Warde's long, strong ties to Parker Exec. Search

[FfldCntyFan]

We'll see. Week of Dec. 9 will be telling. No coach by Friday and this will have been proven true. Does UConn start the dominoes or have to wait because of the 'lack of attractiveness' of job?

One thing that I believe everyone can agree on is the there will be three categories of potential candidates: A) current assistants at high level programs B) head coaches at programs where UConn will be a step up at least in terms of compensation and exposure (we can debate whether moving from the MAC to the AAC would also be a step up in competition) and C) Out of work, larger names who want to use us as an opportunity to restore their name (if the Nutt rumors were true he would be one of these).

If hypothetically there are forty candidates among those three categories who are legitimately qualified, it is very likely that as few as fifteen have a true understanding of what UConn can offer while the remainder know what little they could have gathered from listening to pundits and ESPiN (who primarily knock us). Do you really want to go through with this job search with the understanding that nearly two thirds of the best targets will dismiss us immediately? Keep in mind that about a year before we hired him Jim Calhoun turned down an offer from Northwestern on the advice of Bobby Knight.

A third party can do a much better job than an insider of convincing someone that yes we can be a quality football program, that we will have the commitment to build a program and that we can be a legitimate expansion candidate for the B1G and/or ACC. A third party can prevent WM from wasting his time chasing the handful of candidates who would never consider us even after a major job of selling our positives. In my opinion I believe that if utilized correctly this could be money very well spent. Where you and I differ is that I don't see WM as someone who would purchase a tool without any clue as to how it should be used. He won't take a chisel and use it to tighten a screw. He knows enough to use a screwdriver for that job. JH on the other hand,... well,.....

 

[J187Money]

I saw that on their website. It's a clever niche they have.

I didn't look at their site, but that's how it has worked when I've used retained search firms. Makes it so much easier on the internal folks not to have to deal with the nonsense.

 

[ruskin]

All outside the eyes of FOI'ing of expense reports, phone records, Flight Tracking, etc...

That's another thing folks are accepting, that Parker's activities can't be FOI'd. Given they have a contract with a state entity aren't their activities subject to those regs? Now, if Parker signed a contract with one of the "quasi-public" foundations at UConn I suspect it would be harder to do so.

The other thing -- Warde has to keep in contact with Parker in some fashion. Other than using the Bat-signal aren't his emails and cell phone records subject to FOI?

 

[ruskin]

Keep in mind that about a year before we hired him Jim Calhoun turned down an offer from Northwestern on the advice of Bobby Knight.

Another thing in UConn's favor in this search. Whatever you think of Knight he said something along the lines of "you want to be with the University OF something". Hopefully there's a mentor out there giving the same advice to one of UConn's targets.

 

[huskymedic]

That's another thing folks are accepting, that Parker's activities can't be FOI'd. Given they have a contract with a state entity aren't their activities subject to those regs? Now, if Parker signed a contract with one of the "quasi-public" foundations at UConn I suspect it would be harder to do so.

The other thing -- Warde has to keep in contact with Parker in some fashion. Other than using the Bat-signal aren't his emails and cell phone records subject to FOI?

Never said they couldn't - Skilled people (who are counseled) leave much less of a trail and make it much harder to obtain info in the time frame necessary to blow things up.

How much info will you get from a phone log that shows a number of calls to/from area code 770 as opposed to area codes 517 or 765? If it's sensitive info do you really think WM is going to do it by email (possible of course but...).