Sacking Unsuccessful Football Managers - Essay Example

? Sacking unsuccessful Football Managers Managers perform critical functions in an organisation and they are majorly held accountable for success in performance of the organization that they head. Manager’s change in any field is therefore a critical decision that influences the performance of the organisation and therefore raises an empirical question that generates attention from the academia. This paper provides a critical discussion of the arguments for and against sacking unsuccessful managers both inside and outside sporting organizations. This paper engages two different organizational theories when making the argument namely organization learning and dependence on resource theories. The models influence two different leadership succession theories that will come in handy in the discussion of the subject matter. The two leadership succession theories are vicious cycle theory and common sense theory. The two theories give different relationship of leadership succession and performance of the organization thereby providing the basis for and sacking unsuccessful managers. The integration provides great context to explain the effect of leadership succession. The common sense theory holds that the performance of an organisation will improve when an organization sacks an unsuccessful leader. This indicates that the managers are hired to control the performance of a firm and hence are responsible for good performance. According to the resource dependence theory, the manager has control over the performance of the organisation since he has the ability to start or terminate actions at his discretion. The managers bring on board resources, information and legitimacy. This results if the organization sacks a manager with poor results and hires one with the right mix of resources, the performance will improve. This therefore roots for the sacking of the manager since he is to blame for the organization’s poor performance and hire a manager who has the right mix of resources to spur good performance in the subsequent time period. This thus provides the basis for sacking unsuccessful managers (Soebbing & Washington 2011). The other leadership succession theory is the vicious cycle theory, whose underlying support is organizational learning. The vicious cycle holds that succession in leadership naturally disrupts the organization leading to poor performance. Organization learning provides that for an organization to improve its performance there should be strategic renewal, which focuses on the whole organization not just the managers. The model disregards that managers are an important component, which determine how well the organization is run and how well information diffused to the lower offices and employees. Organization learning holds that when a poorly performing leader is sacked the performance of the team becomes even poorer. This thus supports the vicious theory that poor performance in an organization leads to organizational change but lower performance is a result of change (Soebbing & Washington 2011). This paper will not use institutional theory in arguing the subject matter at hand since it supports the ritual scapegoat theory. The ritual scapegoat theory holds that there is no relationship between leadership succession in an organization and the performance of the organization. From this perspective the leader is only a symbol and does not influence the performance of the organization. This promotes that change is undertaken to promote social constructs, therefore going contrary to the main market consideration that change is undertaken in the search for performance gains. A non-performing manager should be sacked since a new manager spurs immediate short-term reprieve. Of nine studies scrutinizing six countries that included England and Spain, showed that replacing a poorly performing manager does improve the on-field performance of the club. This leads to increase in the club’s short-term performance when a new manager is appointed. The sacking is usually based on the performance of the club in relation to average points set in the league. If the club goes below the lever, this shows that the manager is not working as expected and should be sacked. All managers are expected to control the assets of the organization to ensure success and failure to which, the managers ought to be sacked. In the case of Chelsea when Andre Villas was sacked and replaced with Roberto Matteo, this turned to be a good move as Chelsea won the both the FA cup and the Champions league (Markham 2012) Football is a business that is driven by results and the current performance is considered to be most paramount therefore any non-performing manager should be sacked to improve the club’s short-time performance. It is presumed that a football manager will receive a honeymoon period on his appointment but following this period a manager should be sacked if his performance goes below par. Any acting manager in an organization that sits at the watch to see the organization give poor results should be sacked and replaced with a new manager who has the right resources mix to ensure a current good performance (Bell, Brooks and Markham 2011). The decision to sack an unsuccessful manager improves the responsibility of the players and makes them to fight for the future. This is the case since if the poor performance of the club continues the sacked