Episode 13: One call. Everything changed.

[00:00:00] Justinus: This episode, we are gonna explore how they make decisions when certainty disappears, how they’ve come to old contrarian views, and what we can learn about rebuilding confidence and direction without clarity.

[00:00:13] Sean: We’ve gone from $50 million under management in September 22 to two and a half billion dollars.

[00:00:18] It’s up 50 times transformational.

[00:00:21] Nick: If Nick can drop Gary Tishman, who’s one of his best mates, then I mean, how, how quickly can he drop us? I lost the confidence of the team in that, with that one error that I made.

[00:00:31] Sean: If you grow up in the uk, extremely wealthy, you don’t have to confront poverty in South Africa.

[00:00:38] Even if you are extremely wealthy, you confront poverty

[00:00:40] Nick: and Rusty is pushing him away. He’s actually pushing him away. See, that’s not my place. It’s not my place. Now you look at the, you look at the roads. Those two have trapped, I mean, one was, one was guaranteed to be a springbok. The other one, how on earth did that guy become a spring?

[00:00:56] Sean: Just being aware of, hang on, I can do this. Like, why have I, why have I just subconsciously doubted myself? You try and forecast and plan, well, it’s not gonna work out like that. Whatever happens, we’ll make a plan. And that gives you a mindset of just knowing that you’re gonna come, you’re gonna have difficult times.

[00:01:12] Nick: I don’t regret any single day that I, that I had. I was incredibly fortunate.

[00:01:28] Justinus: Good morning and welcome to Winning The Away Game Today. We have Nick Ballad, who was born in England, raised in Rhodesia and South Africa, studied at UCT and Oxford and played for the spring box before coaching them to the 17 match unbeaten run. He later also coached in France and Italy, and I’m sure with his, with Italy’s recent success there.

[00:01:53] It’ll be part of the conversation today and learned new languages and cultures as he traveled the world today. He’s a rugby analyst, a columnist, and serves under world rugby committees, as well as being a corporate speaker. Sean Peche, trained in Cape Town, worked at Old Mutual Asset Management and Equinox before moving to London in 2001, where he worked at Ilian and Orbis before founding ran more global equity fund in 2008.

[00:02:24] He’s a long value investor who promotes numbers, not narrative challenges. There lots of long held beliefs like holding Forever, orthodoxy and champions, small charities focused on children and poverty. This episode, we are gonna explore how they make decisions when certainty disappears, how they’ve come to old contrarian views, and what we can learn about rebuilding confidence and direction without clarity.

[00:02:55] Flip. How are you doing this morning?

[00:02:57] Flip: Justina’s. Excellent. Very excited to learn more from both guests. Sean, in his own right built a great business. Nick is the godfather of South African rugby, as you may call it. We’re fans of that incredible 99 7 rugby team. So looking forward to what we’re gonna learn from these two gentlemen.

[00:03:13] As a little tradition on the show, we ask our guests, what is your favorite Springbok memory? Sean, will you open the floor for us?

[00:03:21] Sean: Thank you so much to you and Justina for inviting me on and to Nick for joining me, and, and it’s a, it’s a great privilege to be in your company. So, so I know that you don’t like the 1995 to be, you know, brought up as the, as the favorite memory, but mine is slightly different because at the time I was at, I was training as an accountant at Deloitte and we had been at an away, an offsite at the Val River.

[00:03:49] We were traveling back to Johannesburg International Airport to, to catch the plane back and hoping to, to watch the rugby game in Cape Town. But it was a little bit touch and go. And our bus coming back from the Val River broke down on the way to the airport and we were there stranded on the side of the airport outside of the highway.

[00:04:08] And these cars were going past with flags and tooting. And we thought there’s just, we’re gonna just be stuck here. And in fact, we saw the Boeing fly over, okay, from the side of the highway watching this Boeing fly. ’cause we could see Ellis Park Stadium. And we thought, oh, this is an absolute disaster.

[00:04:24] We’re gonna be stuck here. The guy who’s supposed to come and fix the bus, he’s not gonna pitch up. He’s gonna be watching the rugby. The good news is we did actually make it. We missed our flight, which was great because of the chaos in the airport. The flights were all delayed. We missed our flight and ended up watching the end of the game in the bar, in the airport.

[00:04:40] So it was extremely festive. Whereas if we’d made our flight, we would been up in the air and not, and missed all the activity. And so I guess a key takeaway from that whole experience is that when things are, are tough and there’s a, there’s a tendency to extrapolate, we stuck on the side of the highway, we’re gonna miss the game, et cetera.

[00:04:58] And you just extrapolate that difficult situation into the future, and yet it actually somehow worked out better for us all men. So I’m sorry to have brought that one, but I felt I had to share that. That’s awesome. That was the story.

[00:05:10] Justinus: That’s epic, man. I love how you turned it around into Alexa.

[00:05:14] Flip: You would’ve been so Deloitte to, to put you on the airplane in the middle of the,

[00:05:18] Sean: in the middle of, I couldn’t make like, and, and of course that was, there was, I remember there was one guy on the bus with a, with a cell phone.

[00:05:25] So it wasn’t like we could all, you know. Huddle around an iPhone and watch the game, et cetera. We’re like, we were Strand, no communication. They were watching. Oh. ’cause Anyway, it was crazy.

[00:05:34] Flip: Nick, Nick, where are you now these days, Nick?

[00:05:37] Nick: So, in Cape Town.

[00:05:38] Flip: Okay.

[00:05:38] Nick: Yeah, in my, in my house, in Cape Town, in, in Teka. So yeah, I just goes to the Steinberg Golf course five minutes away, so I can go and hit a ball quite, quite regularly, which is fun.

[00:05:49] But mine, strangely enough, it’s, it wasn’t, obviously, I, I was very excited about a few of my results, but for me, the one that, uh. That is left. The biggest impression for, for me is the, the 2019 win in, in Japan. And the reason for this, uh, is for what happened after the game. It was, it was quite extraordinary.

[00:06:10] There was a, first of all, we played against England and England were, were favorites going into that final, that played absolutely outstanding rugby against New Zealand in the semifinal. And we were, I remember doing a, a, a, a, a little interview with an, um, with, uh, one of the English journalists and it was with Mung, uh, Hanani Mung as well.

[00:06:30] And, and we, and they were, they were saying, listen, you know, they’re not many spring box would make the England side. And, you know, we, we, we had solid real favorites going into this game. And, and I remember both Shami and I saying, you know, the one thing you guys haven’t faced is, is, uh, the commitment that South Africa shows on defense.

[00:06:48] You know, the speed off the line, the fact that we don’t play much rugby, therefore we, we, we don’t make too many mistakes. And, um, and we are gonna turn you around with, with kicks, and we’re gonna, we, you know, it’s gonna be a different sort of game that you’re gonna face. And, uh, they laughed at us, basically.

[00:07:02] And, uh, but, but what happened? We end up by winning that game. But a moment there that absolutely it’ll remain in, in my mind forever was, was fear. Going to Rothi and saying to him, please come and stand with us and celebrate this victory, uh, together with us because you are, you know, you, you’ve been such a pivotal person in, in getting us to be as successful as this.

[00:07:26] And Rahi is pushing him away. It’s actually pushing him away. See, that’s not my place. It’s not my place. And I just thought for me, that, um, that thumbed up absolutely. The, uh, the, uh, the way in which South African rugby, um, uh, had, had sort evolved under Rossi. You know, he was, he would give everything he possibly could to the players.

[00:07:48] But they were the ones on the field who won the applauded, and they were the ones who had to hold up the World Cup and it wasn’t his moment there to be in, in the limelight. And uh, I loved that moment. I just thought from a coaching perspective, um, it’s exactly how I felt too. When, when, when the side got success, I wanted them to, to absolutely revel in it, you know?

