Ciarán Kennedy

IT’S THAT TIME of the year where big moves are being made in the coaching world.

Wales are on the hunt for a new head coach having parted with Warren Gatland. The Wallabies are also in the market with Joe Schmidt deciding to step away after the Rugby Championship. Leicester Tigers recently confirmed Michael Cheika will depart at the end of the season, Racing 92 have handed Stuart Lancaster his papers and of course, Munster have been engaged in a search for a new head coach since Graham Rowntree left the province in October.

Those are all big jobs to fill, and will generate plenty of interest. There will be whispers about some of the names in the running but what we won’t hear is how the process actually unfolds.

So, what is it like to interview for a job as a rugby coach?

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Former Connacht head coach Andy Friend has experience from both sides of the boardroom table, having been both the interviewer and the interviewee on a number of occasions. The process can widely vary from organisation to organisation. Some interviews last a couple of hours. When Friend was in the running for the Connacht job, his interview lasted three days.

“First time that had ever happened,” says Friend.

“Timmy Allnutt (Connacht’s Head of Rugby Operations) was there, Willie Ruane (Connacht CEO) was there, Barry Gavin (former Connacht captain and board member) was there, there was an array of ex-Connacht players and other members. It was fascinating. There was an initial day of just meet and greet, a second day of six hours of conversation with a panel, and then the next day there was another two or three hours of a conversation with the panel, which was really thorough and I thoroughly enjoyed it to be honest.”

When it comes to hiring a head coach, some clubs will invite their preferred candidates to apply, rather than waiting for CVs to land in their inbox. And just as a club will interview a number of candidates, those same candidates might have applied for multiple jobs. The Connacht interview was not the only plate Friend was spinning when he landed in Galway back in 2018.

“I’d been very upfront with Connacht. We’d flown into Ireland and had the interview and then were heading to the UK to have another interview, and I’d had another interview on the way to Ireland, so I had three interviews!

“So you’re cramming for all of them basically, and they’re all very different. One was a Sevens job, one was an English Premiership job and one was Connacht. So there’s a million things going around in your head. It is very tiring and very time consuming.”

The hiring process can work differently for an assistant coach.

Noel McNamara’s journey has taken him from Ireland to South Africa and France. A turning point arrived for McNamara as he neared the end of a five-year career break from Clongowes Wood College. Having worked with the Ireland schools, U20s and the Leinster Academy, McNamara had been building experience but found opportunities limited in Ireland. A conversation with then-IRFU Performance Director David Nucifora opened up the possibility of finding a new challenge abroad. Nucifora spoke to Rassie Erasmus, who was working as Head of Performance in South Africa, and knew the Sharks were on the lookout for a new attack coach.

Rather than a formal interview, McNamara had a series of informal chats with the Sharks before they decided to hire the Clare man. That’s not to say McNamara didn’t need to do his homework.

“You do a lot of work. You want to look at how they’ve played, and there’s lots of unforeseen stuff that you can’t possibly prepare for. The humidity in Durban, the conditions and the impact that has in terms of how you can play, the challenges you have in South Africa of travel, the contrast in conditions from one week to the next. You could play at altitude one Saturday, the following Saturday you could play in 100% humidity and the following Saturday you can be in Italy at zero degrees.

So I don’t think anything could prepare you for that, but you try to do as much homework as you possibly can on the players that are there, on recent games and you talk to the coaches that have just left if you can, if they’re still on good terms!”

For many coaches, the job search can take you all over the world. Friend is now back in Australia working with the Brumbies women’s team alongside running his high performance business, Performance Friend. Before Connacht, his life in rugby saw him move between the 15s and Sevens games while leaving Australia to unpack his bags in the UK and Japan.

It can be a demanding life. Friend once spent eight weeks in Japan being sounded out for a coaching director role while his wife, Kerri, stayed in Australia with their young children. At the end of those eight weeks he was told there was no job for him, and he rang home to deliver the bad news.

“Then about quarter to midnight the phone rang and they said we want to offer you the job,” Friend remembers. “So then all of a sudden it’s all worthwhile.”

That’s an extreme example, and while Friend views the Connacht experience as the most professional interview process he encountered, it highlights how varied the demands can be from organisation to organisation.

The nuts and bolts of the interview process itself haven’t changed drastically over the years but there are aspects of the job which now demand greater scrutiny. Go back to the 2000s and social media wasn’t a major concern for clubs. Now, some want to know how a head coach will help grow their brand online, while there is also an increased focus on the image a coach will portray with the media.

There is an increased focus on how a coach will come across in the media. Laszlo Geczo / INPHO Laszlo Geczo / INPHO / INPHO

“There’s definitely a greater focus and awareness on the style that you’re going to play and the language you’re using in the media, because that’s driving everything at the moment,” Friend explains.

“Everyone wants to win, of course they do, but what is deemed a win? Well, the number of hits on your social media channel, that’s a win now. The scoreboard is still a win. Connection with fans and community is a win. Is the coach responsible for all of that, no, but the coach will have an impact on all of that. So all of those factors will come into play, which is probably deeper than clubs have had to think previously.

Whether you like it or not, as head coach you’re one of the main faces of the club going forward, so the image that’s portrayed there needs to be something that’s appealing to the community and the fans so that they trust you, they believe in you and they like the way that you’re conducting things.”

Those off-pitch demands will vary in importance from organisation to organisation, but one thing which more or less remains central to the head coach interview process is the powerpoint presentation, where the candidate outlines his vision to his prospective employers. Flunk the presentation, and you may as well pack your bags.

