Josh Kingsley

Welcome to the Offseason!!

I started writing for ArrowheadOne just before the start of the 2021 season. Just over a year ago the offseason started abruptly and I had a dilemma: what is the topic to cover an eliminated, possibly underachieving team? Here we are a year later with a different task: what is the topic to cover a Champion, possibly overachieving team?

I have to be honest and tell you I like this task more. Last season featured a two part processing journey of the AFC title game elimination, a Super Bowl pun intended soup recipe, and then a piece about Eric Bieniemy. This year I covered two wins, which was awesome, and now sit in the Bieniemy spot again. He is the main topic again, but not before a couple of my signature, totally unrelated to anything football sidebars to the deep unknown. Like I said… welcome to the offseason.

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A Wedding Planning Life

I talk about work often in these posts. My busy body personality keeps me purposefully over-employed, which is 100% by my design. I do not do nothing well, so I may as well make it productive. While I talk about work often I pretty much never name drop companies, which is by design… ish. It didn’t start as intentional, but I noticed it and decided to keep it going similar to the long running Friends joke keeping Chandler’s job hidden. I’m breaking that trend this week for the business owner portion. Why this and why now? A couple reasons. First, there really isn’t a reason to hide it, and everyone there knows all this stuff. The CEO of the parent company of my franchise was part of my AFC Championship tailgate crew. Second, I have a relevant story surrounding it.

I mentioned the DJ background in the Party Planner for Life portion of my AFC Championship game recap with a story about when I believe I became a wedding pro. Here’s some additional context. Sitting still has never been my thing. One year in college I turned in 17 (I think but did not fact check) W2 to my tax guy. This was a result of keeping 2-3 jobs at any given moment while attending school full time, and many being project based and fill-in type stuff. In late 2002 I tired of going to the same small town bars every Saturday and looked to make a change. Sitting at home was never in the cards. I pulled out the school newspaper for the classifieds and found two compelling jobs: mobile DJ and bartender trainee.I applied for both.

A Literal “Union”

A couple days later a guy named Mark called from a Manhattan, KS number. He owned a company called Complete Music and wanted to meet me at the school Union building for a interview the following week. I sat down with him for an hour and learned about becoming a wedding DJ. The whole thing simply made sense: out on Saturdays, in different towns, meeting new people, plus money to hype up a party. Sold. I started almost immediately, which was that December. Training lasted until February (I think) and that story about saving the party happened in April (again, I think). The guy who called me was Scott. That was my favorite job in college, and I held all the way until I finished grad school in May of 2006 and through the summer until I moved to Denver.

At that point I officially retired, but I kept coming back. I covered a couple weddings for friends in the following years. After my wedding in 2010 I found the need to occupy weekends again ending up working for a photo booth company. In 2013, I stepped into music again for a company trade show party. This was a giant industry show and I was working in sales for one of the big players. One of the nights we hosted a massive customer event and I was the musical entertainment. It was off my iPod (Pod, not Pad – 2013), but it re-lit the fire. I plodded through another year or so of the photo booth stuff until I snapped. During an exceptionally long break I called Mark and asked if there was a Complete in Milwaukee. He assured me I’d receive a call.

Finally Put a Ring on It

Well, I got a call. Not from a Milwaukee franchise owner, but rather from Ian, the franchise sales guy. In retrospect Mark was gently prodding me in that direction back in grad school. He finally finished the job in May of 2015 when Misty and I signed on to join the Complete Weddings + Events family as franchise owners. Complete started in 1974 when a guy named Jerry in Omaha took his reel to reel tape player to his sister’s wedding. It became a franchise model in the 80s and quickly took over the Midwest. Shortly after I left in 2006 the organization added photo and video rebranding from Complete Music to Complete Weddings + Events. Photo booths joined the stable shortly after, up lighting after that, and now we also do day of coordination. We are truly “complete.”

Last November Scott, who is now the owner of the Manhattan location that hired me, unveiled a new concept called Complete Nation. His goal was simple: unite the past, present and future of Complete under a community banner. I can personally stake a claim to all 3. This whole thing started as a job for me in 2002, morphed into a business in 2015, became a 10,000 hour skill at some point, and then ceased to be work because it transformed into something else. At this point it’s an identity.

Last Sunday I made the trip back to Kansas to attend Scott’s annual awards banquet in Manhattan as he unveiled Complete Nation to his team. I even brought a couple college friends who I pulled into the DJ gig back in the day. It was a great night of fun and celebration for what is still my favorite job.

EB and the Corporate Screw Job

Eric Bieniemy is no longer part of the CHIEFS organization. This is a good thing as he outgrew his role as offensive coordinator. What’s not a good thing is… the job he took is an Offensive Coordinator and Assistant Head Coach job. That’s not a “promotion” for EB because he really took the exact same job with Washington.