coach can longer be the scapegoat but the players will carry the blame for the poor form of the club. A new manager brings with him new start and provides freshness that stirs the whole team to good performance. The new manager often invigorates the players who used to remain at the bench and give them second chance to a start. This therefore raises the morale of the club members to play well and make the new manager proud. At the long run, this restores the good performance of the football club (Tossani 2012). According to Heuer, Muller, Rubner, Hagemann & Strauss (2011), the motive to fire a manager mid-season is frequently owing to dissatisfied anticipations in linked to the club stipend bill and to the prevalent postulation of clubs, their supporters, and media that shifting the football coach has a key positive consequences on a ensuing club’s performance. Manager’s should not be sacked, but should be given a longer time at the helm of power. This works at the benefit of the organization in that it pushes the managers to learn and remain keen to sustain good performance. Solely sacrificing the manager is a major disadvantage in that although the change could not affect the short-term performance, it does not in any way address the underlying issues for instance, players’ fitness, leading to deterioration of outcome in the long-term. The organizational weaknesses take hold in the future and the new manager can hardly appreciate the weaknesses facing the organization. Performance deterioration in the future is inevitable as the human capital resources decline and the competitors improve their standing. There is usually a false believe among many that in the short-term after the change of management, performance will increase. The short-time success, which is usually as a result of ‘shock effect’ creates the illusion that fool the organization that the problems in the organization have been ironed out and it fails to pay attention at greater problems which cause poor performance in the long-term. Frequently, time allows managers an opportunity to develop useful knowledge on how to curb a negative situation but change takes away the knowledge. Sacking a manager and the inevitable procedure of replacing the coaching staff causes the loss of important knowledge concerning the team’s strength, capabilities and weaknesses since the new manager will quickly work to reshape the team’s style and tactics to fit his way of doing things and preferred style (Soebbing & Washington 2011). Poor performing managers should not be sacked since the new managers who come in spend time to learn about the organization before they start putting in place long-term solutions. It takes a lot of time for the new manager to change the infrastructure, shape the team, and to learn the strengths and weaknesses of each player. There is always great turbulence that takes place as the new managers learn about the organization in a trial and error manner. The immediate change disrupts the well-established processes and lead to instabilities and unnecessary tension in the management eventually causing a detrimental effect on performance. Managers should not be sacked since this only uses them as the scapegoats and hence their replacement with other people is just a fallacy. This is the case since the underlying problem could be the players and the sacking of the manager does not give reprieve to the club (Hughes, Hughes, Mellahi & Guermat 2010). In conclusion, Longer tenures have in the past been associated with better performance therefore poor performing managers should be given time in leadership to improve the performance of the organization and address the underlying problems. Only after then that the tenure of a manager can be judged, whether his change is strategic and in the best interest of the firm. If a manager is to be sacked the decision should be based on their inability to tackle the current weaknesses in the organization rather than analysing the wins in the previous days. Mechanisms are then to be laid to ensure a firm-specific knowledge is retained and the new managers should be given ample support to grow in their new roles immediately the short-term reprieve ends. The new managers should be given time to learn of the faults that led to poor performance before undertaking a diagnosis process. References Bell, A, R, Brooks, C, Markham, T, 2011, ‘The Performance of Football Club Managers: Skill orLuck?’ [online] Viewed from < http://www.icmacentre.ac.uk/files/discussion-papers/DP_2011_24.pdf > Heuer, A, Muller, C, Rubner, O, Hagemann, N, & Strauss, B 2011, 'Usefulness of Dismissing and Changing the Coach in Professional Soccer', Plos ONE, 6, 3, pp. 1-7, Hughes, M, Hughes, P, Mellahi, K, & Guermat, C 2010, 'Short-term versus Long-term Impact of Managers: Evidence from the Football Industry', British Journal Of Management, 21, 2, pp. 571-589. Markham, T, 2012, ‘The sacking of football managers as an exact science: who got it right and wrong’, [online] Viewed from < http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2012/04/23/the-sacking-of-football-managers-as-an-exact-science-who-got-it-right-and-wrong-230401/ > Soebbing, B, & Washington, M 2011, 'Leadership Succession and Organizational Performance: Football Coaches and Organizational Issues', Journal Of Sport Management, 25, 6, pp. 550-561. Tossani, M, 2012, ‘Should QPR and Southampton sack their managers?’ [online] Viewed from Read More