[00:08:09] Um, and, and I, you know, obviously as a coach, you get, you get, uh, compliments afterwards through the, through the fact that the team has done well, but it’s not your moment to be standing there with a cup, uh, holding it up in the air. You, you aren’t the guy who played the game.

[00:08:23] Flip: Yeah.

[00:08:24] Justinus: Yes. Interesting tidbit. I dunno if you guys ever watched the Super Bowl in the us but after the Super Bowl, when they hand over the trophy, they don’t hand it to the player.

[00:08:35] They don’t even add it to the coach. They hand the trophy to the owner of the team.

[00:08:40] Nick: Yeah.

[00:08:41] Justinus: It’s just such a different mentality.

[00:08:44] Nick: It is. That’s professionalism Stanley, because they’re the guys who pay their salaries.

[00:08:51] Flip: Yeah. That’s, that’s such a good story, Daniel. It’s great hearing it from your side. ’cause it’s something, as a player we saw from the side and appreciate it.

[00:08:58] And I finished my play career in France as well. It’s, and it’s very much the opposite. You know when, when the team wins, you, the coaches write books and it’s all over and it’s just ladi dah. When the team lose, it’s the players that have less type of behavior. Take us a little bit through your, your own, you know, you, you always see very celebrated player and then it became very quickly a very good coach.

[00:09:17] Um, how did it happen? What, what, what was your thinking process? Uh, integrating into.

[00:09:24] Nick: Yeah, it was interesting club. I was, I was in South Africa during the apartheid era. We were winning curry cups. We had a fantastic Western province cur Cup team. I think they won five or six in a row at that time. I was involved in four of them and, um, I was 28 years old and, and New Zealand and France was supposed to come out on tour and they canceled the tour because of the political situation.

[00:09:45] So, um, you know, I I, I’d been fortunate enough to get a couple of caps against, uh, um, a South American team that had come over the Argentine. It was basically the Argentine side, but with a couple of extra players. And, um, and I just thought to myself, listen, use rugby as a passport to the rest of the world.

[00:10:04] Let’s, let’s see if you can travel and, and use it. And I was fortunate that I had. A good mate, Dougle McDonald, who had played in, in Italy and had played in, in France, uh, played for Ulus with, uh, Jean p Reeve and Reela, and in Italy he played at Palmer. So, and he’d gone to Oxford and he’d been at UCT. So we had quite a similar background.

[00:10:23] And he said, Nick, there’s a, a, a small. Second division side in the center of France in St. Claude. It’s tiny. It’s close to Geneva, and they’re looking for a player coach, uh, would you be interested? And I said, what level is it? And they said, no, no, it’s second division in France. It’ll be like playing for UCT thirds, you know, so, so I said, well, what is it?

[00:10:44] You know, is it little? Did you know that business prospect? And he said, listen, the guides love a drink in France, so if you go over, you’ll make money out of the bistro. There’s no question about that. So I spoke to my wife and I said, listen, are you up for it? I was 28 years old. And, um, without speaking a word of French, we said off with St.

[00:11:01] Cla in, in, in France. And I was, uh, a bistro owner and coached and played for a team in the second division. Took them up into the first division. And, uh, it was a fascinating way to learn how to coach. You start off, obviously, you know, I’d played for the spring box and played for Western Province, so you were a better player than the other guys.

[00:11:20] And I would try and do everything myself. You know, I’d be taking kick for the poles and kick for touch and, you know, I’d want to jump in every line out and score the try. And eventually you work out, you know, that you’ve actually gotta make sure that everyone else does their job properly and if they do their chop job well then it makes it so much easier for you to do yours.

[00:11:38] So, uh, it was a, it was a really interesting learning process and, uh, that I, I, I was able to pick up French obviously then. And, uh, I, I moved from there up to Paris. Had four years with another second division side, which I took to the first division as well. So as a player coach, I had nine years in France and that actually set me up for when I came back to South Africa.

[00:11:59] ’cause in those 10, nine to 10 years that I was in France, um, you know, learning how to be a coach, uh, South Africa was out of international sport and just playing amongst each other. So I was at a huge advantage when I came back. Um, I’d watched Six Nations to, um, you know, championships I’d been, I’d seen the way that Australia played when they won the World Cup in 91.

[00:12:22] Um, I’d followed them around France and watched their practices. So I came back to South Africa armed with quite a lot more information than people had here, and that made coaching a lot easier for me when I, when I started off at False Bay and then went to Boiler, I know we’re talking about, you know, getting out of your comfort zone by leaving your country, but for me, I was a, I was sent to boarding school when I was six years old and, uh, so, you know, you’ve gotta start learning at six years old how to get on with other people because you’re the youngest guy in the school.

[00:12:52] They’re guys of 13, and then, you know, then you’ve gotta go to senior school. My, my dad was headmaster Bishop and he said, you can’t go to bishops where I’m headmaster. You’ve gotta choose between Michael a St. John’s and St. Andrews. And I chose St. Andrews. And I think all those experiences of being a boarder, being away from home, having to sort of sort things out for yourself.

[00:13:12] Made made it a, a, a very unsear thing to travel. I was delighted to go over and study at Oxford. I was delighted to go over to France, even though I couldn’t speak the language, I knew I would pick it up, you know, if I was behind a bar for seven days a week, it was, I was gonna pick it up as quickly as possible.

[00:13:28] So, so that’s how it all, it all started.

[00:13:31] Flip: It’s a, it’s a whole generation of people that went to, went to boarding school quite early. And I agree with you that, that, um, lack of fear to move and explore new things, um, you know, is especially important when you, when you move away and, and try and window away game.

[00:13:46] Um, and you speak great French by the way, so you, you’ve kept that, um, Sean especially, especially in your career as well, you know, um. The financial industry is not something that you take up lightly, and it’s, and it’s not the coaching IP that you can go throw around and let’s do it my way. It’s very regulated.

[00:14:05] And backing up your stuff, going to, to London and saying I’m starting something new and then starting a business in London. Um, take us a little bit to that, to that bravery and that.

[00:14:16] Sean: Thank you.

[00:14:17] Flip: Yeah.

[00:14:17] Sean: And, um, if I may just say it. Thanks. You know, thanks for Nick for, for joining me on here because there’s a bit of a story flip, and if I can just, um, take you back a step because it was quite fundamental and instrumental in my life.

[00:14:30] So I was at a small school in Cape Town, St. George’s Grammar School, and I had the privilege and pleasure of being taught by Nick’s late sister, Jenny Mallett in standard two. She was my, my teacher in standard two. And I mean, that must be 45, 46 years ago. And, and what was amazing about Jenny is everybody absolutely loved her, but totally respected her.

[00:14:53] So you knew where your boundaries were and, and she was intimately involved in all aspects of life. She, she, so, and in fact, and I’m gonna tell you this. You know, hand on Hartner. I remember her telling, she was so proud of her family. I mean, I knew all the names of her siblings, including that Nick was one of the few people to ever receive two Oxford Blues.

[00:15:15] And I remembered her telling us this, you know, so many years ago. And I looked it up. I thought it was rag and rowing. I didn’t know. But then Brother Dave was my under 11 rugby coach, and he was also an assistant, um, housemaster. I was a, a weekly boarder. And, um, and we were quite scared of Dave. Dave. We used to call him the bear.

[00:15:34] We definitely weren’t gonna tell Dave to his face that we called him the bear. We are way too scared of Dave. But I tell you what Dave did do is he, um, he made us believe in ourselves because the one thing you didn’t want to do is miss a tackle in UND 11 and have to answer today. So we didn’t miss tackles.

