3 early issues in Ryan Poles era as Chicago Bears GM

1. The handling of turning around the front office

If anything could be blamed solely on Poles so far, it is that he has bad timing. He rushed for Ogunjobi, then rushed to replace him when he missed out. The timing of his Bates offer made him vulnerable to when the Bills matched it.

The other question has been the timing of the way in which Poles has moved on from long-term front office members.  The biggest notable one has made waves recently LaMar Campbell, a person who was on the search firm that helped hire Poles was let go on the Friday of the 4th of July weekend, springing questions about what led to the timing.

The firing is not an issue, and we will never know exactly how, and why this happened. Still, Poles could have helped himself and made it much quieter with better timing. If he does this on a Tuesday afternoon during the dog days of the summer, nobody cares.

It seems as though the news was leaked to the media through Campbell because the perception comes off that he was blindsided and that the timing was unfair. The timing is certainly unfair, and this is another thing Poles could have gotten in front of by also cluing the media into his decision, or helping with any reasoning.

Not doing so allowed Campbell to own the narrative for the week. This is a small thing, but when it comes to hiring top-end executives and filling a franchise top to bottom you need a strong perception from your top guy in charge. The best GMs can play the media game as much as they play the trade machine.

Poles can do better at the small details such as when to fire someone, whether to rush to sign a player with a known injury, when honesty is best, and when it may be best to keep things tighter to the vest. Small details, but things that will help him once he picks up on them.