What business lessons can we learn from Germany, one of the Soccer World Cup’s former greats?

Before I go any further, I need to disclose a few things. First off, I am a soccer (or football as the rest of the world calls it) fan. Second, what you will read below is my perspective and my POV. Unfortunately, I wasn’t invited or asked to be at any team meetings, briefings, and related, and nor was I a fly on the wall in the team dressing room. So, you might very well ask then, Shaf, aren’t you just an armchair critic? Well, no because third, I have been a supporter of the German soccer team for well over 44 years, so I feel I know a thing or two about them.

Ask any of my pals who I grew up with in Kenya – boys who have grown to be salt of the earth men, men I would call on to have my back any day – ask them and my soon-to-be ex-life partner, about how I live, breathe, eat, and prioritize the German soccer team over anything else, particularly during the World Cup and the European Championships as well.

And so fourthly, while the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar isn’t over yet, I am calling it another disappointing German team performance and early exit from the tournament in the group stage.

As I said to my childhood pals on our WhatsApp group recently, the weakness of the German team is their pathetic performance and inability to do what’s needed in the last third of the pitch, their complacency, especially when they think and feel they are in a winning position and hence their hubris, and finally, their total lack of psychological strength at finding their grit, desire, drive, passion, and motivation to fight until the last seconds of the game, something that teams in 2014 and earlier exemplified as part of the true German spirit.

So, what can we learn from what I now call one of the former soccer greats? You might say, well, Shaf, they’ve won four World Cups in their past, surely, you are writing them off too early and they must be one of the greats, yes?

The answer I have to that is a resounding, NO. Not anymore…listen, this is not a team that is “just in a rut”. What plagues this team, and the one that participated in the 2018 World Cup as well as the intervening European Championship, is that there doesn’t appear to be any glue nor anything that keeps and brings these 11 men on the field together, to unite as a team.

That’s the first lesson we can take away. Think about your workplace and take a close hard look? Are you like the German soccer players, just a bunch of random people all just doing what you think are your jobs? Or are you a group of individuals that really comes together and rows in the same direction? Do you have each other’s backs and do you believe in a bigger, greater purpose than just doing your job?

High performance teams require a purpose that brings them together, allowing them to coalesce around something that is bigger and larger than they are as individuals.

The second lesson is that we all need to be humble. Hubris reeks of overconfidence and cockiness that can only spell demise. Guess what? – look at your workplace and I’m sure you can easily identify that one or two individuals who think they are invincible – well, guess what, once you look beyond their BS, you’ll see an insecurity and an inability to know how to learn, adapt, and evolve with a changing environment. That’s the same with the German teams of 2018 and 2022 – they just don’t inspire confidence, authenticity, and they lack credibility. And this despite having a whole host of players from the very successful Bundesliga league club, Bayern Munich.

Third, leaders and their teams do have to take risks at times. But there’s risk that is SMART - specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound, and then there’s Elon Musk’s I’m gonna make wholesale and all at once drastic changes to Twitter…back to the beautiful game, while old Germany National Manager Joachim Low likely stayed on too long (he needed to pull a Jerry Seinfeld and leave when he was at the top of his game with the crowning achievement of winning the 2014 World Cup), new Manager, Hansi Flick, incidentally of Bayern Munich fame, was supposed to herald a new era for Germany.

And while he had some successes in the first six or even games under his tenure, IMHO, he made a reckless decision in the opening game against Japan, by taking off two key players Ilkay Gundogan, and Thomas Müller, and subbing them with players who were supposed to be equal but proved to be sub-par performers instead.

Does this remind you of when a new leader comes into your jaded, stale, and pale organization, with that cute bunny look, the one who comes with hope, the one who says, “I am going to make an impact by taking some risks?” Rather, what we need and want is a leader who listens and learns, and then, yes, makes SMART changes, involving and engaging the rest of the employee team in an authentic and credible fashion.

Ironically, the Japanese substitutions were immediately impactful. And if memory serves me right, two or more of the Japanese substitutes had a strong and real impact on getting the win Japan secured.

So, there you have it. The German soccer team is far, far, off from being a credible and worthy contender. The legacy of the past is no guarantee of their performance now and into the future. Hansi, you were meant to bring new hope and many of us believed in you, but alas, like many other indifferentiable leaders, perhaps our faith was misplaced and we expected too much from you – something you were just not capable of delivering.

For now, as a realist, the cup is not coming home…as an idealist and an optimist, of course, I’d like Germany to advance, but for that to happen, they’re going to have to swallow their pride and pivot to being hungry and driven to win…can the team of 2022 do that? Alas, I don’t think they can.