Director general still has key role to play

A historic few days lie ahead for the GAA, as the identity of Liam Mulvihill's successor is due to be formally revealed. This is such a rare appointment - the first in 28 years - that there was little communal experience or institutional memory to guide the choice of a new director general.

Mulvihill made some interesting comparisons between the association he took over and the one he will leave when announcing his retirement last July but those tended to emphasise the vast distance travelled (for instance, Central Council income went from €254,000 to €44 million) rather than suggest the road forward.

There are so many entire areas of operation that effectively just didn't exist in the 1970s - like media rights including modern media such as internet and 3G telephone technology, sponsorship and the redeveloped Croke Park - that the job of director general is completely different from the one Mulvihill stepped into.

It's a watershed the GAA can put to good use. For a start there is the opportunity to define clearly the scope of the position as well as the optimal means of filling it. The latter consideration will be significant given it's highly unlikely that we will see future occupants of the office maintain the last century's average tenure of over 26 years.

Then there is the other issue of what role the president should play in the association and how that should dovetail with the director general's. It is believed a work group will address that relationship and establish some guidelines or ground rules for the future. At the moment the presidency is radically changed from its old principally ambassadorial function to something that begins to resemble an executive chair's responsibility. Nickey Brennan, the incumbent, within his first year reorganised the association's financial section, staffing it up to reflect the rapidly changing challenges of growing and diversified revenue streams. He is part of the negotiations with various broadcasters for the new rights agreements and regularly attends high-level, executive meetings - for instance, the recent talks with the AFL in Paris.

Despite the obviously full-time nature of the office there is no formal remuneration for serving as president. When asked about making it a salaried position the traditional response has been for that to happen would undermine the role of the director general.

This is a circular argument in that if the scope of the role creates confusion with that of the director general it makes little difference that the president isn't paid.

A redefinition of the president's role would be prudent in any case because it has become so wide ranging. In recent times the GAA has been well served by the holders of the office in that they were competent to deal with the spiralling workload.

Brennan is from a business background - currently on leave from Glanbia - and is able to bring those perspectives to the presidency. But given the office is freely elected by congress every three years there is no guarantee, and perhaps this is a good thing in what is supposed to be a representative role, that the successful candidate can successfully handle the many demands of the office.

However, there is no way of curtailing the responsibilities of the director general given that it is the top administrative position within the GAA and the organisation has grown so dramatically. Croke Park staffing has also grown in recognition of that but the buck still stops at the top.

In as much as the GAA has tried to define the role it has been as part of its two major organisational reports of the past 36 years: the MacNamee Commission of 1971 and 2002's Strategic Review Committee. Naturally these documents might as well have been describing different planets given the evolving circumstances over those 30 years saw the association going through the most fundamental change in its history.

By Mulvihill's account the biggest changes he has seen throughout much of that period have been the change in competition format that has seen the championships expand to the point even the enhanced revenue and raised profile have failed to defuse the sense of concern that the intercounty programme is undermining club activities. On a more negative note he also believed the dependence of county boards on central subvention was an unwelcome development in that when he took over in 1979, all counties looked after themselves financially.

One thing MacNamee and the SRC agree on is that the primary duty of the director general is to implement association policy. That is a responsibility to which Mulvihill was scrupulously attentive - to the point where there has been criticism of his being slow to innovate.

Nonetheless, the constraints of the position hardly allowed for much innovation. Even if the old snobberies towards the "hired help" had abated the director general was still expected to be a civil servant rather than an innovator - as reflected in the continuing stipulation that although a member of Central Council and Management Committee he can't vote.

Yet Mulvihill's annual reports are so full of ideas ahead of their time and frequently ones that would eventually be implemented that it's almost frustrating to re-read them.

The SRC report even redesignates the director general as the chief executive, a description at odds with traditional perceptions of the incumbent as some sort of Sir Humphrey.

There was an initial feeling that after Mulvihill's departure the job should be handed to a complete outsider, someone who would bring the disciplines of the real world to bear on the organisation. This view has obviously given way to a more realistic assessment of the task, which isn't a business because the GAA is far more than a commercial concern.

For all the unease over its commercial direction the GAA puts all its money back into its activities. Maximising the revenue benefits the association. But the priority has to be - and generally always has been - the games and not the means to fund them.

Over the years the great success of the GAA has been notably assisted by the manner in which each general secretary and later director general has risen to the demands of his era. If the years ahead require someone to manage change, which comes at an ever-increasing rate, that challenge too will in all likelihood be met.