[00:15:50] Okay. And then when you made a good tackle and you went really low, you thought, hang on, that wasn’t too bad. You know, I should just keep doing this. So we ended up punching well above our weight. I remember our, uh, I think it might’ve been Dave or Head master Pool can at the time, saying it’s not the size of the dog in the fight that counts.

[00:16:06] It’s the size of the fight in the dog. Okay? And, and then, then just the third member of the family. Um, next mum Vivian was our librarian. And, uh, and I still have this image of, you know, but very involved. She wasn’t just go find the book, she would read to us and all the rest. So, so I’ve had so much involvement with Nick’s family and then more recently his son who’s, uh, just a fine young man Nick can be very, very proud of, of Doug.

[00:16:31] So I finally got to meet, um, Nick and uh, and what a pleasure it is. So, so flip the, the, you know, going overseas and I guess in many ways we share, you know, Nick and I share similar things in that if you can play rugby in South Africa, we can play rugby overseas. If you can coach in South African coach overseas, you know, and, and whether my wife’s a doctor and if you treating a person in, in Cape Town at Red Cross, your child at Red Cross Children’s Hospital or treating a child over here, you know, they’ve all got.

[00:17:05] Hearts, lungs, kidneys, et cetera. So companies have income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements. And I guess it’s the belief in oneself that actually, you know, we can punch above our weight. Um, we can go overseas and do this, and never really doubting yourself. And make no mistake, there were very difficult times.

[00:17:23] Um, but having the resilience to see it through, I guess. So

[00:17:26] Flip: I love other families. Intermingle two great things that came out of here is, you know, is, uh, shown a very good lesson to people listening, particularly young guys. You don’t have to go to this massive big name school in South Africa to actually make it out there.

[00:17:40] I think that’s a very important point. You know, on the other hand is you need very good and strict teachers. If I imagine, uh, nickel, I imagine his sister was very much like him. You know, some, some discipline in the, in the classroom is very essential.

[00:17:54] Nick: Very much, uh, she was, uh, she was a, an extraordinary, uh, this, I’m gonna add a little bit of, you spoke about a human touch that you must add to this.

[00:18:02] When I came back from, from playing in France and I was coaching at false bank, very soon after that I got, I got asked to coach Boyett. And I mean, we didn’t have a big budget at all. I mean, I think the guys won 48,000 rand a year. That was the, that was the number one contract. And the second contract was 24,000 a year.

[00:18:21] So the guys were still school teachers and students. They weren’t making a lot of money. And I was doing the, the attack, the defense, the fitness and conditioning and everything. And I didn’t have anyone to help me with the, the tech technological side. And, and as you know, I’m not very good at it. So I wrote out onto on a, just a, a big a four piece of paper, you, uh, penalties, four penalties against line outs, four line outs against crus fall, scrums against knock ons, four knock ons against, um, uh, myth tackles, et cetera.

[00:18:52] And I gave that to Jen and she sat in this, in the Bull Stadium and I did at Wellington and at halftime, she would give me this list and I’d walk in and the players hated it. They absolutely hated because that was the honest truth that came off that piece of paper. She would never cheat. They would know, you know, okay, that Mr.

[00:19:11] Tackle three, two knock ons and one stupid penalty. And they knew they were gonna get it at halftime, you know, just because it was all there clearly written out in Jen’s piece of paper. No, she was wonderful. She loved rugby and she got so irritated with men ignoring her, you know, when she wanted to give an opinion.

[00:19:29] So she wrote the referees exam and she was the only person ever to have got a hundred percent. There’s no man as ma no man got a hundred percent and, and top referees don’t get a hundred percent. Jen got a hundred percent Tinky. Hans was the referee manager in the Western Cape, and he told me it was quite extraordinary.

[00:19:48] So she went around with this in her pocket saying, I’m a quantified referee.

[00:19:52] Flip: Amazing.

[00:19:53] Nick: Nick, you must listen to my opinion. Wonderful.

[00:19:56] Justinus: Um, so Sean, maybe talk us a little bit of, of the sort of change in identity and the cultural and professional psychologically adjustments you felt you had to make when you landed in the uk and, and how was it different and what was some of the lessons you learned there early on?

[00:20:14] Sean: So Justina, the one thing I’m very grateful for in the UK is it’s a very cosmopolitan place. You know, you go, got Thai restaurants and Indian restaurants and there’s lots of people from lots of different cultures and you don’t feel like you’re an outsider. Um, so it’s very welcoming in that respect. And there’s a huge number of us South Africans as well.

[00:20:33] I mean, you just have to go to S Field or Clapham, Southfield, et cetera. You know, you’ll hear Afri cos and, uh, and, and the South African shops, or even in Coum where our office is, we’ve got a South African shop with some, yeah, great choice of Bill Togs and red wine, et cetera. So it’s, it’s, the transition is very, was very easy.

[00:20:54] I mean, certainly much you wouldn’t have to learn a different language. People can understand you. Uh, you’ve got lots of friends over here. So actually I found the transition pretty easy. I mean, the one thing just in terms of our business, when we set up, ran more back in 2008, for most of the early years I was focusing on marketing to South Africa because the one, because I’d made an error and the error was the era of judgment.

[00:21:18] Well, the error was that I thought that in the finance sector, because I didn’t go to the schools over here and the universities over here, I was gonna find great difficulty in breaking into that network. Okay? Especially in finance. Um, living and having friends and all, there is not a problem. But breaking into the finance network that I, I completely misread that.

[00:21:38] And in 20, it took me until 2022 when I, I’d, I’d seen a, a client and they said, well, you know, can you go and speak to my guys in Guernsey? And I spoke to the guys in Guernsey and they said, well, these are great numbers. We’ve never heard of you. And I thought, okay, well, you know, and that sort of opened a whole avenue for me.

[00:21:54] And I then got on the platforms over here, which was quite an exercise, and now more than half our businesses from UK clients. Um, so, so the transition I think was easier than in some places. Uh, you know, we play the same sports, watch the same sports, et cetera.

[00:22:10] Justinus: Mm-hmm. And why do you think you made that assumption, and, and why do you think it took you so long to invalidate the assumption?

[00:22:18] Sean: Sure. Um, you know, I, I don’t know. And when I think, when I think back, I think, well, how could I make this assumption, this incorrect assumption, because it’s such a welcoming place with all these cultures, et cetera. But, you know, the finance sector was, is quite different. You’ve got some very old names, you know, Kano and Wrath Bones and all these old, uh.

[00:22:41] Private banks here, some small private banks, et cetera, and those are quite networked. Many fund managers over here went to Oxford and Cambridge and places like that. Um, many of my peers at ORUS went to those prestigious universities. And so I guess, but it, but it just takes, you know, you just gotta, I guess the point that I made was, is that just being aware of, hang on, I can do this.

[00:23:05] Like, why have I, why have I just subconsciously doubted myself? Never consciously doubted myself. Never, you know, and I didn’t have a network, so that was the other thing. I didn’t really have a network. And that’s where LinkedIn came in. So LinkedIn helped me build a network and I mean, look, that’s how we got together and that’s how I got to know the Leer network, et cetera.

[00:23:23] So it’s, it’s an incredible resource that allows us South Africans all around the world, not just, I mean, any business professional to connect. And the other thing is, it’s a very positive network. Mm-hmm. You go onto Twitter and you make a comment, and people can hide behind the non de plumes and throw mud, but.

[00:23:40] Because they, you know who the, who, who’s that person? But on, on LinkedIn, everyone’s very professional and they’re trying to put their best foot forward, et cetera. And so it’s a, and so you may try to make positive comments, which is a, which is what we all want, so, so LinkedIn really helped me, I guess LinkedIn, where was LinkedIn back in 2001 when I got over here, it wasn’t around, so I guess it was all of those things coming together that even if I’d wanted to make a network or build a network back then, it might’ve been harder without those kinds of resources available.

