Managing Leading and Stewardship: A Critical Analysis of FIFA's Management Practices

This article provides a critical analysis of FIFA's management practices, highlighting issues such as lack of accountability and efficient regulatory bodies. It discusses the relevance of stakeholder theory and organizational culture in understanding FIFA's management practices. The article concludes with recommendations for improvement, including the need for a clear ethical code and robust governance framework.

Running head: MANAGING LEADING AND STEWARDSHIP
Managing Leading and Stewardship
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Introduction
The FIFA, Federation Internationale de Football Association is the governing body of the
global football. Established in 1904, the association of FIFA was established under the Swiss
laws. The first world cup of FIFA was held in 1930 at Uruguay in the scenario of football
association with the European affair. Like the other international governing bodies of sports,
FIFA has considerably changes through the years. It has developed and evolved from a simple
club organizing and arranging sports competition to a economic enterprise that has gained lots of
power (Hough and Heaston 2018). The importance and significance of football and sports to the
public in the current state has helped the organization to emerge as powerful intergovernmental
organization. The organization has emerged to be one of the high profile organizers of the event,
a powerful entity of the corporate and the regulator of the popular game attracting numerous
attention of the public. The organization has been under query and questions in the recent years
due to the management practices that has been long critiques in the public spaces for years.
Questions regarding human rights, the practices inside the organization that challenges the future
of the accountability in the organization has been increasing day by day (Szymanski 2016). The
assignment focuses on the questionable organization, FIFA and its practices of management that
has been under long public scrutiny. It furthermore states some of the recommendations
highlighting the theoretical perspectives of the organization that deepens the personal and the
critical awareness of the practices of the organization and the management with some of the
relevant theoretical lenses in the literature.
Critical analysis of the organization
The discussion of the public regarding the significant adverse effects the management of
FIFA has on the communities and the individuals has some of the similar trajectory. The reality
was unknown till the public discussion of FIFA that went viral after the 2010 selection of the
Russia. The report tries to highlight the issues in the management and the accountability
shortcomings of FIFA (Matheson, Schwab and Koval 2018). The controversy related to the dark
side of the management practices of FIFA is not a new concept. Their work connects to the
concept of human rights and the international relations exerting quiet an important influence on
the rest of the world.

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Some of the problems within the FIFA are:
 Lack of proper accountability
 Lack of efficient regulatory body and enforcement of the legislations
 The member countries having incentives towards the engagement in the seeking of the
rent
In context to the above study of the much controversial and questionable practices of the
management of FIFA that has been under the constant scrutiny of the public, the last few years
has been much challenging for the international organization (Kassem and Higson 2016) The
practice of management and corporate governance of FIFA have been constantly highlighted
under close public scrutiny as the international organization has been facing multiple allegations
regarding the corruptions (Bean 2015). Some of these allegations included the news of the
buying of the vote in case of the election of the president and the unethical bribery in the
procedure of bidding in world cup. The procedure and the way FIFA has dealt with these issues
and the allegations have drawn some of the widespread criticism raising queries among the
public regarding the degrading management process and the effectiveness of the current
administrative process of FIFA. On of the most noted issues was the facing of the complaints by
FIFA while constructing stadiums and dealing with lot many corruption charges.
The relevant theories and the models of the corporate responsibilities help to identify the
transformation of the FIFA. Among all of the relevant organizational theories, the stakeholder
theory is one of the most relevant in context to the management process of FIFA.
Stakeholder theory is one of the most widely understood concepts in the world of
business today. The theory focuses on the purpose of the business for the creation of the value
for the stakeholders and not only the shareholders. The theory highlight that the business of any
of the organization requires the consideration of the customer, the suppliers, the shareholders and
the communities. The theory furthermore suggests that the main aim of the business is the
creation of the possible value for the stakeholders (Sharma and Gursoy 2017). It explained that
for effective success and sustainability in respect to the time frame, it is important for the
executives to keep the interest of the customer and the shareholders aligned towards similar
direction of the business. Edward Freeman in his influential research illustrates how the

