Wes Morgan: Down To Business
The support mechanism in place provides the perfect conditions for those experiences, giving players the best opportunity to achieve their goals and realise their potential. What comes after football is often purely optional.
Many choose to go into media, becoming pundits for international broadcasters and sharing an expertise that has developed over decades. Others, meanwhile, wish to complete their qualifications and venture into coaching or management.
Wes Morgan, however, has always had a significant interest in business. He studied the subject at college as a teenager before entering the world of professional football and has now opted to re-educate himself.
With the assistance of the Professional Footballers' Association, the 36-year-old is involved in two programmes – Sports Business and Corporate Governance, in order to lay the foundations for a post-playing career.
“I’ve always had business in the back of my mind,” Morgan told LCFCQ. “It’s always been something that I wanted to revisit, and I felt like it was time to do that given the stage I’m at in my career.
“I spoke with Jason Lee, who is a representative from the PFA, and he approached me about a few different bits, including which direction I wanted to go into after my playing career. I wanted to get into the business side of football at a football club somehow.
“He produced a couple of options that he thought would assist me and give me the necessary knowledge and education regarding the ins and outs of football and business in general.”
For a professional footballer, time away from the game can often be sparse. Recovery is key after intense training sessions, which take place daily in the lead up to a Premier League fixture.
The flexibility and variety of both courses have been vital to Morgan’s education.
“The Sports Business course is a weekly online course for an hour,” explained the Leicester City skipper. “It’s manageable because it’s in the evening time from 7pm until 8pm. Everyone logs in and there’s people from all over the world that are on that course.
“We discuss topics and have guest speakers in certain positions in football and business in general that share their knowledge. We also have assignments once every couple of months that we have to complete.
“The Corporate Governance course shows you how to act within the governance of football and the governance of business in general. It’s pretty in-depth and that takes place once a month for six months with assignments in between. Both are pretty flexible courses.”
In a visit to King Power Stadium, former Nottingham Forest striker Lee, who holds a position as an Equalities Education Executive at the PFA, congratulated Morgan for his recent achievements in education.
“Never in doubt,” Lee joked as he embraced Morgan with a friendly handshake after the 2016 Premier League champion received his Corporate Governance results.
“I passed the course with a B+, which is great,” said Morgan. “I graduated in April [2019] at Wembley Stadium.
“It’s more about taking in what they have to teach us and learning and picking up things as we go along. When it comes to assignments, you have to give presentations and gather information.”
Morgan and Lee first met when the former was a young player rising through the ranks at Nottingham Forest. They have kept in contact ever since and both still live in nearby Nottingham.
Lee’s aim with Morgan has been to pass on post-playing career advice and to help guide him in the correct direction – something he has done for many former players who are seeking to extend their involvement in football in different capacities.
Lee said: “As I have done with a number of players over the years, you look at them with interest. He’s always had leadership potential. He was captain while he was at Forest and I’ve always tried to be a good role model and senior pro. Wes will do the same.
“You try to pass on information to players that you think might benefit them. For me, with Wes and many other people, it was just about imparting some of the mistakes you’ve made and ensuring they don’t make those.
“Wes is very studious. He’s done well and he’s looked after himself both on and off the park. He’s not taken it for granted – he has been thinking about what he wants to do next. He’s trying to implement that, which is key. The earlier players can do that, the better.”
Morgan believes that Lee’s support has been vital to his post-career aspirations.
“It’s very important to have people like Jason supporting you,” he said. “Players need to be aware that the PFA is there to help them regarding anything they want to achieve, go into or need help with. The PFA can help with that.
“Some players don’t think about what they’re going to do after football until it’s too late, which isn’t ideal. If you leave it too late, you’re on catch-up, so it’s important to pre-empt what you want to do.
“Sometimes, you can’t dictate when you’re going to finish. Injuries happen or you fall out of favour so it’s hard to predict. It’s always good to have an idea in the back of your mind about what you want to do post-football.
“If you wanted to go into the coaching side of things, there’s no harm in getting your badges sooner rather than later.”
There is a range of routes available for players to take after they hang up their boots, and Morgan feels that the skills required to become a professional footballer are easily transferable into other lines of work.
