Harbaugh says error made in Schembechler vetting process
Harbaugh provides details of how the “mistake” was made.
Too many people wanted to jump to blame someone in these situations including Warde and Harbaugh. That includes whomever wrote that long post about “don’t blame Warde, blame Harbaugh” because they happen to be an expert and work in an AD department. As I said it was a mistake. Here are the relevant details.
Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh said on Thursday that a mistake was made during the vetting process in the recent hire of Bo Schembechler's son.
"Once I became aware of things that were offensive -- offensive to me, offensive to other members of our team -- [we acted]," Harbaugh said, according to MLive.com. "We didn't want that mindset around."
"I read the report myself," Harbaugh said. "We have a company that vets that -- social media -- and they came back and [cleared him]. We've got a new company doing that [now], but they've got to be better.
"I'll take responsibility for that," he said. "If somebody can find that in a day, then we have to be better ourselves."
I expect nothing less from Jim as described above. We are all lucky to have a coach with this level of integrity and character
Does this also apply to topics about Prime?
Read all the replies in this thread and not one said FIRE HATBAUGH.
I am dissapoint.
FIRE HATBAUGH
I wonder if Ace will put away his torch and pitchfork for a day or two. I doubt it.
I don't have any love for Ace, but this message board is as obsessed with him as he is with his causes.
Yeah, it's fun
Mean Joe in particular. Guy brings up Ace every chance he gets.
Maybe to distract from the fact that he thinks, if you put aside all the racist stuff, Schemy made some good points and everyone is being too hard on him on the internet to virtue signal instead of treating him with kid gloves and trying to change his mind.
You have chlamydia and all 7 forms of hepatitis.
I do. And so does RGard's mother.
Best not hold your breath, mate.
If an Ace tweet falls in the woods and everyone has been blocked, does it make a sound?
"As I said it was a mistake." You, today
"This can’t even be called a mistake made by a staffer. Certainly not a mistake by leadership." You, on 5/23
I sure am glad this made the front page of ESPN, though. Nothing quite like rehashing old news.
Ahh thank you! You are right. I said it can’t even be called a mistake by leadership or a staffer. Turns out it was neither.
Oh, god, stop the bootlicking. Shemy shouldn't have been hired in the first place -- not a merit hire, a sop to the disgraced Schembechlers -- and the guy who hired him was probably Harbaugh, despite very broad and established consensus that Shemy is an idiot.
Yeah --- I agree here. To start off with, yes, Glenn is the absolute number 1 villain and moron in this situation.
But it's kind of absurd to spin this into "Extreme Leadership by Jim Harbaugh." Glenn was a "hmmmmmmmmm, uhhhh, that's interesting" hire even prior looking at his Twitter feed. The Jay Paterno analogies some have made aren't completely off.
JH shouldn't be punished in any way here, but "extreme leaders" also see the obvious "rakes in the lawn" ahead of time and don't wander near them.
Why do my eyes roll so hard? Every time I read or hear “extreme ownership” or “extreme leadership.”
Im with you Nittany. Shemy never should have been hired.
Even great leaders make bad decisions. Lincoln and the six generals before Grant, Grant at Cold Harbor, FDR and Pearl Harbor,etc,
Critics always bat .1000 because they are never in a position to risk being wrong on a decision that impacts lives.
Speaking of critique, batting a thousand is spelled 1.000
"Even great leaders make bad decisions. "
Yes... and when they do, it isn't "great leadership".
Bootlicking doesn’t really apply here. More like partisan apologia
Harbaugh deserves blame for not doing his due diligence on Shemy’s social media activities,
“very broad and established consensus that Shemy is an idiot”. Ummm, what? Before the Twitterversy I doubt that most people remembered his vocal defense of his father.
Shemy responded to the accusations against his dad as most people would. It might offend others that he went after the victims, but this was a guy who saw his dad being attacked for reasons he believed were unjust. Expecting someone to believe a stranger over their parent is a lot to ask.
