Structure of private remuneration. An important article.

This is perhaps the biggest illusion cast about Malaysian chess. That there is no money in chess and that certain people are only doing it for their love of the game. Actually this is the mantra to knock down the people who can do something about developing us. Let me try to explain.

Now if you have read carefully what I have been saying about the actual role of MCF, here, then you will see that its already a big job. Even setting the policy guidelines and aiding the affiliates will take a lot of work. But it makes sense. You release new potential by developing the States and you also ensure we do not lose good officials or players from unfair practices. All that and still run the National events. There is enough money for this as I have just explained in the post below. Here again.

Now comes the other problem. How do we develop a GM? It takes a lot of financing and know how. This is, in my opinion, the role of private bodies. Read this.

That is of course business at a very high level but the principle is the same. It's about giving value and establishing track record. So lets us start by looking a little closer at our private academies.

Private Academies.

Perhaps a good example for us to look at for comparison is Chess Kidz from Singapore. What are they doing that is different? We see their coaches coming with the players for tournaments. They provide guidance and give tips on how to win where it matters; in the tournament. Isn't this obvious? It cannot be done from a classroom.

What do we do instead? We get GM's to do the training for beginners when it has already been shown from the Asean 2010 training that this is not suitable. You do not use a professor to teach kindergarden. Now I hear we are bringing in a super GM to do the same. That is not their job. These practices will only be self defeating in the longer run as the people who coughed up the money will not have been given value.

We have "trainers" with zero record of success going around asking for investors etc etc.

The Academies here have not thought through what is training and what is coaching and so they are close to failure. So this needs to happen. We need them to figure out the difference between just technical training and developing a winning mindset. We need them to start to understand what is competitor analysis etc etc.

And if they can do that they can also be successful. It is not that chess cannot earn them a living. It is because they do not give value but instead try to sell the hype. But the players do not improve on hype do they? They will be tested on an International field and found wanting. (And so the backdoors, the sabotage etc).

Private Organisers.

Remember I said that Dato Tan asked Hamid and Najib to go to the sponsors themselves if they wanted the last Malaysian Open to happen? I think this was the intention. Dato wanted them to learn how to do things properly and to understand the work involved. True, Dato directed them to his own companies and his allies which does make it easier. Still the lesson was, it is not easy. You need to deliver or they will not be there the following year.

So this is the lesson for private organisers. You need to develop your own business contacts, do the work of writing your own proposals to sponsors and make sure your tournaments deliver what private sponsors want. There is money if you get it right. Give value.

But again what is our practice? We learnt from our own Asean 2010 training that not only will "MCF" move against us and ask players to go to another tournament but again operational people, in this case the supplier, will charge the event, management fees when they did not do the work.

What I am saying in the above paragraph is our focus is on undermining, sabotage, taking money from others that we did not work for. So no energy is given to doing the work that matters.

We need the private entities to go about their business without hindrance for they perform a very important role. Only they can have the resources to develop our GM. The expenses and expertise is beyond the resources of MCF. So MCF should do what MCF needs to do and allow the private entities to do what they are best suited to do.

Lets look more closely at the repercussions of our current system in my next post.