In this podcast episode, the host adapts a Jamaica Gleaner column to argue that the chronic under‑performance of Jamaican and West Indian sport federations stems from a lack of long‑term strategic planning. By contrasting Australia’s sustained dominance in cricket—achieved through a systematic, youth‑focused investment strategy—with the ad‑hoc, short‑term fixes common in the Caribbean, the host illustrates the need for a forward‑looking roadmap. He then offers three concrete recommendations for sports administrators: (1) select a 10‑ to 30‑year target year, craft a vivid, measurable vision with interim milestones, and generate alternative scenarios before committing to one; (2) employ backcasting—planning backwards from the desired future to the present—to reconcile ambition with reality and adjust the target year as needed; (3) build broad fan support by integrating divergent (input‑gathering) and convergent (decision‑making) activities, turning supporters into co‑creators of the long‑term plan. The episode concludes with a call to visit the host’s blog for further resources and to submit unsolved strategic problems from Caribbean companies.
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Hello and welcome back to Chronicles from a Caribbean Cubicle podcast. Here's an article I wrote that's based on a column published in the Jamaica Gleaner. It's entitled Strategy for Jamaican Sports Federations. You love your national sport. Seeing the Jamaican or West Indian flag Soar above a global stage fires you up. But you also see that in football or cricket, we've fallen. Could it be something about long-term thinking? When the West Indies men's cricket team dominated the world in the 1980s and '90s, other countries envied them. They all tried to catch up, but Australia's response was unique. They decided to invest in youth cricket. Like never before. Why? They recognized the long-term problem. Quick fixes wouldn't solve it permanently. Fast forward a decade and their success since then shows their planning at work. While we in the West Indies struggle to find talent, revive interest, and fix governance problems, Australian dominance continues. Simply put, they built a system to win international cricket. Meanwhile, the West Indies continues to fail except for occasional successes. We get lucky sometimes and win, but those wins happen despite our system, not because of it. I'm not criticizing our setup. I'm not an expert, but if we learn from Australia's long-term focus, can we apply it to our national football team? We got lucky and competed in the World Cup once, but a long-term system is still missing there. More importantly, is there something our sporting federations can do differently in their planning? Here are 3 ideas if you happen to be a part of one. Number 1: Pick a target year and visualize. First, set a planning horizon 10 to 30 years ahead your target year. Be careful. Picking too close or too far has downsides. If you pick a year too close, it becomes selfish. You'll be pushing aside future generations. Also, if you're too aggressive with your immediate goals, others won't believe you. As a result, they won't take action. On the other hand, if you pick a year too far away, your plan could become irrelevant. There won't be enough urgency for stakeholders to respond. But the key is not just choosing the right year. The idea is to commit to milestones between now and your target date. These milestones should create the right mindset on a large scale. They could inspire people of all ages to make the sacrifices needed for world-class performance. After setting a target year, create a vivid vision or endgame. This isn't just a vague vision statement but a numeric, measurable list of outcomes. Together, they describe your desired future. Within this space, generate up to 3 unique but alternative visions. Then choose one. Many organizations make a big mistake by stopping here. Number 2: Strategize backwards. To connect your vision to reality, you need to backcast, or plan backward, from your desired future to the present. As you do, you'll correct two common anomalies. The first anomaly is that some of your initial visionary outcomes are probably unrealistic, and some will be overly ambitious. The second anomaly occurs when the target year itself has to change to make the plan work. But don't remove these anomalies randomly. Your team needs to find a careful balance between aspirations and reality. This is a task for insiders and can't be outsourced. If your team fails to achieve this balance, you'll lose fan support. For example, if they say— sense that the planning team said yes to too many things without making tough trade-offs, they may turn away. Your plan needs to make logical sense. Number 3: Build social support. Sporting federations need widespread fan support, but the old way of selling your plan to people doesn't work anymore. Instead, the modern approach is to involve fans in the process from the beginning. This doesn't mean filling a room with hundreds at every meeting. The key is to incorporate both divergent and convergent activities in your schedule. Divergent activities are invitations to gather more input. They benefit from broad participation. However, convergent activities involve making tough decisions using that input. This is a consolidation step where you summarize and draw conclusions. Use both in a sort of dance. And you'll bring your fans into your long-term thinking and the planning needed to achieve success in your sport. Thanks for listening. Do you have an unsolved problem in your Caribbean company related to strategy, productivity, engagement, or business process improvement? Just visit a searchable listing of all my prior articles and you may be able to help yourself to a fresh line of thinking. Go to blog.fwconsulting.com or see the show notes.