Shemy wasn’t just attacking “others,” he was publicly attacking his own brother.
Not sure Harbaugh needed much reminding to know that about Shemy.
That may make it even worse from Shemy’s perspective.
If Harbaugh thinks Bo is innocent than he wouldn’t see an issue with hiring Shemy.
Matt Schembechler's account was absurd and contrary to the facts and common sense. Of course Shemy was going to refute it, and more power to him for doing so.
I'm with those who thought that Shemy's hire was cronyism, but cronyism is common in college football.
You really think that before this latest issue, people don't remember that Shemy Shembechler defended his dad vociferously? People on this board have clear recall of Rose Bowls from the 70s.
And yeah, you're not wrong in saying that a son's natural instinct is to defend his dad, but.... it's not "a stranger." It's several dozen former players and associates of the program coming forward and contributing to a third-party review.
How is having a background check company to look through someone's social media activities not doing his due diligence? Would you rather have our football coach wasting his time plumbing the depths of all of his social media accounts? Ludicrous. He did his due diligence. The company they hired was just shit...and I guarantee it wasn't Harbaugh who hired that company either, and it shouldn't be, he's got more important things to do.
Bingo.
THAT is the problem here. Nepo hire Shemmy should have never happened even if he had NONE of those social media posts.
The guy ain't good at his job, and he's a Schembechler. Quit giving your childhood friends charity jobs.
Yeah it's kind of no wonder that the firm didn't push back hard on the hire. When Jim Harbaugh says he's hiring this guy cause he's a friend and he's a Schembechler I doubt some 25 year old social media consultant is going to make a big fuss about it.
In my experience, consultants tend to tell the people who hire them what they think they want to hear (and in some cases, they are overtly instructed to do so).
But that one asshole who upvotes his own posts told me that I should blame Harbaugh
...and HR. Clearly you missed that part, maybe your cape was covering your eyes.
But lol, this guy. 🤡
I can smell your butt hurt from here.
butt hurt about what exactly?
Regardless of the social media crap, why hire him in the first place?
Regardless of whether the vetting company failed, somebody in the athletic department should have been more thorough. How can you miss something that bloggers found publicly available in a day? This is especially true when it is Bo's son with the Robert Anderson scandal fresh on the university's mind.
That person with the long post was me...OP, how exactly does this mean Harbaugh shouldn't be blamed (when you literally quoted him saying, "I take responsibility for that")?
Warde Manuel doesn't do HR. Period. He is responsible for the people he hires directly. There is a 0.00% chance he had anything to do with this hire. It's not how athletics administration works. Administrators don't hire members of coaching staffs or anyone on coaching support staffs.
I'm literally hiring a position right now. The AD has ZERO to do with my search. I report directly to the AD...guess who was responsible for that search? The frickin Athletic Director.
It's between me and HR. Just like I said before (you conveniently left the part out where I said the blame falls on HR...and I elaborated and said I don't know if UM Athletics uses central campus HR or if they do it themselves...regardless, it's the responsibility of the hiring manager and HR, period).
If this person reported to Harbaugh. It's his job. If someone else on Harbaugh's staff hired Shemy...it's that person's job (along with HR).
But Jim Harbaugh would be the first head coach in the history of modern college football to allow someone on his staff to hire an important position on his staff.
We aren't talking about an assistant nutritionist. We aren't talking about something like a trainer. This is the Asst. Director of RECRUITING.
That's Harbaugh (and HR).
Not sure how I can make that any clearer.
Are you sure you don't want to write a few more paragraphs?
As long as you keep reading them, I'll keep writing them. Thank you for your service.
Someone is cranky today. Get the baby a bottle.
This would be true if they were hiring a non descript GA. When you are hiring Bo's son, after everything that happened with Dr. Anderson, both Warde and Harbaugh need to be aware of everything involved with Shemy before he gets hired. Either they are oblivious or they knew and looked the other way until there was a backlash. Either outcome isn't great.
I understand what you're saying, but I think you are grossly underestimating the power of a head football coach.
