Three months in and Chelsea Lane’s role as Head of High Performance (HP) at Basketball New Zealand (BBNZ) has been an eye-opening – and productive – experience for both her and the organisation.
Since joining basketball’s national sporting body in early August, Lane believes she has spoken with ‘hundreds upon hundreds’ of people across the country in an effort to evaluate both the current state of Aotearoa’s national high performance basketball programmes and where it needs to be in the future.
“One of the tasks Dillon gave me was to ‘look under the hood’ of our HP programme so to speak; to do a full and critical evaluation of where BBNZ is at in the HP space,” says Lane.
“And what’s been uncovered is that while we have some amazing, hard-working people in the HP team, we’re very resource-poor and our structure needs a re-vamp; we don’t have the resources needed to be where we want to be.
“The reality is that we’re wanting to put on a second floor on a house that hasn’t got its foundations fully in place yet; so instead of building that second floor, we need to go back and focus on those foundations first.
“BBNZ is in a time of evolution at the moment, which is exciting but it’s also a massive piece of work required to determine where the organisation should be at – and how we get there. There’s no quick fix and we can’t take any shortcuts.”
BBNZ Chief Executive, Dillon Boucher says that the level of expertise Lane has bought to the role over the past three months has been immeasurable.
“Chelsea’s wealth of experience has been great and it’s made us take a look at ourselves in a different way – which isn’t always an easy thing to do. We don’t ever want to be an NSO that continues to do things a certain way because we don’t know any other path; we need to be progressive and adaptable and to keep improving,” says Boucher.
“Often success in the HP space is measured by number of medals earned, but there are other metrics to focus on too; how prepared are our high performance athletes, physically and mentally, to compete against the world’s best? What does success look like for athletes with different goals? And are the pathways that we have in place achieving the best outcomes for all our athletes and for basketball in New Zealand?”
Boucher says that this evaluation process has also involved some very honest conversations around how BBNZ is currently performing in this space.
“One of the things I admire about Chelsea is her honesty and her willingness to tell it like it is; she’s been part of some of the world’s top basketball programmes so her opinion carries weight.
“I’m happy to put my hand up and say ‘yes BBNZ isn’t where it needs to be’ in the HP space, which is why we were lucky to have Chelsea on board. And what’s become apparent from this evaluation and from these conversations with Chelsea, is that to have someone of her level in this space, it actually feels like we’re skipping a process.
“So based on Chelsea’s recommendation, we have agreed that the best way forward with the current evolution of our HP space is for her to step aside as Head of HP; it’s an extremely honest and mature decision on Chelsea’s part and it frees up BBNZ resources to begin building that foundation up as she identified.
“We’re going into a new budget year for 2023; the timing is quite important as this is when processes are being examined across the board. So now is the right time to make this decision.”
Lane agrees that this is an important first step in BBNZ committing to ‘real’ improvement.
“Over the past three months we’ve looked at the resources, we’ve looked at the needs, we’ve worked through it all and we believe this is the best outcome.
“It takes real courage and leadership from everyone involved to work this out and make a decision like this, to press pause to get everything right, because steamrolling through is not the right move – for me to stay on and potentially be a burden on BBNZ’s limited resources would have been bad leadership.
“So this has been a very positive experience for me at all, I’ve enjoyed the journey and helping BBNZ’s HP programme to be in a position to succeed. And I believe that in 3-5 years from now – once the foundations are fully in place – is when actually this position will really come into its own.”
Boucher is confident that Lane will continue to be involved with BBNZ in the near future.
“We’re keen to continue engaging with Chelsea as a consultant, as there’s more we can do together to continue building the HP programme to where it needs to be; it’s simply a better use of our resources this way.
“And although the timing wasn’t right for Chelsea now, it’s not to say that Chelsea won’t be part of our journey in a few years’ time. The door is by no means closed and we thank Chelsea for her valuable time with us.”