“Sometimes it’s based upon key values or gamestyle or some videos that are sent to them from the organisation,” says Friend. “Sometimes it can be just coach directed, so for example, what are you going to do in the first 100 days? I’ve had that before.”

The last time McNamara stood before a room to present during an interview, he was going for the Ireland schools job in 2011. Even at this level, below the professional ranks, organisations want the candidate to come with plenty of detail. When McNamara presented for the schools job, the IRFU President, Head of Elite Player Development and Head of Coach Development were all in attendance.

“The focus at that point is largely around development,” McNamara explains. “There would be an element of performance within that, but it would be largely centered around development and player development. So player development, coaching philosophy, your way of working, for want of a better phrase, and your vision of what the role could entail, and then it was questioning afterwards.

“For me it was very much ‘This is what I believe in, this is what I think are important aspects of this, this is something that I’m very passionate about’, and it was just trying to convey that message.”

Friend has also been in the room as the interviewer when candidates have butchered their presentation.

Everyone wants to fill that time and overfill that time because they’ve got so much to tell you. No. I just need it to be succinct enough that you fill the time with the key elements that you think I need to hear.

“I’ve sat on a lot of interview panels where you say we’re going to give you 20 minutes to present, and invariably someone goes to 25/30 minutes. Straight away that’s ‘No, don’t worry about it’, because you can’t stick to time. The ones where I’m starting my stopwatch and at 19 minutes and 50 seconds they say ‘That’s the end of my presentation’ – big tick, because time management in a professional program is really important.

“Every single day as a coach we have time constraints. We’ve got a 20-minute team meeting into a 10-minute warm-up into a 20-minute skill drill into a team activity and then you’re finishing that and you’ve got media and you’ve got a meeting with the CEO… So time’s really important and if you can’t stick to time, well, that tends to be a black mark for me.”

Some have made the wrong impression even before getting to the presentation.

“The first question I ask is ‘What’s your coaching philosophy?” Friend continues. “And it’s amazing how many coaches won’t have one. You need to know what your basic philosophy is, you need to know what your strengths are, what your weapons are, what your work-ons are, what you’re not prepared to budge on.”

Get to the presentation stage and you know you’re close to landing the job. Young coaches who are still making a name for themselves might be part of a wider search, but often, if you’re at the interview stage for a head coach role at a leading club, you’ll be one of only one or two being interviewed.

Even then, you might be further off that you think. Friend recalls sitting in an interview where he had a clear sense the club had already decided to hire someone else: “It was really painful because you want to stay engaged but you’re like, I’m pretty sure you buggers have made your mind up anyway!”

In the cases where you are being weighed up seriously against another candidate, there are multiple variables for a club to consider. Some might focus more on a candidate’s track record – what have they won, where have they coached? Others might put more emphasis on their style of coaching.

“The better interviews I’ve been in, they want to know about the person,” Friend says. “When you get to that stage you know most coaches know footy, but how in tune are you with yourself and what drives you and what you’re prepared to stand for?

“Then on the rugby side there has to be an alignment with the style of footy they play. So take Connacht and myself. As we know, Connacht play a pretty expansive style of footy. I coached Sevens, an expansive style of footy, so there was an element of connection already and an alignment there. There’s no point asking me to come in and be your coach if we’re just going to kick the ball. I want us to play a little bit, so there has to be that alignment.”

Then there’s the question of how you’ll work with what is already in place. If you’re a head coach you might have a say in appointing your assistant coaches, depending on contracting situations. However if you’re an assistant coach you’re likely joining a team to work with new faces for the first time, and trying to embed your own ideas alongside the broader identity of the team.

“I think the reality of any new coach coming in, they’re going to have strong beliefs and a view of the game and how it’s played, but I think they’re going to be open-minded as well in terms of learning and adapting,” McNamara says.

Noel McNamara's coaching journey has brought him to South Africa and France. Morgan Treacy / INPHO Morgan Treacy / INPHO / INPHO

“It’d be very foolish to think that you have all the answers. Really it’s just about trying to initially not throw everything out while still being clear in your own identity and still being clear on where you want to take the group.”

McNamara left the Sharks to join Bordeaux-Begles in 2023. The opportunity came about through Yannick Bru, who spent a year with the South African side as a breakdown coach before becoming Bordeaux head coach, and asking McNamara to follow him.

“He would have been in most team meetings at the Sharks, lots of unit meetings, every pitch session, so he would have had a very clear idea of my view and how I would go about coaching the attack. You could call it a year-long interview.”

As is often the case, the job itself only formed part of the equation. When there’s a move involved, family and lifestyle also impact the decision.

“To me, the family is probably the most important,” McNamara continues.

“There’s a couple of really important pieces. One, the synergy within the coaching group is crucial. How that coaching group get on together off the pitch, you spend an awful lot of time with these people, so it’s not just about being competent in your own silo. There needs to be chemistry and a synergy within that group as well.

“Then the family, you’re trying to ensure that it works for them as well, that their quality of life, their experience of it (is good) and it’s not just a personal crusade.

“And the reality is no matter how much preparation you do or homework you do there is always going to be a step into the unknown, things you can’t preempt or prepare for. It’s the nature of it, and at some point you have to take that leap of faith and work as hard as you possibly can to make it work.”

All of these factors boil down to making the final appointment, and hopefully, ending the interview process for at least a couple of seasons.

‘There’s a hell of a lot of work from both ends mate,” Friend says.

“There’s a lot of time spent by a lot of people trying to get the right person, so if you’re lucky enough to land a good job, well, well done to you.”