One of our greatest ever players and only captain to ever hold the William Webb Ellis trophy as a winner thinks the Allblacks may not be quite ready to go all the way yet again.
Vidcom NZ were delighted to host a table of guests at the Auckland Chamber of Commerce Rugby World Cup 2011 Speaker Series today with David Kirk as the guest speaker.
The theme was preparing for the world cup and lookig at things from both a business and rugby perspective both of which David Kirk is incredibly well qualified to speak on. The Rhodes scholar, captain of the 1987 World Cup winning team and ex head of Fairfax Media is a rare hero achieving great success in both the business and sporting worlds.
Interestingly David thought the jury was still out as to wether the Allblacks were capable of winning the 2011 World cup with the current crop of talent. While hard to swallow he did have a few good points and it was refreshing to hear and ex Allblack being honest and not just sticking to the party line of drivel coming from the NZRFU.
His speech focussed on three key points:
1. Planning: Being prepared for the event. Do the research, get yourself and your business ready to capitalise on the event and do it wisely.
2. People: Get the right people in the right positions as you can do all the planning in the world but if you have the wrong team you are never going to succeed. - The 1987 team had awful preparation an a heap of new players but they were the right players!
The sweet taste of success in 1987
3. Poise & personality: A further empahis on point two really where you need to have that little bit extra to rise to the top. The sheer determination and self belief in success (something we as New Zealanders struggle with at times). See things through when the going gets tough and celebrate our succecsses.
He opened his speech with commentary on society and business highlighting that for a nation to truly grow and its people to benefit the growth is driven by businesses. The health care system, education social welfare all benefit from the tax dollar generated by business so we need to champion business success and drive for busines growth first and foremost. Something that many people fail to see especially when times are tough and businesses have to make hard decisions to keep afloat let alone make profit. In the long run if businesses in NZ are out there growing and making profits we all benefit.
The wise business great also put a special emphasis on using the event to not only have a profitable 2011 but to utilise those profits wisely and rather than tkaing the soft option of using the extra profits to reward ourselves by an extra overseas holiday or a new boat, look to reinvest in our businesses to ensure prolonged growth and stability.
For the rugby diehards I have added a clip from a RWC interview with David Kirk on next years events and his take the historic 1987 victory a very good watch!
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