Most of my professional career features large companies, and each gives me insight to organizational behavior. I often say that most large businesses, regardless of industry, are the same place: a bunch of flawed people with good intentions paying attention to the wrong stuff. Most large companies are also a series of smaller divisions acting like small businesses under a large umbrella. Some function highly, make the stock prices look awesome, and overshadow lesser performing divisions. Often times the collective is a flawed assemblage of business growing in spite of itself and its inefficiencies.

The collective NFL is one of these such organizations. From a business standpoint the NFL is one giant organization. Some business units, like the CHIEFS and Steelers and Patriots, function as well oiled cash cows.  They work to cover up the losers who can’t get out of their own way, like the Browns and Texans. Nothing makes this more obvious than the annual carousel of head coaches.

Bad Hires Stacked on Bad Decisions

The 2012 season was the lowest point for the CHIEFS organization (remember 2-and-14?). Clark Hunt responded by tossing massive resources at getting the best possible coach in Andy Reid and allowing him and the front office to build the team. The Cleveland Browns recently had 3 different head coaches in a 2 season period before landing on the guy they should have hired earlier in Kevin Stefanski. They flirted with building a team methodically, and then chickened out committing $250M guaranteed to a sexual predator caked with rust. The collective NFL grew the entire time, but it wasn’t because of good Browns business.

Recent coaching cycles show more corporate malfeasance with these wild hires:

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These three (3) coaches have a few things in common. First, they were not up for the job and seemed like a reach in the moment. Second, they did not make it halfway through their contracts. Third, they are now insanely rich as they will collect every penny of their agreed $100M plus from poorly run organizations.

These teams are the business units that do not do good research, don’t follow markets, and haven’t launched a quality product in 8-10 years. There is another common thread: each filled their position instead of hiring Eric Bieniemy.

The Internal Candidate

All NFL teams collect into a singular business. The branding, operations, etc. all fall under the league umbrella. Head coach is an internal promotion in most cases with the college ranks being the only external source. Large organizations like the NFL have jobs open all the time and internal candidates are always on the table. There are two approaches to filling the roles related to internal candidates:

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There are pros and cons to both no doubt. Tapping on the shoulder is the quickest way to a filled position rewards tangible performance within the business, but it does lack an air of thoroughness, and technically doesn’t comply with rules that jobs must post publicly out of fairness. Plus, it open the door to nepotism. Panels can be thorough, collaborative and cross functional, but often focus on things that do not relate to the business functions –> such as good answers to situational questions, and –> essentially create and find reasons not to hire people.

Important Notes and Assumptions

I have been on and through hiring panels. Some of my jobs and promotions came via shoulder tap method as well. I have hired people both ways too. Every person on my leadership team in my company is a result of a shoulder tap. My focus is on business and organizational motivation: not racial bias. However, I do believe it is a combo of both at this point. The NFL constantly makes it clear it controls what it wants to. It actively chooses to allow the Rooney Rule to be a kangaroo court and to not actually address a diversity program in the coaching ranks. Actually addressing it looks like an LDP (Leadership Development Program) where they teach things like soft skills; AKA, interviewing well, and encouraging minorities into the pool.

This is similar to how the NFL keeps the referee positions from being real jobs.

Undeniable Facts About Eric Bieniemy

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Quick question: what is missing from the above resume if applying for a head coach position in the NFL? Let’s explore.

Reasons NOT to Hire EB for HC

There are always “good reasons” to avoid making a hire. An old saying goes something to the effect of “everyone but the CEO ends up in one job above their capability.” There is a possibility EB is over his skis in a top level job like NFL head coach. Kind of like the possibility of the other three mentioned earlier. What reasons (pronounced: excuses) keep coming up with EB? Here are the three I see most and my responses.

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A Reason to Hope

How can this turn out okay? Key point: I am only concerned about this turning out well for EB. The Colts and Cardinals can stay dumb for all I care. Denver can enjoy their second retread in as many years as well. Bieniemy has a solid opportunity in front of him. He goes into a mostly positive situation at Washington. Ron Rivera seems like a decent boss, and he is giving EB the full offensive reins. The Commanders have offensive talent on the line, in the backfield and at receiver. They appear a QB short, but are in a position to upgrade via draft or free agency. Finally, owner Dan Snyder is most likely selling the team, and that eliminates a black cloud and the barrier to a return of a rabid fanbase.

A playoff team and top 10 offense potentially pulls NFL owners heads out of their… well… you know, and EB out of Washington after one year. That’s what I’m rooting for!

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Josh Kingsley — ArrowheadOne and Arrowhead Kingdom

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