as consultants and academics believe? Football managers themselves often come back to the simplicity of the win-lose-or-draw outcomes of matches against single opponents.
更有趣的是这两种角色的不同之处。领导一支球队真的像咨询师和学者认为的那样复杂吗？足球主教练自己往往会回归简单，即与单一对手比赛的胜、负、平三种结果。

Compare this to Apple’s critical decision last week on the launch of new iPhone models. Tim Cook, chief executive, had to align pricing, innovation, brand and design considerations in a shifting market crowded with rivals, some of which he cannot even identify yet. If he concentrated only on the threat posed by, say, Samsung, he would be quickly outflanked by others.
将其与苹果(Apple)最近在推出新款iPhone上所做的关键决定做个对比吧。苹果首席执行官蒂姆•库克(Tim Cook)必须在一个充满竞争对手（其中一些对手他甚至还无法辨识出来）、不断变化的市场中综合考虑定价、创新、品牌和设计因素。如果他只关注比如说三星(Samsung)构成的威胁，他将很快被其他竞争对手超越。

Football managers’ plans are more tactical and are tied more closely to the next short-term challenge. The thoughtful Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger tells Mr Carson how hard it is to “sack 14 people every Friday morning [when he selects a team for the weekend] and then re-employ them on a Monday”. Failure to get this team selection right can doom managers’ careers, while failing chief executives can sometimes cling on. But football’s short-term focus also allows its leaders to recover swiftly, whereas corporate leaders’ big strategic mistakes, on people or product, can blight a company for years. Intel admits it missed the smartphone chip revolution. Last week Brian Krzanich, the new chief executive, staked its future on leapfrogging the competition with tiny chips for wearable devices. That is a far bigger call than a preseason squad reshuffle.
足球主教练的计划侧重战术，与短期内的下一场赛事联系更为紧密。思维缜密的阿森纳队(Arsenal)主教练阿尔赛纳•温格(Arsène Wenger)告诉卡森，“每周五早晨舍弃14名球员（因为他要选定周末比赛的阵容）、然后周一再把他们招回来”是一件很棘手的事。主教练选不出正确的阵容可能会断送自己的职业生涯，失败的首席执行官有时却能保住自己的位子。不过，足球运动关注短期结果的这一特点，也让主教练能够迅速东山再起；而企业领导人在人员或产品方面犯下的重大战略错误，却能对一家企业造成多年的拖累。英特尔(Intel)承认，该公司错过了智能手机芯片革命。最近，该公司新任首席执行官布赖恩•克尔扎尼奇(Brian Krzanich)将公司的未来押注于用于可穿戴设备的微型芯片，试图以此来在竞争中实现跨越式赶超。这个决定可比在赛季前调整阵容重大得多。

Mr Carson reckons the vast majority of what keeps business and sporting leaders awake at night relates to people management. Football managers’ motivational skills, their genuine love of the job (which far offsets the pressures, as Mr Mourinho pointed out at last week’s book launch), and their surprising humility about what they do, are worth copying. But to assume the Mourinho or Ferguson way would work for your own team of copywriters or accountants could be misleading. To take their narrow, often tactical approach when you should be worrying about strategy might even be dangerous. And when seeking the right candidate to run a FTSE 100 company, you should look for leadership potential honed outside the stadium.
卡森认为，企业领导人和球队主教练夜不能寐的绝大部分原因与人员管理有关。足球主教练的激励能力、对工作的真正热爱（正如穆里尼奥在最近新书发布会上指出的那样，这远远抵消了这项工作带来的压力）、以及他们对自己所做工作的那种令人吃惊的谦逊，都值得人们效仿。但如果你认为穆里尼奥或弗格森的方式适用于你的广告文案撰稿人或会计师团队，那么你可能是被误导了。在你应当操心战略的时候采用他们那种适用范围狭窄、往往侧重战术的方式，甚至可能给你带来危险。在你物色合适的人选来经营一家富时100指数成分股企业时，你应该寻觅的是在球场之外磨练出来的领导潜力。