What Can Jurgen Klopp’s Time at Liverpool Teach Us About Managing Change?
In the world of football, few names resonate with the power of transformation as much as Jürgen Klopp. His time at Liverpool FC has not just been about silverware, it's been a masterclass in effective organisational change. There are valuable lessons to be learned from Klopp's approach that can be applied in various organisational contexts.
I’m going to highlight 5 lessons that the porcelain-grilled, bear-hugging German can teach us about managing change, but firstly, let’s take a look at the context of his arrival at Liverpool in 2015...
Jurgen Klopp replaced Brendan Rogers on 8th October 2015, declaring himself ‘the normal one’ in his first press conference; forecasting a Premier League title in the next 4 years, displaying humility and ambition. On the pitch, the club had sold their talismanic forward, Luis Suarez, to F.C. Barcelona for a fee in the region of £75m, and narrowly missed out on a Champions League position after a disastrous run of form at the end of the season.
Off the pitch, the loss of revenue, stadium refurbishments and their ‘self-sustaining’ ownership model - combined with a squad that needed a total overhaul - meant funds were tight. Further, their competitors: Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea were investing at record levels, digging a financial moat around themselves by pushing player transfer fees and wages into the stratosphere.
Apparently undeterred, Klopp embarked upon turning Liverpool into a breath-taking, ‘heavy metal’ footballing menace. And here, I believe, are the 5 most important lessons we can learn from the Klopp approach.
Embracing a Clear Vision and Philosophy
The Klopp Approach
The ‘gegenpress’ is a style of play that focuses on winning back possession from the opposition as quickly as possible. Players appear to aggressively swarm the opposition when in possession, which creates nervousness, and leads to mistakes for Liverpool’s creative players to capitalise on. Technical, but less physically capable players, such as Philippe Coutinho and Emre Can were casualties of these demands in favour of industrious, aggressive players such as Sadio Mane, Jordan Henderson and Andrew Robertson, signed in 2017 by Klopp from Championship side Hull City for £8m, a miserly fee in hindsight.
He was not just focused on tactics but also on creating a culture of positivity and resilience. This unrelenting attitude became a hallmark of Liverpool’s play from 2015 onwards, beautifully demonstrated in the 5-1 dismemberment of Arsenal in December 2018.
Lesson for Organisations
Clear vision and strong leadership are essential. A leader must articulate a clear goal and philosophy for the upcoming change. This vision should be ambitious enough to inspire, but not so wild as to demotivate and alienate people. The vision has to be underpinned by a set of values, which are the things you stand for, and notably the things you will not stand for.
The difficulty in a workplace environment is that people leaving don’t provide tens of millions to re-invest in remodelling the business, but it’s important to be selective about which people are going to be involved in carrying the message throughout the business. These people need to embody the values that you intend to propagate throughout the business, as this can be infectious, for better or worse.
Building Trust and Unity
The Klopp Approach
Jurgen Klopp has a fairly unique relationship with his staff, in particular the players. It’s not unusual to see the 6’ 3” Stuttgart native sprint onto the pitch to lift one of his players off the ground in an ecstatic post-match bear hug. He is rarely critical of his players and backroom staff (at least in public), and is very vocal with his praise of sometimes individual, and always the collective effort.
All of this builds a sense that the whole can achieve more than the sum of its parts. Remember, Klopp’s tenure at Liverpool has been marked as much with defeat as it has with triumph. His Liverpool team had fallen at the final hurdle 3 times before winning the Champions League in 2019.
The trust and unity displayed by not just the players, but the owners and directors of the club is testament to how well Jurgen Klopp was able to sell his vision of what could make Liverpool successful.
Lesson for Organisations
Trust, not bear hugs, is the foundation of any successful change. Leaders need to invest time in building relationships, understanding different perspectives, and creating a sense of unity and shared purpose among all stakeholders. Practically speaking, trust can be earned by giving people the opportunity to contribute to the change project in a meaningful way. Sessions during the planning stages of a project, and asking for regular feedback throughout can ensure staff feel their opinions are valued.
Also, be mindful of the impact that targeting individuals for praise can have on the perceived outsiders of a group. It’s often best to praise the individuals individually, and the group collectively. The same goes for conflict resolution.
Adaptability and Learning from Setbacks
The Klopp Approach
As mentioned above, the turnaround during Klopp’s initial time with Liverpool was not immediate. Although fans could see the performance levels increase, which made for thrilling results like a narrow 5-4 victory to then 19th place, relegation-battling Norwich City, this didn’t translate into silverware until the 2018/19 season, almost 4 years after Klopp’s initial appointment.