“You can’t play football forever and you have to think about what’s next,” he said. “Some people want to go down the coaching or management route, other people want to finish football and they don’t want to continue in that line of work – they have happy memories of it, and they want to move on.
“For me, I want to get into the business side of football and hopefully, my insight as a player can help me in the next phase of my career.”
The PFA’s Assistant Director of Education, Oshor Williams – a former footballer for Southampton, Stockport County and Port Vale – has also had a role in Morgan’s education and believes his leadership and professionalism are two valuable characteristics.
“Our support strategy is based around tapping into some of the wider skills and transferable skills that players have,” said Williams. “For instance, Wes Morgan has obvious transferable skills and qualities – the qualities of leadership.
“As a professional athlete, that professional approach to everything such as simple things like commitment, punctuality, team work and problem solving.
“Every game that a modern-day footballer plays and every situation in a game, it’s quite clear that these are skills that can transfer into a whole range of areas of activity either during or after football.
“That’s always our starting point when we speak to players. It’s not age-constrained. We encourage players to explore their wider interests as early as possible. The longer you leave it, the less inclined you are when you come to choosing the next step.”
A role model for many Foxes fans, and indeed others in the sporting world following the Club’s 2015/16 heroics, Morgan’s leadership qualities have been particularly evident in the Corporate Governance programme, according to Williams.
“Wes is exactly the same role model as Leicester fans right across the country see him as,” Williams explained. “He’s got leadership qualities, he’s got ambassadorial qualities and you can see that he’s supportive of those around him.
“An important aspect of leadership is to be able to positively impact those around you. In terms of Corporate Governance, there’s a big focus on leadership, particularly when you’re talking about organisations at boardroom level.
“Wes has the ability to have a positive impact in terms of his input. Within the area of leadership is the ability to command respect and give respect – it’s a two-way street.
“Immediately, if we talk about those qualities of a Premier League footballer, it’s exactly the same dialogue when people are talking about the leaders within the corporate and business world.”
Morgan’s off-field interactions with personnel at Leicester City are ones that he now has a different understanding of following his Corporate Governance course. He is now able to look at various footballing situations from a different perspective.
“It’s interesting to learn about the exact ins and outs of Corporate Governance,” Wes said. “On the field, all we know is how to play football – everything is organised for us. Once you’re on a course like that, you know what goes into football behind the scenes.
“You discover what makes a football club and business function and achieve what it’s supposed to achieve. It’s very interesting.
“Everyone has their own experiences through their career and everyone will have something they have to deal with at some point, speaking to the necessary parties, whether that’s the manager, a director or the Chairman.
“Being on this course, I’ve definitely got more of an understanding of why your own situation develops in the certain way.”
Lee, who amassed over 650 appearances and played for 18 different clubs during his career, is tasked with ensuring players are aware of their educational options and assists them during transitional periods of their life.
“When you get into the professional game, you move away from education,” Lee said. “The longer you leave it, the more difficult it is, but it’s not impossible. I left school at 16 and did my scholarship and I didn’t re-educate myself until I was 30.
“It was daunting. I found it difficult, but young people now are very good at grasping stuff. You just have to keep yourself moving and continue to develop.
“Players can do that – they always have to continue to take on new information and tactics. They can apply themselves to education as well.”
Morgan certainly possesses the ability to apply himself to different situations and adapt when needed. He has played for three football clubs – Nottingham Forest, Kidderminster Harriers and Leicester City – in as many different tiers.
It is those experiences, and his educational development, that he feels will combine to stand him in good stead following his incredible journey as a professional footballer.
“Everyone’s different, some people still dabble in a bit of business during their playing career, but for the majority, all they know is playing football,” Morgan concluded. “There are little things like picking up a pen and writing a 1,000-word essay that would be foreign to them.
“For me, being on these courses, I’ve had to do that quite often. It’s all about reminding yourself and re-educating yourself about what it’s like to be in a classroom scenario and what it’s like to learn for long periods of time.
“There are things like writing and making sure you present an assignment or produce documents in the correct manner. It’s all about re-educating yourself. People that have been in a football bubble during their playing career don’t often come across written work.
“It’s something that I’ve embraced and enjoyed.”