Risk Taking
February 14, 2012
The June 22, 2009 cover story of Business Week which I just reread was titled “The Risk Takers.” It featured businesses which during difficult times, instead of playing it safe, placed bets on some gutsy new strategies.
To make a point, the author used an illustration that we can relate to here in Michigan. I paraphrase:
Imagine a driver on a snowy night. If the car starts to slip, the driver’s natural instinct is to slam on the brakes and jerk the steering wheel in the opposite direction. But the laws of physics advise the opposite: laying off the brakes and steering into the turn.
The author reports that from 1985 to 2000, the average merger in an economic downturn created an 8.5 percent rise in shareholder value after two years; while the average deal in good times resulted in a 6.2 percent drop in the buyer’s share value. In other words, mergers – one of the biggest, boldest moves in business – do better in bad times than good. Much better, in fact.
It wasn’t recklessness this article was celebrating; it was risk taking – daring to be aggressive, rather than just defensive, amid a weak economy. Steering into the turn, so to speak.
Just like the winter driving analogy in the article, we who are involved in school sports in Michigan can relate to the big idea of the article because we too made some of our biggest moves at our bleakest times. The MHSAA retrenched in some ways, but the greater theme as we climbed out of our bad times of 2008 was that we made unprecedented investments in new technology.
Today MHSAA.com is the website of highest traffic and MHSAA.tv is the website with the most productions of any comparable organization in the U.S. And all of these investments in technology during those bad times have allowed us to undertake the ArbiterGame project now that will provide all member high schools the electronic tools necessary to make their tough tasks of school administration more streamlined than ever before.
More is Not Better
September 30, 2016
Michigan is generally considered the first state to conduct high school sports tournaments in different classifications based on the enrollment of participating schools, but the Michigan High School Athletic Association may be the last statewide high school organization you will ever hear say "More is better" when it comes to tournament classification. In fact, the MHSAA argues against the classification expansion virus that infects many other states.
While still far from the "Everyone gets a ribbon" philosophy of some youth sports programs, the number of classifications is increasing and the number of schools in each classification is decreasing in the state tournament structures of many states.
While media will opine that increasing classifications waters down the tournament, our arguments are more practical. For example, the more classifications a tournament has, the greater the distance teams must travel for early round games, which is expensive and time consuming for teams and fans alike.
While some people believe more classifications might enhance their favorite team's opportunity to taste success in tournament play, reducing the number of teams in each classification actually leads to more repeat champions, which reduces rather than increases tournament excitement and attendance.
The more classifications there are, the harder it is to find a single venue to host the finals of all the divisions and the less likely that all divisions will enjoy the same services and support. Media are spread thinner, leading to less coverage of tournaments. Audio and video networks find it impossible to cover multiple venues adequately.
The most efficient and economical tournament is a single-class format. Nevertheless, a format that serves a membership where some schools are 100 times larger than others requires separate classifications. But there is a point of very diminished benefits.