There is not an AD in the country who is involved with coaching staff or coaching staff adjacent hires.
Harbaugh could hire you right now and there is nothing Warde is going to say about it. Warde isn't even going to know about it.
It doesn't matter if you're the OC, an analyst or the Asst. Director of Recruiting. It's still a D1 head coach and his program.
Now I get what you're saying about the connection to Bo and all of that, absolutely. But there is still nothing Warde can do about it other than say, "you sure you want to do this?"
And I doubt he'd get that opportunity because Jim would have no reason to consult Warde (or anyone for that matter) before hiring a member of his staff.
Listen, I'm not saying Jim should've been perusing the guy's Twitter likes. I'm saying he's ultimately responsible for the people he adds to his staff and HR is responsible for the background check process. Warde isn't part of either of those.
I also mentioned (before) that this process may be a result of it being an "at-will" classification. Which likely has a different HR process than typical university faculty/staff.
Last paragraph 😉...the thing I wonder is, would Biff Poggi have caught this and challenged Jim as to whether he was sure this is something he wanted to do. Doesn't make a difference, but the rumors were always that Jim listened to Biff. Just a "rabbit hole"/"what if" thought.
Harbaugh more than likely thinks Bo is innocent. Going from there it makes sense that he wouldn’t have a problem with hiring Shemy.
Bo was and is a huge influence on Harbaugh.That isn’t going to change even with the accusations against Bo.
Harbaugh has never cared about backlashes. That’s just who he is as a person.
Well maybe that's a stupid way to run things. I mean, perhaps the AD should impose a standard vetting process for anyone hired into the department. That doesn't mean Warde has to personally review each hire. If the coaches are screwing it up, something's not working. Why have every coach/sport doing background checks (or not) their own way?
I never once said every coach does background check their own way.
I did (imply) that every coach is responsible for their respective staffs. Which is absolutely true. Just like I am for the people I hire.
And my guess is there will be a deeper vetting process going forward. It's in everyone's best interest.
I literally used this example in my executive staff meeting to start a conversation around how we vet staff in these situations.
Damn near, every athletic department is the same and this could've happened to any of us. High profile coaches have always had autonomy on who they bring in.
If Warde has failed at anything it is that he doesn't have enough people around Harbaugh who can communicate back to him when something a little "unsettling" comes up. But again, there's nothing he could've done about it (in terms of not hiring the guy because of his last name), even if he knew ahead of time.
It sounds as if there was a big problem, and it was addressed rapidly.
Yeah but my opinion needs to be heard
~the internet
If the internet's opinion wasn't heard on this matter then Schemy would still be employed. Is that preferable? Frankly I'm glad the internet had a voice in this case.
I think he was referring to the ongoing battles in here long after the outcry was heard and the guy was fired. Dumb hire, bad process. Learn from it and do better in the future.
Harbaugh has a huge blind spot re: Bo, and by proxy his family. It’s fair to criticize him for that, especially because it’s the whole genesis of this saga.
That said, Shemy’s vile views are the kind of thing that one doesn’t air out to other people not dressed in white hoods, so I don’t have a problem believing that Harbaugh didn’t know that about Shemy. But seriously though, wtf kind of social media company did they employ? This was something an average college freshman could’ve unearthed with thirteen minutes of research.
"Harbaugh has a huge blind spot re: Bo, and by proxy his family. It’s fair to criticize him for that, especially because it’s the whole genesis of this saga."
Harbaugh actually knew Bo. I would guess that you did not. Like others here, your opinions about people you don't know and probably never met are not worth a whole lot.
Everybody here could use a lot more humility and restraint when judging others they don't know. A lot more.
You are correct, I don't know any of the Shembechlers personally. So I have to form my opinions through means like the WilmerHale report and thousands of likes on a Twitter account.
Then you should recognize the serious limitations of those opinions. I don't think you can know somebody's character based on twitter likes and a report from a law firm. Many here don't seem to understand that and recklessly spew toxic epithets about people they don't know. It's disturbing.