Why the man who conducted Melbourne review has a very different perception of the Demons

Darren Shand believes the outside perception of the Melbourne Football Club is wrong.

The long-time All Blacks manager, who helped build the renowned culture of New Zealand’s famed national rugby union team, was a key component of the recent football department review undertaken by the Demons.

It came in the wake of apparent issues surrounding the likes of Christian Petracca, Clayton Oliver and Joel Smith and the ensuing exits of CEO Gary Pert and president Kate Roffey.

Shand, the founder of leadership consultancy Winning Teams, insists that things under Simon Goodwin are nowhere near as bad as they are being perceived by the outside world.

“We got some players involved with the coach, the CEO and the Board,” he said on SEN Breakfast.

“My perspective of looking at the Dees was the world was saying they were falling apart. It was basically one plus one equals three.

“That wasn’t my experience at all. There was a couple of separate issues, but very solvable.

“The world just said, ‘The club is falling apart’. Yeah, the results weren’t great, but I still felt inside their environment a lot of the systems and structures were really good, a lot of the people are really good, the ambition was good.

“Once we set up that environment to think about what’s next and have a whole lot of players involved as well, it was awesome to watch it unfold.”

Having spent two decades working closely with the savagely successful All Blacks, Shand has a fair grasp on what good culture looks like.

He referenced the precedent set by Kiwi legends Richie McCaw and Dan Carter as the perfect example of what a strong culture is.

“If I reflect on the All Black time, culture is something you’ve got to see, you’ve got to feel, and you’ve got to be able to hear,” he said.

“It’s not what’s up on the walls, it’s what you see in an environment and how you feel things, and what it’s like every day. That defined that period I had there (with the All Blacks).

“It was a very honest place, the leadership was shared, it wasn’t a coach-driven environment.

“I look back at that era over about 10 years when we were number one in the world with McCaw and Carter, they were such important participants in the culture as well as the on-field (performance).

“The way they were inside the environment, how they turned up, how they behaved, who they were every day.

“Every single day Richie McCaw was the first player on the (training) field. I can’t recall a day where he wasn’t. Now that’s culture, that’s a leader setting the standard that he expects from everyone else.

“Those kind of things were the things that featured mostly for me.”

Listen to the full chat with Shand below: