The team-building process is going to be done a little differently in Minnesota. That’s exciting. New is exciting. Adofo-Mensah graduated from Princeton with a degree in Economics. He worked on Wall Street trading energy derivatives and commodities. That’s different. He earned a master’s degree in economics from Stanford in 2013. The puzzle of football apparently intrigued him as he started working for the San Francisco 49ers that same year. He started as a manager of football research and development and later became the director of the same department. In 2020, the Cleveland Browns pried him away from the 49ers to be their Vice President of Football Operations. His experience and rise through the football world is far different than the scouting grind that routinely produces general managers across the league.
When the Vikings announced the eight candidates that they wanted to interview to be their new general manager, Adofo-Mensah was #8 for me. It was a knee-jerk reaction. He’s from the analytics world. I prefer the scouting world. I’ve always been a skeptic of analytics-based team-building. Analytics should be a part of the talent evaluation process. It should be part of the decision-making. It shouldn’t form the the basis of the decision-making. Since Adofo-Mensah was a candidate to be the Vikings next general manager, I decided to discover more about him. It didn’t take long to realize that my initial opinions were based on ignorance. People didn’t just have good things to say about him. They had great things to say about him. Co-workers, peers, everyone raved about him. Even the scouts. The people that he was supposed to be making obsolete. I’m still skeptical about analytics-based team-building. I’m not skeptical about Kwesi Adofo-Mensah. I’m completely sold on him as the Vikings next general manager.
Darren Wolfson shared this text from someone in the NFL that knows/worked with Adofo-Mensah:
A brilliant, well-rounded leader with a great sense of humor and fantastic people skills. He’s a natural collaborator that will build a culture of inclusivity and bring out the best of every perspective in terms of decision-making. The organization will be in great hands if he is the hire.
At the start of the search process, owner Mark Wilf emphasized that collaboration and inclusivity will be the Vikings way. Everyone will enjoy coming to work. Everyone will enjoy working together. Everyone has a say. Everyone will be heard. Someone that knows/worked with Adofo-Mensah says that “he’s a natural collaborator that will build a culture of inclusivity.” Everyone that’s worked with him mentions his intelligence. That’s great. It’s also great that he’s smart enough to know what he doesn’t know. He picks the brains of those that know what he needs to know. He values and includes the opinions of others. He understands that the more information that he has the better equipped he is to make a decision. Scouting will help form his decisions. Analytics will help form his decisions. Everybody in the building will help form his decisions. Collaboration. Inclusivity. It seems that the Wilf’s found their ideal general manager. Vikings fans seem to agree. And they rarely agree on anything.
It should be noted that Adofo-Mensah isn’t a fan of the term “analytics.” Perhaps it’s too simplistic, too narrow. He prefers “research and development.” No matter the terms used or how it’s defined, there’s going to be a new way of thinking at TCO Performance Center.
The Minnesota Vikings are stepping into a new team-building world. Embarking on something new is exciting. I’m excited about the Vikings new general manager.
Now, it’s time to find a head coach.
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