Power’s People Why Trump needs an aide like Rory’s old caddie

YOU’RE Rory McIlroy,’ said caddie JP Fitzgerald as he berated his famous boss during last month’s Open, ‘what the f*** are you doing?’ The short, sharp shock seemed to work, and Rory recovered his form to come fourth in the tournament. But it hasn’t escaped fans’ attention that within weeks of that bout of straight-talking, JP had been fired as Rory’s caddie after a nine-year stint.

This week Rory explained their parting of ways by claiming that he had been jeopardising their friendship by being ‘too hard’ on JP. From that small exchange at the Open, though, it sounds as though his caddie could give as good as he got.

So was this a White House-style sacking by a man who can’t handle the truth from his inner circle or a genuine effort to preserve a personal relationship by sacrificing a professional one?

In fairness to Rory, I reckon the second explanation is closer to the truth. It did sound a little too sweet to be wholesome when he laid it out at this week’s press conference. ‘I was treating him hard on the golf course,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to treat anyone like that, but sometimes the game drives you to that.’

Sceptics have pointed out that he has replaced JP with another close friend, Harry Diamond – the best man at his recent wedding – to belie the suggestion that chumminess and caddying don’t mix.

But his alliance with JP has been one of the most crucial to his career, as he was 200th in the world when they first paired up in 2008 and, taking a longterm view, he’d be foolish to risk it over a hot-tempered exchange where things get said that can’t be unsaid.

‘I got to the point,’ he explained, ‘where if I didn’t play a good shot or made a bad decision, I’d get frustrated at him. I’d much rather be angry at myself than angry at him.’

By the sound of it, a cooling-off period – which, he’s hinted, this might just turn out to be – was probably overdue.

The better you know someone, after all, the more freely you can speak to them. And that’s fine between friends, but when both parties’ financial prospects and professional careers are thrown into the mix, then speaking your mind gets a little more complicated. There’s a good reason spouses shouldn’t work together, especially when there’s an imbalance of power in the office relationship, or why it’s just not possible to be best buddies with your boss.

Donald Trump doesn’t just demand personal loyalty from his staff, he also expects them to express love and devotion on a regular basis.

Not that rhapsodising about Trump’s amazing loveability and wonderfulness has ever saved any of his yes-men from being sacked or forced out – witness the fate of Anthony Scaramucci this week, just 11 days into the job – but it clearly creates a spectacularly dysfunctional and paranoid working environment.

THE chaos in the White House from the very first days of Trump’s presidency is a consequence of a boss who can’t listen to a single word of criticism. All his life, Trump has surrounded himself with toadies, sycophants and grovelling boot-lickers hired to agree with his own view of his magnificence.

Which might have worked for a bullying billionaire businessman buoyed up by inherited money and cushioned from reality by the bubble of his enormous wealth and capricious power, but it’s not a recipe for long-term success in any public sphere.

You need advisers with the freedom and the courage to speak the truth, not family and close friends who tell you what you want to hear. Rory McIlroy had the good sense to realise that friendship and professional candour aren’t always compatible.

Donald Trump, unfortunately for all of us, has not got the intelligence to know that he needs at least one aide with the guts to tell him, ‘You’re the President of the United States, what the f*** are you doing?’

HARRY Styles, we learned this week, has just begun dating Camille Rowe, his fifth Victoria’s Secret model. Or, as one headline put it, he’s dating his fifth model from the Victoria’s Secret catalogue. Harry, Harry, Harry – it’s the lingerie that you’re meant to pick from the catalogue, you know, the clothes! Not the women…