DEATH BY MEDIOCRITY, THE USTA STANDARD.

By Javier Palenque

What is mediocrity in leadership?

Mediocre leaders never personally acknowledge their role or contribution to any mistake or failure. Selfish and Self-Serving. Mediocre leaders act out of self-interest and bring a sense of entitlement to their roles. Uncivil and mean. This is one proper definition of mediocre leadership. Try to understand this definition in the context of the state of tennis and the terrible leaders that the USTA promotes and empowers.

Here is a perfect example: if the sport is not growing and the data proves so, the intelligent thing to do is to acknowledge the state of the sport and recruit people who think of ways of solving the problem (new blood). The USTA board and leadership do the exact opposite, they conflate the information about the US Open, hide the real data, use data that is proven false about participation, hide their membership revenues, and hide data from their competitions to keep the status quo going. This is of course never accepting any role in the demise of the sport while keeping their jobs and the act they put up that they care for the sport when the reality is they care for their positions. This is called mediocre leadership.
Now think how many years you can sustain this charade. How many tennis generations can support such stupidity? Of course, not many, this is a…