Subtle changes to the structure of the team paid huge dividends. The high pressing game meant defenders needed athleticism, and had to be comfortable defending 1v1, with Virgil Dan Dijk optimising this style. The purchase of a deep-lying defensive midfielder in Fabinho, who could shield the ball, turn and find a forward pass was vital in resisting counter attacks when the left and right-backs (Robertson and Alexander-Arnold) were busy contributing in an attacking sense.
It’s also worth mentioning that Liverpool are 10th in the net spend table over the last 5 years (that’s the 19/20 season through to the 23/24 season), and currently sit 5 points clear at the top of the Premier League. Teams like Chelsea and Manchester United have trebled Liverpool’s net spend. This apparent frugality means Liverpool’s squad has been in a constant state of evolution under Jurgen Klopp.
More recently, the adaptation to life without selfless, playmaking forward Roberto Firminho, Klopp has replaced with more creative wingers like Cody Gakpo and Luis Diaz, and even the mercurial Mo Salah has occupied central areas of the pitch less often.
Lesson for Organisations
Change is not always a smooth journey. Organisations must be adaptable, learning from failures and setbacks. It's crucial to maintain a growth mindset, viewing challenges as opportunities to learn and improve. This is easier said than done for people working day to day on a data migration, for example, but this is where the leadership, or executive sponsor can add value to a project. Also, from time to time, and for short periods, it helps if team members can be flexible to accommodate changing priorities.
Also, it’s important to set a regular cadence for project meetings, reports and communication. Not only does this give the project team the opportunity to raise issues through proper channels, but CRM and email tracking software allows you to monitor the effectiveness of your communications, and a drop off in engagement might point to a lack of momentum in the project, or de-prioritisation due to other issues in the wider business.
Empowering and Developing People
The Klopp Approach
Liverpool under Klopp have developed a knack for identifying potential and nurturing talent. Once seen as a negative by fans, the transfer committee ran by the football department has been crucial in the growth of the club, and their ability to replenish first team talent. Selling Luis Suarez, Raheem Sterling and Philippe Coutinho whilst in their prime, for a combined total of £240m, freed up the funds required to purchase Virgil Van Dijk, Alisson Becker, Sadio Mane and Mo Salah for a total of £196m on long-term deals, all of whom were vital to the team that earned Champions League and Premier League trophies.
Young players blossomed under his guidance and grew to exceed expectations, owing to the trust and development opportunities they receive. Joe Gomez, Trent Alexander Arnold, Harvey Elliot and Curtis Jones, all of whom received their first team debuts under Jurgen Klopp, have since become first team regulars.
Finally, of the total minutes played by all players in the 2021/22 season, Liverpool retained players that played 91% of those minutes at the end of the summer. This suggests players are happy to stay providing the club wants them to, and this culture means Liverpool’s transfer dealings are rarely from a position of weakness.
Lesson for Organisations
Successful change requires both unlocking the potential of people, and careful selection of the teams carrying out the project. Leaders should focus on understanding the skills of the people at their disposal, and provide them with opportunities for development in the areas that they can most positively contribute. If there is a significant skills gap in the existing team that can’t be bridged with training and development, contractors or consultants can come in useful.
That being said, the basis for making this decision is having the understanding of what skills are needed to deliver the project, as well as the available skills within the current team. This means careful planning, and ensuring teams make an honest assessment of the skills at their disposal during the planning phase. The more notice you have of a skills gap, the more time you have to deal with it.
Creating a culture of empowerment and belonging will reduce staff turnover relative to competition. If your company is a desirable place to work, you can enter the recruitment market in a position of strength.
Patience and Long-Term Thinking
The Klopp Approach
Liverpool’s recent success didn’t happen overnight. It was the result of patient, long-term planning and execution, focusing on sustainable success rather than quick fixes. Without a doubt, this planning started prior to the replacement of Brendan Rogers with Jurgen Klopp, so a large part of the credit for this success has to be attributed to the patience of the Liverpool owners and board of directors.
Lesson for Organisations
Organisational change requires patience and a long-term perspective. Quick wins are valuable, and should of course be taken, but not at the expense of the long term goals. Sustainable change takes time and continuous effort, and most importantly faith.
Conclusion
Jürgen Klopp’s journey at Liverpool is more than a sports success story; it's a blueprint for effective organisational change. His methods highlight the importance of vision, unity, adaptability, empowerment, communication, and most of all, patience.
Practically for business leaders, it means really believing in what you’re trying to achieve, and finding evangelists who share these beliefs. It means creating plans collaboratively, and ensuring these plans have an element of flexibility in them, whether that is in scope, budget or timing. Finally, it means thinking about the long term, typically beyond 3-5 years, and ensuring that the business as a whole isn’t taking actions in the short term, that lead you away from the long term target.