3MANAGING LEADING AND STEWARDSHIP
managers and the leaders are not answerable to the shareholders. The theory focuses on the
concept that the shareholders, consideration should be made for any of the individuals and the
group who can get affected by the management process of the organization.
Apart from the various criticism of the theory, the stakeholder theoretical approach is
essential for the international organization, FIFA, due to a number of reasons. These include the
concept of the improvement of the state of the world and the driving force towards the increase
in the value of the stakeholder (Matheson, Schwab and Koval 2018). The theory furthermore
illustrates that the effect of the management process of the international organization towards the
world and the people is directly proportional to the name, the recognition and the finance of the
company (Nunkoo et al. 2018). The international organization, FIFA tends to fail consistently in
case of the practice of the basic governance and modules. The corruptions and the allegations
over the last few years have affected the rate of the stakeholders of the organization (Kassem and
Higson 2016). The non profit organization that majorly runs with the promotion and the funding
from the foreign governments and the nations is losing its stakeholders and the profit for the
business thus affecting the stakeholder and the shareholder model. The organization is lacking
the importance of the stakeholder theory.
Organizational Culture from the list of the organizational theory lenses illustrates
different perspectives with the deepening critical and personal awareness related to the
management practices at FIFA (Boudreaux, Karahan and Coats 2016). The organizational
culture can be defined as the assumptions, values and the ways of interaction, the underlying
beliefs that furthermore contributes to the psychological and the social environment of the
organization that are unique in the nature.
Organizational culture furthermore includes the experiences, the expectations, the
philosophy of the organization that tend to guide the behavior of the members with the
interactions, the inner workings and the future expectations (Maennig 2018). The culture of the
organization furthermore includes the visions, the values, the systems, the norms, the languages
and the habits of the organization that keenly aware the strategic objectives of the business.
Some of the basic principles for the mobilization of the organizational culture in case of the
international organization like FIFA are the following.

4MANAGING LEADING AND STEWARDSHIP
On May 2015, some of the top executives of FIFA were arrested on the charges of
corruption in the case of fraud, bribery and money laundering (Rowe 2017). The governing body
of the football world has been long perceived as a reluctant committee that allows multiple
interventions and interference. Most of the people in Britain and the public of the other nation
have reported the organization to be one of the most corrupted organizations with continued
corruption scandals and financial issues. The organizational culture has been destroyed and FIFA
has gradually lost to regain any of the credibility that it has lost in the recent turmoil and
corruption evidences against the international organization. From the receiving of the complaints
for the development of the stadium to taking participatory actions in corrupted activities, world
cup bidding process, the engagement of FIFA towards the corruption allegations are currently
over the tip of iceberg.
Recommendations
The calls for the reformation and strategic measures for the improvement of the
organization in FIFA have been repeated and widespread. The need and the requirement for the
changes appears apparent towards the FIFA circle and the general secretary of the organization
has claimed for looking towards some of the radical changes for the improvement of the
governance of FIFA (Nunkoo et al. 2018). Furthermore provision of the relevant organizational
tools and the procedures that will initiate help in facing the challenges that may come in the way
are some of the basic recommendations for the management of FIFA.
In context to the important and the relevant theories discussed in the analysis part, the
recommended theory of importance in case of the international organization, FIFA is the
stakeholder theory (Boudreaux, Karahan and Coats 2016). This is because the stakeholder theory
initiate recommendations and suggestions for the players, the clubs, the sponsors and the fans in
the national and the international associations of the football and sports that requires to get
involved in the review for the purpose of FIFA.
The stakeholder theory illustrates FIFA as a chain of competitive and collaborative
relation that needs simultaneous attention. The deceptively simple theory is important for the
easy identification of the groups and the individual that are affected by the organizational
scandals (Hough and Heaston 2018). The theory furthermore assumes that values of FIFA are

5MANAGING LEADING AND STEWARDSHIP
explicitly and necessarily one of the important part of the international business platform as
slight alteration of the values and the image of the organization challenges the sphere of the
business ethics.
FIFA furthermore requires to reconstruct and define a clear and ethical code of the
principles of the organization and the values (Esposito 2016). They need to follow and roll these
out with frequent meetings with the staff and the members of the board for accounting against
the prescribed code. Besides this, implementation of effective schemes for the encouragement
and the protection of the values of the organization regarding the code of ethics are some of the
important recommendations for the international organization.
Introduction of some of the new approaches and robust governance framework is thus
required for FIFA with some of the clearly defined principles that will provide a broad outline of
the values of FIFA. Below are some of the factors of recommendation that FIFA needs to initiate
for the changes in its management process to answer back regarding the allegation of the
corruptions towards the organization.
Discipline - To commit the organizational behavior that will be recognized on an
universal basis and will be properly accepted worldwide
Independence - To introduce effective mechanism for avoiding and managing
organizational conflicts (Verver 2015).
Social Responsibility - To be aware of the current trends and the news against the
organizational values and effective responses towards the social issues
Transparency – To give importance to the stakeholder analysis and analyze the action of
the international organization.
Accountability - To ensure effective accountability
Apart from the above factors the international organization furthermore focus on the specific
aspects of the leadership traits and change the current corrupted management practices of FIFA.

6MANAGING LEADING AND STEWARDSHIP
Conclusion
FIFA is an essential umbrella that covers some of the group of the football
confederations. The continued allegations of the corruptions towards the organization have been
challenging towards the image and the process of management together with the raising level of
criticism. The existing model of corporate governance of FIFA has not at all been effective in
addressing these issues and these recommendations towards the introduction of the proper
strategic measures needs to be done. FIFA should initiate measures to win back the trust of the
public, recover its image and the stakeholder engagements. These can be done by maintaining
transparency and encouraging stakeholder engagement for the long term success in the world of
football.

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