[00:24:09] Justinus: It’s fascinating. I just actually finished one of the most amazing books I’ve ever read. It’s called The Five Types of Wealth. But one of the interesting things he talks about it is that the things that really get you in life is not the things that you don’t know. It’s the things that you know for sure that just isn’t true.

[00:24:30] Nick: Yeah,

[00:24:32] Sean: that’s it.

[00:24:33] Justinus: Yeah. Yeah. So because we, we make, it’s so easy in that context to make that assumption even subconsciously, like you said, and it takes you so long to realize that’s wrong. And, and as soon as you realize it, like you said, your business is probably doubled because half your business is from, from UK clients now,

[00:24:50] Sean: I mean, we’ve gone from $50 million under management in September 22 to two and a half billion dollars.

[00:24:56] It’s up 50 times. Transformational.

[00:24:59] Flip: Yeah.

[00:25:00] Sean: Um, and, and the power of that LinkedIn has just been incredible.

[00:25:04] Flip: Yeah. Be careful Sean. LinkedIn is gonna come and ask some, uh, permission.

[00:25:10] Sean: A membership. Yeah.

[00:25:13] Flip: A small percentage. Yeah. Yeah. Are we speaking to speaking to two LinkedIn pros? I know between you and Justina, so you guys know how to work.

[00:25:20] Ah,

[00:25:21] Justinus: come on, flip.

[00:25:22] Flip: Um,

[00:25:23] Justinus: we are just learning from you.

[00:25:24] Flip: Yeah. Well that it is, it is quite nice. ’cause it is a, as you said Sean, it’s a, it’s a positive platform and that’s, that’s what, that’s what makes people a little bit a agitated by it ever so often because, um, so it’s not true as positive. Um, anyway, that aside, you know, there’s a small nuance again, is our family farm in the middle of the Kalahari is called Kum as well.

[00:25:43] You wouldn’t believe Sean?

[00:25:45] Sean: Wow.

[00:25:45] Flip: Yeah. Um.

[00:25:47] Sean: Amazing.

[00:25:48] Flip: Um, but, uh, anyway, um, Nick, I wanna, I want to get back to you, um, and you, and you know, after your little, you did your little French RV ous and then came back to sbe. Yeah. And, and then, and then ards, you know, and when you look at coaching, it’s, it’s not often you go, okay, well we’ve got this guy, you know, little ti from, from Cape Town, you know, he coached Falls Bay and Lan, you know, now stepping into a very afri regime back in the day and becoming, yeah.

[00:26:19] Becoming Springbok assistant coach and then, and then coach. Um,

[00:26:24] Nick: yeah.

[00:26:25] Flip: Uh, and, and, and it happened quite quickly, if I’m not mistaken, from nine to six, and then all of a sudden, all of a sudden, coach, how do you step up to that ladder and then just, you know, go on all God’s blazing and start performing it?

[00:26:38] Nick: I think, I think, uh, it was, it was, uh, there was quite a bit of.

[00:26:43] Self-confidence that I’d built up from, uh, coaching in France. And I’d seen that, um, oddly enough, it was, I knew that if I was on the field, I could make a, a positive, I could have a really positive influence on the players around me, even as a, as a captain or as a coach or someone who was able to manipulate the referee a little bit.

[00:27:03] But it was, uh, it was, I knew that I, on the field, I could do it. And, and for me, the big test was off the field. If you’re no longer on the field, but you’re coaching and, and you’re preparing the team, but you’re no longer actually in the fight yourself, are you able then to still get the same, um, sort of benefits and the same intensity and the same, uh, intelligence from the players that, that, uh, that I was getting when I was on the field with them and coaching Fo Bay and Boland, which were two teams, they were teams that were sort of very much down, down the order and getting them up, you know, to, we finished.

[00:27:38] So I knew that if I got top players. I knew that I’d be able to do a good job with them. And, and, and having that self-confidence is, is, is vital. I went, uh, to when I was offered the job and given it, and remember I think I was the sixth or seventh coach in five years. We went through, uh, coaches that just as soon as they didn’t perform well, they were fired.

[00:28:01] So, um, I, I wasn’t sure I was gonna get very long in the job, but when I was in it, I was gonna do absolutely my best to, to get the best results possible. And I went around South Africa, I went to Durban and I went to Blanc, Fontain and Pretoria and Joburg. Obviously living in Cape Town. I spoke to 17 guys that I thought were absolutely critical for that 97 tour overseas and just said to them, please, guys, you know, it’s been a long season.

[00:28:27] We’ve lost to the British lions. We lost to the All Blacks. But I promise you this is gonna be a fantastic tour. We will do well on this tour. The only one who was injured, actually it was, um, Andre Bert wasn’t able to go on the tour because he had to have an operation, but otherwise everyone else came on that tour.

[00:28:44] And, um, it, it was a fabulous tour. We turned it around. We had some fantastic wins against France, against England, against Scotland. Put 68 points past Italy. So, and, and it was just, it, it regenerated that whole feeling, you know, and, and once, once, um, you know, I, I had players like Henry Honey Ball, Gary Tashman, Mark Andrews, uh, uh, you know, I just had such good rugby players.

[00:29:09] Uh, you know, I just knew that they were better than the opposition and that if we could play properly, we were gonna absolutely smash them. And that’s, that’s what we did. So, um, we carried that through to 98, and then there were lots of mistakes I made. It’s never, um, always going one way upwards, but there were lots of mistakes.

[00:29:26] You’ve gotta reset your goals, which I didn’t do. You’ve gotta be much more careful about your selections. Um, I didn’t place enough, uh, um, importance on leadership. Um, I, I, I was, I, I thought I, I could pick a team just on form. And leadership in South Africa is absolutely critical. You’ve gotta have a good leader.

[00:29:45] It makes. Everyone else in the squad gel together. If you’ve got a good leader, if you haven’t got a good leader, then everything bombshells and, and you know, people go off into their little pockets of guys together, guys from natal together, English guys together, and they, there’s a lot of insecurity builds up and, and you as a coach can’t do anything about it.

[00:30:03] You’ve stuffed up, you know, and once you’ve stuffed up, it’s very hard to put it together again. So the Gary Tishman thing for me was a really, really poor decision. But, um, you know, unfortunately it was made and I would never make that decision again. But, uh, it was a lesson that thankfully every other coach after me has lurched.

[00:30:21] You know, I think John Smith played at least two or three seasons longer than he would’ve. Because, um, um, because Jake White and, uh, Peter DiUS just rated him so much as a captain. So a guy like Bismarck, D plus C had to wait in the wings for longer than perhaps he, he would normally have done. But that’s really what was it?

[00:30:38] When you ask how did it just fire? Um, when, when you come back and you’ve got an idea of how you want the game to be played and you, and you pick young players and they can do it, and they’re better than players who playing international rugby, they’re actually playing better collectively better. Then it gives you tremendous amount of confidence and um, uh, and, and the fact that I coached Burant was very important for me too.

[00:31:05] I think I, I don’t speak good Afrikaans, but I had two years there and, and the guys there, you know, I said to them, you must speak to me in Afrikaans. I will, I will get better at understanding it. And, and if I speak English back to you, it’s not an insult, it’s just because I can’t speak it as well as I would like to.

[00:31:22] And, and I know that that was probably my, one of my, another mistake I made, I probably should have gone to Pitton Novato or something like that for six months and made sure that, that I never spoke English. Uh, so that when I went in there, people like Andre Fent and Kran Otto and Auste would trust me as much as the English speaking guys would trust me.

[00:31:43] Flip: Mm-hmm.

[00:31:44] Nick: I knew that. I knew that when I was in France and I spoke French to a Frenchman, or if I managed to speak Italian to an Italian, you know, you touch their heart, which you can’t do if you’re going through. A different language.

[00:31:57] Justinus: So if you go back to that decision on Gary Taman, what do you think was in your sort of decision making process?

[00:32:07] Where, what was it that, yeah. Was it, was it, uh, overconfidence in something that turned out to be false? Was it not assessing or was it just, uh, still learning? Where do you think you went along in making that decision?

[00:32:21] Flip: Yeah,

[00:32:22] Nick: I think, I think a number of things. First of all, he was a very close friend of mine.

[00:32:26] We are only about 10 years apart. In fact, I, I started coaching the box when I was 40 years old and Gary was 30. You know, so we, you’re not miles apart at that point. And, you know, we, we’d gone through that unbeaten session, uh, period together. Um, and then unfortunately when things didn’t go well and in, and in 19, in 1999, um, um.

[00:32:51] It was, we went through a really difficult period before the, the, the, the, the World Cup at the end of the year. And, um, and Gary had been, he’d played, I think he’d played 33 months of rugby out of 36 and was carrying a couple of injuries. And, uh, the team that was firing at the moment was the Stormers, or it was Western province in those days.

[00:33:11] And they were beating, um, the shark or Natal. And uh, and, and you know, when your international side’s not playing well and your captain’s battling to get onto the practice field until Wednesday, he was battling with a back injury and at a neck injury, I should have, I should have had more control over the international rugby players.

[00:33:31] If I had what Rusty has got, which is we can take a guy out of sport outta sport and get him rehabbed by the spring box, then it would’ve been fine. But I didn’t, you know, that he had to play the curry cup. And then, um, and then his, obviously his coach. Um, Macintosh wanted him to play in that competition ’cause he was gonna be judged on how they would do in the Curry Cup.

[00:33:53] And so you, you have your hands tied behind your back a little bit. And then I, I’ve typically, you’re a leader and you think to yourself, a leader’s gotta make a decision. Uh, you’ve gotta be seen to do something. So you make a decision in haste and it’s a massive mistake. It’s not a mistake that g that um, um, Bobby Skinstad didn’t deserve to be in the squad and didn’t deserve to be there and was playing really good rugby.

[00:34:17] That wasn’t a mistake. The problem was the leadership and, um, and not having the top leader there. Um, I should have carried on just using Bobby off the bench. He was outstanding in that, in that role. And, and, um, and certainly if I’d had Gary Thaman at that 99 World Cup, despite the drop goal of Ham, I still believe in that extra time.

[00:34:39] I still believe we would’ve had a leader who would’ve held us together. On the field to the extent that we might have, uh, gone on to win that game. So it was a really difficult lesson for me to learn youth too young, thinking I had to make a decision. Um, and, uh, and, and, and picking on form and, and not understanding the value of, of, of a great leader.

[00:34:59] Those are the two mass at the state.

[00:35:02] Flip: That’s, that’s very good, Nick. And, and it, it takes a man to admit these mistakes. We on that.

[00:35:07] Sean: Well, well, well said flip, because Nick, I was just listening to that. And, you know, just reflecting. And I think it’s such good leadership, you know, to be able, people think that people in top positions are gonna make no mistakes.

[00:35:19] And, you know, there’s not a barrister. There’s even the best barrister in the world doesn’t win every court case. The best doctor in the world doesn’t diagnose, um, the patient correctly. The best fund manager in the world doesn’t get it all right. You know, and, and the thing is, it’s actually quite liberating I’ve found when we just tell clients before they invest, like, don’t expect us to get it right, we’re gonna make mistakes.

[00:35:39] And what we gotta do is be reflective on those mistakes. But um, we are gonna give it our best shot. And, uh, you know, so anyway, cute, full marks to, to you being so, I think it’s a mark of a great leader, to be honest. I really do.

[00:35:51] Nick: No,

[00:35:52] Justinus: but if we

[00:35:52] Nick: wouldn’t say that, it’s just, it is just, I’m intelligent enough to know when I really cocked up.

[00:35:58] Justinus: So when was the point when you realized it was a mistake? How long after announcing the change did you realize, oh, shit. I think this was

[00:36:06] Nick: a big topic. When I got the, when I got the squad together, immediately I, I got the squad together for the preparation of the World Cup. I just knew immediately you have a gut feel.

[00:36:16] I mean, you have to have that as a coach. You’ve gotta understand the feeling in your changing room. And there was a feeling in those first two years that I was, when I was coaching the box, we were just tight, really tight, you know, a good coaching staff, good captain, really good team, um, good youngsters coming through, pushing the guys to play well.

[00:36:36] But from 97 to the end of 98, we were in a good, good space. And then, then in, in, in, in 99 when I decided to leave Gary Art and we went to P Play to prepare for the World Cup, there was a completely different feeling in the camp. It was almost as though the team felt cheap as if Nick, if Nick can drop Gary Tishman, who’s one of his best mates, um, and the captain of a team that took him to 17, then, then, I mean, how, how quickly can he drop us?

[00:37:05] You know? So it was almost, I lost the confidence of the team in that, with that one error that I made. And we held it together funny enough, because to get to that, uh, we played really well against England with, with Yanni DeBeers drop goals. And then we, we got against Australia up. That was the final, our game against the semi-final against Australia was like the final, because we, I knew that if we’d got, if we’d beaten Australia, we’d have smashed France in the final date.

[00:37:30] They, their, their big game was the one against New Zealand when they managed to come back and beat New Zealand, but they weren’t capable of putting two big, big performances together. So I knew that that semi-final against Australia was like a final. And, and you know, we had to get through that game and they were a very, very good team, um, Australia at the time.

[00:37:50] But, but you know, when you’re looking at, at the spring box now, and, and how did we win a quarterfinal by one point, a semi-final by one point and a final by one point, how do we manage to do that? It’s because Rusty didn’t make the mistakes that I made. That team is still tight. That team team has still got good leadership.

[00:38:10] That team, every single person tries to do a hundred percent that he can for his teammates and for his country. So, so that’s why you get that little 1% extra, that 1% better performance. Then you might get, you might get from an English side. That, that’s, uh, for them, you know, it, uh, they’ve missed a bonus, but, uh, you know, it’s not the be all and end all of their lives for South Africans.

[00:38:33] You wanna win because you wanna win for South Africa, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s quite an extraordinary feeling.

[00:38:38] Justinus: Sean, the first time we spoke, you actually mentioned something that stayed with me, that really connects well to what Nick just said. And, and, um, I wanna prompt you, but I, I want to let you tell the story from your point of view and, and that part of the broader view we as South African has is the, the variety of the society that we grow up in and, and the adversity in a lot of the challenges that we face.

[00:39:04] So yeah, please tell us that story and, and give us your perspective.

[00:39:08] Sean: Justine, as I was saying, when, when, when I’m listening to you just set me up there, what I, what I was saying is that if you grow up in the uk, extremely wealthy, or you grow up in Italy, extremely wealthy, you don’t have to confront poverty, okay?

[00:39:23] Because you take off from Heathrow and you go and fly, I don’t know, go and ski in the Alps and then go back and then go to New York and then go to watch Formula One in Monaco or wherever. In South Africa, even if you’re extremely wealthy, you’re taking off in your airplane. Um, even if it’s a private jet, you know, close to Cape Town, close to, to Langa and Gtu or Alexandra, you confront poverty.

[00:39:50] And, and I think, um, that, you know, we, we are a melting pot. And I look today, I look at America. I just look at that country and I go, this country’s very divided. Half the country hates the other half of the country. If you’re Republican and you Democrats, then you don’t wanna talk to each other. If you maga, they hate the other half of the country.

[00:40:09] Okay? We don’t have that. I mean, yes, there’s probably a small percentage of South Africans. You hate the rest of South Africans, but, but we don’t have that. And I mean, I travel back to South Africa regularly and whether it’s the guys at the check-in counter or the porters at the airport, or the taxi drivers or the waiters, the restaurants, there’s this feeling of friendliness and of warmth.

[00:40:31] And you know, you just, when I speak to people flying back recently, you, you know, Americans or, or, or Germans or whatever, you know, people have the most amazing time in South Africa because they have this warmth and, and all the rest. And so maybe it’s, maybe it’s just, uh, you, you lessen your, you lessen a bubble than maybe you are elsewhere in the world for a level of income.

[00:40:59] You know, I mean, it’s humbling. We, we, we support a, a rugby club in Manenberg through one of our charities and, and they share rugby boots. I, which I find actually, I find that very distressing that we are world champions and we have teams that are, who are sharing boots in the Western Cape. And if they’re sharing boots in the Western Cape, what on earth are they doing in the rest of the place, you know, in the rest of the country, in the deep in hinterland.

[00:41:26] But, um, so, so anyway, that’s what we kind of working. We’ve got a little project going here called Run More with Ran More, where we collecting shoes and used tacky trainers and rugby boots, hockey boots, football boots, et cetera, from clubs that we sponsor over here and schools. And we are about to send our first container back to sa.

[00:41:49] We’re gonna have about first on 10,000 pairs of shoes. We’re gonna get them cleaned. Being sorted and packed in a nice little bag, you know, size six or whatever. And so that’ll create some employment terms of shoes and, and then, but we’ve had such, it’s taken so long to get an import permit that we’ve now started to run more with Rand More and Cape Town.

[00:42:09] Hang on a second. Why don’t we go and make sure that, that there are no used shoes in wealthy households that are not being used elsewhere. And so we gotta do something similar there. So we starting in Cape Town, we’ll see where it goes, but that can make a big difference. You just pair a shoes, really?

[00:42:24] Flip: That’s, that’s beautiful. Sean. No, it, it, it, it rigs through. Next point that he said is it’s South Africa. You know, winning is, it’s not, you know, it’s not about match day bonus and et cetera, you know. Uh, luckily there’s that involved, but you know, when you one point behind and you need to win in the last 10 minutes, you know, that guy playing Berg and he went off and he had to change shoes to just to play rugby.

[00:42:46] You know, that, that built a little bit more character that that pulls you through in, in the very, very hard times. So, um,

[00:42:52] Nick: quite right

[00:42:53] Flip: and, and, and very well, well on you for, there’s, there’s some people we can, I can connect you to that in that space as well. You know, there’s, they’re doing great works, uh, great work and just, you know, giving identity to people through school shoes, you know, um, it’s so much, so much needed do in South Africa.

[00:43:11] Sean: No, that’s amazing. Thanks Phillip. I’d love to to hear those. You know, it gives sport just gives children hope. Yeah. And, and I came across as saying years ago, kids in sports stay out of court. Don’t we want our children to be playing sport rather than joining gangs, because if they’re trying to get their identity, let’s get them their identity, whether it’s football or hockey or netball or whatever, but get it through sport rather than, you know, the bad elements.

[00:43:38] And actually for remarkably little money, we’ve gotta place outside capes on place outside Cape Town and sdo. And we’ve set up a thing in Illa charity, sdo, and supporting, um, some of the local schools and, uh, some bursaries, et cetera. But one of the things we did is we bought balls, rugby balls for all the local schools.

[00:43:55] One of the schools had 1600 pupils and their sporting equipment was one rag ball. I mean, it’s like, this is an hour and a half out of Cape Town, like how can this possibly be the case? And you think like a rugby ball or a football’s 400 grand. Okay. And it, it can entertain. 20 youths or whatever, you know, for hours and weeks on end.

[00:44:16] So why are we not flooding the, our, our youth with, with all these balls and it just keeps them active and all the rest. So anyway, that’s one of the things we’re trying to

[00:44:26] Nick: do. Hmm. Yeah.

[00:44:29] Justinus: So if we go back to wearing the Y game, like moving back Italy, and I mean, I’m sure you’re very happy with Italy’s recent performance, uh, and starting again in South Africa now starting a new career, um, later in life.

[00:44:43] Uh, tell us, talk us a little bit about that, that I identity change and that transition and, and how you experienced that.

[00:44:51] Nick: Yeah, I think I, I think having, having gone to, to Italy to coach there, I was, it was later on in my career, I was 50, 51. I think I’d had the time with Stu France. I, I coached, uh, in France as well.

[00:45:04] I had three years with the spring box, two years in Stu France. A lot more experience as a coach and I went there. Not, um, uh, not with high expectations of results, but, uh, wanting to, uh, make a difference to a team, well, to, to a rugby team that I thought had some very talented players, but not enough, um, you know, just not enough registered rugby players.

[00:45:26] Uh, I’ll give you the, the numbers were very simple. There was, there’s seven, there were 17,000 rugby players registered in Italy, and that included old Crocs women and children. So, so, you know, you were, you were literally picking from, I dunno, probably. 500 adult males, you know, that, and that’s a national side.

[00:45:47] Wow. In in the Western Cape alone? Yeah. In the Western Cape, 96,000 people are registered in South Africa, over 250,000. In, in England there are 700,000 registered rugby players. So you can imagine that for Italy, it’s a very, very small sport. And was when, when I was over there in 22, 0 7, 2 8, um, until 2011, those four years that I coached them.

[00:46:10] But, um, what was, what was, uh, staggering was when I went there, they didn’t play in the, in the, uh, Celtic League. They were playing in their own local competition. And if a guy was a good player, he would then get bought by to lose or lon, or go to was, or Lester. And, um, and otherwise the rest of the guys were in their local league.

[00:46:29] And so I, I, I was watching a couple of their local games. In a game, it was Ravigo against Palmer and the ball in play in that game was, was 19 minutes. 19 minutes out of 80, that there was a ball in in play. And over that same November, Australia played England and the ball was in play for 45 minutes. So you can imagine that the guys playing their club rugby in Italy going at, you know, one mile an hour.

[00:46:56] Suddenly they get selected for a national fight and jump out of Ravigo to playing international rugby against England. And they’re used to playing rugby for 45 minutes as opposed to 19 minutes. It was just an impossible task. So I managed to get the, the, um, the Italian Federation to look at the Celtic League and to get Italy after, after I was there for two years, we got them into the Celtic League and that has been a massive change for their rugby because teams like, um, Truviso have been producing some top players and they’ve built confidence being able to play against Wales and, and, and Scotland and free and, um, Irish International and now particularly with South Africa involved as well, you know, they, they’ve, they’re really getting the best of the best to as, as opponent.

[00:47:42] So that was, I was really proud of that. But again, that, that, um, that experience was. Um, it was so important. It was like going back to doing Burlington false play again. It was taking a team and saying to them, listen guys, before we can dream of beating anyone, we’ve gotta be competitive. You know, we’ve gotta, it’s no good losing by 45 points to 50 points every time you run out because you’re trying to play pretty rugby, but you’re dropping the ball in opposition of scoring left, right, and set.

[00:48:08] I said, we’ve gotta be a difficult side to beat and then once you’re a difficult side to beat you, you, you can then perhaps win a game or two. And that’s what we did. And I, and I got so much pride out of that win against France 2322. I mean, it was the most incredible, um, atmosphere at the, at the stadium.

[00:48:27] The team ran around and, and they sang the national anthem seven times. I kid you not, seven times, they sang the Italian national anthem. And, uh, it was just a wonderful, wonderful game. And, and to be able to beat Argentina away, we beat Samoa for the first time. We had the best results ever against New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, France, England.

[00:48:48] I mean, we only in two games in against, uh, England, in, in Italy, we lost by five points and by four points. So those were the closest results up until this last year where they, where they beat England. So it was a fantastic experience getting players like Castro, Giovanni and Sergio Parise. Um, we had Alessandra Maier fullback.

[00:49:08] He got, he got the player of a tournament. We, we won one game in the tournament and my fullback got player of a tournament. I mean, that’s just absolutely fantastic. A Sergio won. So in two of the four years, uh, we got two Italians winning the player of the tournament, which was voted by, by journalists. So that was fantastic, you know, and then.

[00:49:27] After four years, I came back and, and was, I was thinking about going back to Europe and coaching again because it’s what I, what I love doing. But, um, I started on super sport and started doing the analysis before and after the game, and I enjoyed it so much and it was so less, uh, stressful. You know, that’s the big thing for if you are, if you are a coach nowadays, it’s a very high profile, extremely stressful job.

[00:49:52] And, and it, and it involves, you know, unfortunately now in South Africa, rugby is full right through the year. So point out when a John Dobson gets a, gets a break, you know, if you’re an international coach, you get a break, but not if you’re coaching the URC and the European Cup and then your players go off and play it for the spring box and then you’ve gotta start the URC again.

[00:50:12] I mean, it’s just so difficult. So when, when I was given the opportunity just to talk about rugby as opposed to coach it, uh, I grabbed that with both hands and, and I’ve loved the last 10 years.

[00:50:25] Flip: And, and you, you, you’re doing an excellent job, um, with that as well, Nick.

[00:50:30] Nick: Yes.

[00:50:31] Flip: Um,

[00:50:32] Nick: thank

[00:50:32] Flip: you. Uh, uh, on, on, on that point, you know, is, is we, we are seeing you, you were responsible for a, a great generation of coaches.

[00:50:39] The, the guys that came out of that era of 97 year Rusty, et cetera, mark. Yeah. I, I played under even AKA now. Yeah. Um,

[00:50:48] Nick: yes,

[00:50:48] Flip: we’re seeing a whole new generation of coaches coming through, uh, JP Peterson at at the Sharks. Uh, yep. You know, we, we, we spoke about, uh, snowman at the Stormers, et cetera. What would your advice be for, for young guys looking into say, you know, um, either end of their rugby career or, you know, maybe I’m not gonna be the professional player, but I, I I understand the game I could play.

[00:51:13] Um, what would your advice be for aspiration coaches?

[00:51:17] Nick: Yeah, flip. It’s not, it’s, you know, coaching is like being a good school teacher. You know, it’s your ability to put something across that is understandable and that that person who’s listening to you gets it. You know, they, they, they, they, they’ve been math teachers at schools I’ve gone to who are so clever.

[00:51:34] They are so clever that they, they can’t understand that, that the class doesn’t get what they’re trying to teach them. You know, they speak too quickly, they explain it too fast, and your normal, average guy like Nick Mallard just can’t pick it up that quickly. You know? So the teaching is the critical part of it.

[00:51:51] And I think if you’ve, if you’ve come from a teaching background, you look at a lot of good coaches or ex-school teachers, you know, even someone like Graham Henry, Jake White was a school teacher, Graham Henry. So Graham Henry was a school teacher. Macintosh was a school teacher. You know, I trained to be a school teacher, although I never went into school teaching.

[00:52:09] So it’s the ability to, to have information and to pass that information across in an understandable way. That, that, that your squad, your team can get their heads around and believe in. And, and so EQ is very emotional intelligence. Ei, I suppose you call it now, is very important ’cause you’ve gotta deal with different individuals in your team.

[00:52:32] Some people are, are more competitive and others, some, you know, they need an arm around their shoulder and a hug, another guy needs a kick up the ass there. There are lots of different ways in which you’ve gotta motivate these guys. But, so you need to have that, that, that ability to judge, to understand the difference in, in human beings, but you also have to have the ability to put across ideas in a way that the players can, can, uh, can understand.

[00:52:57] And I think, I think some people going to coaching, having an idea about what they want, but they don’t have the ability to put that across to the, to the players. So it’s not just if you can be a great sportsman, a great rugby player, but you aren’t necessarily gonna be a great coach. Um, so I think that would be the first thing I would say to them, make sure that you understand what’s required as a coach.

[00:53:19] It’s not a, you’re not a performer. You are, you are actually trying to get other people to perform for you. And that’s a very different, uh, um, it’s a very different

[00:53:29] paradigm,

[00:53:29] Nick: I suppose. You yeah, you, you, you know, you could, it’s, it’s, I remember one I was talking to, Donny Ber. Donny Kcampbell said he just couldn’t understand why people couldn’t sidestep like he side stepped, you know?

[00:53:41] But, but I mean, I completely understand why, ’cause I just didn’t understand how you could do it. You know? So, so you, you, you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta bring yourself down to the level of the people you’re coaching and make sure that they understand. And, and I think that’s where Rahi again, I’m, I’m saying ’cause he has been the most successful international coach over the last six years and I think will continue to be, and he doesn’t miss out on the, uh, the, the IQ side, the intelligence, emotional intelligence side.

[00:54:12] Um, and he, and he certainly is the hardest working technical coach I’ve ever, I’ve ever met in my life. He really studies it. So the players are so well prepared whenever they go in. But I just wanna talk about two people to, to give you an example of this, of this, um, you know, the difference in, in what you have to handle in South Africa.

[00:54:33] You get Peter step to, to who comes from a grandfather who was a springbok. Uh, what was he called? Peter to, he went to Paul Gym. Uh, he was, he played standing like as ape and, uh, and Peter Step was born to be a Springbox. He comes from a Springbok background. Springbox family was pen to a school with surrounded by potential Spring book, well coached, I mean, went to the great, you know, into a good academy.

[00:55:00] Uh, he was gonna be a spring book. Then you get, uh, you know, inata. He, his, he didn’t ever know His dad. Never met his dad, you know, so he didn’t have a family life. His mother died before he was 12. His grandmother brought him up and, and she died when he was 15. So he didn’t have anyone in his life. He used to, he used to walk to practice and at 15 he played in a senior school in the, in the, a senior club.

[00:55:25] They didn’t have school ring, so he went to a club in Tata. Someone from the Eastern Cape picked him up, uh, it was sorry. Border picked him up to play, and he was taken, given his Brits and given his, and when they saw him play at border, they, they picked him at east in the eastern province team. And from there he went to the sharks.

[00:55:43] And out of the sharks, he became a springbok. Now, you look at the, you look at the roads, those two have traveled. I mean, one was, one was guaranteed to be a springbok. The other one, how on earth did that guy become a spring? I mean, it’s absolutely extraordinary. And when you’ve got a coach who understands that and can, and can, um, and can impress upon the whole squad how important it is for, for more pimp to come through, you know, it’s not just the people, the privileged people for whom a Springbok uh, blazer is, is, uh, is waiting.

[00:56:18] It’s, it’s for anyone in South Africa, given the right opportunities and the right chance.

[00:56:24] Flip: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Um, and there are so many more. Um,

[00:56:29] Nick: yeah.

[00:56:29] Flip: You know, if you look like what just said, if you look into the Eastern Cape or if you look into the backside of the Northern Cape, et cetera, there’s so much talent in, in South Africa.

[00:56:38] It’s, it’s actually scary. Um, and I hope the world takes that of it for the next five world. Yeah.

[00:56:45] Justinus: Five of the next 10,

[00:56:47] Flip: Sean?

[00:56:47] Justinus: So Sean,

[00:56:48] Flip: yes.

[00:56:49] Justinus: Go ahead. Flip,

[00:56:50] Flip: flip. Yeah. If, if, if you had to do it again, pull up your pegs, go to the uk, um, start and war, um, what advice would you give to, to a fellow young Deloitte consultant?

[00:57:04] Try to make the big step about his own thing?

[00:57:08] Sean: Um, flip, I would say, you know, it’s a very competitive world. I jumped quite early. I was at Old Mutual Asset Managers for a couple of years and then joined Ilian. Um, and then came over here. We, in fact, we were over here marketing our fund, the original fund at nine 11.

[00:57:28] And then I went to Aus and I spent five years in Aus. And, you know, you look today at some of the top fund managers, they’re much older than me. Um, so you don’t have to jump too early. We have this impatience, I guess, you know, that’s one of the challenges is, is to contain your ambition and wait for the right time.

[00:57:48] I guess that’s the thing. And I guess it’s just like, it’s what you gotta rate, wait for the right time to attack, you know? Um, so build up your skills. But actually the, the benefit these days is you can be anywhere in the world. You, you really can. I mean, even at our place, if we’ve got fiber, you know, you don’t have to go many of the businesses these days, you’ve got teams meetings.

[00:58:10] Look at us now. So COVID, we’ve always gotta think about what the best or what’s, what are the positives? What’s the silver lining? Well, the silver lining with COVID is we used to online meetings and so you don’t have to leave South Africa. And actually I’ll share an interesting story. Um, and if you are overseas, given that it’s such a luxury, make sure you’re making a difference to those who are back in South Africa.

[00:58:30] And I’d almost say, you know, and, and I don’t know how we build this in, maybe Nick, you can, you can,

[00:58:36] Nick: yeah.

[00:58:36] Sean: Comes back to the eq. You gotta put it across in a nice way. But if we wanna be overseas and you’re proud to be South Africa and you’re proud to wear a Springbok rugby jersey in while you’re watching the game, et cetera, you gotta ask yourself what are you doing to help the country that got you to where you are?

[00:58:54] Are you, how much, what percentage of your after tax income are you donating back to South Africa to support others who are not as fortunate as you? That’s what I would say. So, you know, that’s kind of a, it’s a side angle of mine, but,

[00:59:07] Justinus: but, but you know, what was the realization for me, Sean, is it was on the train after the 23 World Cup in Paris on the way to the hotel.

[00:59:17] And yeah, I was in a accord surrounded by Springbrook supporters, 80% of which are experts. And clearly for all of us, this was one of the best days of our lives. We. We had just witnessed ci lifting the trophy for the second time. And what was insane was that most of the people there had decided within the last seven days to drop whatever they were doing, walk away from commitments and, and get to Paris to be there.

[00:59:46] So if we combine the fact that they obviously spent a lot of time and money to be there, and it’s one of the best days of our lives, the next question for me was exactly what you’ve just said is what would we all be willing to give to make sure this happens as many times as possible before we die?

[01:00:03] ’cause I would much rather have that happen five more times than once in the next 20 or 30 years. So that’s the key, is we, we actually have a superpower that, that the low hanging fruits in South Africa is so obvious. We can have an impact that can make that possible.

[01:00:20] Sean: Yeah.

[01:00:21] Nick: I think, I think I, I, I cannot speak highly enough of the South African population and the ability to forgive and, and not necessarily to forget, but to forgive.

[01:00:33] Uh, I was, I was, I come over every year to see my son in London. He’s one of these expats at the moment. And, um, and I was sitting on a tube, and you know what happens in England in the tube? Everyone’s sitting, staring at their phone and no one even looks left or right in case you accused of, you know, something like that.

[01:00:51] So, so a guy shouted across, he, he shouted Nick Mallet, and, and I looked up and there. And there was a, there was a black guy and he would’ve been, I suppose 23, 24. And he said, and he just came over and he gave me the biggest hug. He said, oh, that’s so good to see you. Yeah. What are you doing here? And I just thought to myself, where else in the world, where else in the world would you get someone in a foreign country come across a buddy where all these English guys were looking and think, are these two people completely insane and thank each other?

[01:01:26] Oh, box, we’re doing well. Can I have a selfie? Of course, you know, he is sitting there taking a picture. Hell, it was good fun. I just said afterwards to my wife, I said, that just sums us up. And it’s absolutely incredible to have that warmth and, and good humor and, and wanting to be part and, you know, to, to recognize someone also from South Africa when you’re so far away from home.

[01:01:49] Um, just to finish on your point about, uh, ’cause I was thinking what it’d be like if I was, um, 38 again and, and in the process of being offered the Springbok job, I think I would try and delay it. Because, because I think there’s a time you should take a job of that, of that, um, import. It’s, it, I was, I was young, you know, 40 years old is young, you know, you, I, I’ve, I finished being a springboard coach at 43.

[01:02:17] I mean, you’ve got a lot of your life after 43 years old, you know, so, um, I think hopefully there’s some of these young guys that you were talking about, flipper a victim. Atfield, you’ll make a magnificent coach, a Scott Berger, who’s a brilliant PDA and would be an outstanding coach, I’m sure if he decided to go.

[01:02:33] But if those guys decided to, to, to start coaching at 40, 45. And then perhaps got a, a national job at 55 to 60. I think that that is a better balance than what happened to me. It was, it happened too quickly for me. I think that despite the fact that we got success, um, it was, it was very, I don’t think the mistake I made around Gary Tishman, I’m, I probably wouldn’t have made with 10 or 15 years more experience.

[01:03:05] Justinus: Like if you all gave me a hundred, if I gave you a hundred lessons, I think I would’ve learned today you both saying that sometimes you have to wait, even if it’s the world’s best opportunity, was not gonna be on that list.

[01:03:20] Flip: If you, if you know just who’s, uh, he, he builds a, a airplane while it’s falling down.

[01:03:25] He builds it, you know, he’s doesn’t wait for any,

[01:03:30] Nick: yeah, yeah. I don’t listen. This plane just, I don’t regret any single day that I, that I had. I was incredibly fortunate. And, and I would never, ever give back, uh, to anyone those years coaching the spring box or coaching overseas in France or coaching Italy or, or having the opportunity to talk on television about the, about the game.

[01:03:52] I’ve been incredibly lucky, and I think having a, you know, having that outlook on life does help Sean. You’re an incredibly positive person as well, and I think, I think that, I think that is a powerful, um, a, a attraction to other people. To see someone who believes in themselves and in what they do, and, and, and, uh, then you get people who tend to want to follow you.

[01:04:16] Sean: Thanks, Nick. It’s kind of you. It’s, it’s all about getting the odds on your side. Okay. And I try and do that when we selecting stocks for the portfolio. And so how do you get the odds on your side career wise? Well, you make sure you, you know, get the experience and, and that’s the key. That is a key thing because it’s such a fine line between victory and defeat.

[01:04:39] I mean, we spoke about one point in the quarter, final, semi-final and final. I mean, that’s how fine the line is. You try and forecast and plan, well, it’s not gonna work out like that. Whatever happens, we’ll make a plan. And that gives you a mindset of just knowing that you’re gonna come, you’re gonna have difficult times.

[01:04:54] And when you have those difficult times, you’re just gotta figure out, be creative about finding a solution to those and some of those things. It just takes you a while to figure those things out. So maybe that’s why I said just, you know, don’t rush out there too early. Make sure you got the POS on your side.

[01:05:08] Justinus: Yeah, get the odds on your side. Another pearl of wisdom. Thanks boys. That was really one of the most amazing conversations we’ve had so far. I really appreciate your time. And um, Nick, I’m sure we’ll be hearing lots of your wisdoms, um, on the TV this year with a few big games coming up. And Sean, I can’t wait to meet you in person and hopefully we can go to the book, a book game this year.

[01:05:31] Sean: Sounds wonderful. Yeah, thank you so much. Just thanks. Flip, but thank you Nick.

[01:05:35] Nick: Yeah, yeah, I lovely chat, lovely chatting to you.