Governance of the FAI

[JR89]

Interesting two days for the FAI.

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[JR89]

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[Stuttgart88]

Never a dull moment.

[JR89]

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[Stuttgart88]

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/2023/12/08/roy-barrett-to-attend-oireachtas-committee-hearing-to-explain-jonathan-hill-payments/

"The leaking of Hill’s payments to the media is seen by one faction of a split FAI board as the latest in a series of attempts to oust the London-based chief executive.

"There is a concerted effort out there to remove Jonathan Hill,” a source told The Irish Times. “This is about people trying to take back control of the FAI board.”"

[Stuttgart88]

Seems like a mad AGM. At least the various stakeholders are engaged these days I suppose. They said nothing under Delaney.

Is the FAI actually governable? They’re like the UK Tories. Doing a sh1t job, losing money, racking up debt, leaving Europe early, fighting among themselves. At least you can vote the Tories out. Looks like we’re stuck with a dysfunctional FAI forever.

[Eirambler]

Sounds like Hill is in for a rough afternoon under Government committee questioning.

[Olé Olé]

Got a good laugh at this from Paul Rowan today in the Sunday Times

"Meanwhile, sources at the FAI, say that the departing director of marketing and communications, Louise Cassidy, had enjoyed her 18 months in the job but had been dismayed by the constant leaks to the media about the workings of the FAI."

Imagine being those sources. "Come here till I tell you, Paul, Louise left because she didn't like the leaks. What leaks, Paul?"

[seanfhear]

Probably better not to get a job working under a sive if you don't like leaks !

[tetsujin1979]

No other real thread for this.
The FAI's website has had a lick of paint
https://www.fai.ie/

[pateen]

Thats worse than before.

Just went looking for fixtures and results and cant find it.... thats bad!!

[John83]

Thats worse than before.

Just went looking for fixtures and results and cant find it.... thats bad!!
Same here, and I haven't seen a site that slow to load in a good 20 years.

[elatedscum]

All the old articles are 404ing

[Stuttgart88]

FAI in front of the PAC today. Not hard to see why they receive low public funding!

Malachy Clerkin's take:

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/2024/02/22/the-fai-spent-their-morning-apologising-and-explaining-a-joke-making-a-bad-situation-worse/

The FAI spent their morning apologising and explaining a joke, making a bad situation worse
Jonathan Hill will most likely survive what was ultimately a small scandal with no real consequence other than making the association look embarrassingly clueless and badly governed

You don’t want to start with an apology, really. Not great. Tony Keohane, the fresh-meat FAI chairman who was only elected just before Christmas, wasn’t scheduled to make an opening statement to the Public Accounts Committee on various financial matters. But like an errant husband landing home with petrol station flowers, he hurried to try and soften the blow anyway.

“Look, we’re extremely sorry for sending material in so late last night,” Keohane said. “That was due to the fact that we were working through some advice and to enable us to give you as much information as possible. I hope you accept our apology for that. It was in no way meant to be disrespectful to you.”

[ FAI chief ‘suggested’ he receive payment for holidays not taken, Oireachtas committee told (https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/2024/02/22/jonathan-hill-12000-payment-a-miscalculation-by-the-association/) ]

Well now. The PAC could reasonably have wondered in response what it might have looked like if the FAI had been trying to be disrespectful to them. As Fianna Fáil TD Paul McAuliffe pointed out, the committee ended up with just 45 minutes to sift through an extensive email dump ahead of the meeting. And even then, some of it was so heavily redacted it looked like a sackful of Barbarians jerseys.

Indeed, one seemingly quite significant email put a series of thick black lines through everything except the email addresses of CEO Jonathan Hill and former finance director Alex O’Connell. They even, in their wisdom, redacted the FAI’s social media channels – albeit they kept the Facebook and Twitter logos intact so you can do your own sleuthing on that score.

Thing is, if you start with an apology, you better make sure the only way is up from there. But of course, this is the FAI we’re talking about. And reader, this is going to shock you now – the only way was not up.

First off, the joke. We weren’t five minutes into the questioning from McAuliffe before it emerged that the whole problem with Hill’s salary issue apparently came about because of a throwaway gag in an email. A junior staffer got onto Hill about converting unused holidays into cash and at the end of his reply signing off on the idea, the CEO seemingly wrote: “Can you negotiate the same for me please?!”

That was it. That was, by Hill’s account, where all this started. A feeble joke with a subordinate, a David Brent-style attempt at faux-solidarity. Never mind that in the course of later questioning, it turned out that the cash Hill got in lieu of 12 days’ holidays in 2022 amounted to around €11,500. So basically, a bit of Stick-It-To-The-Man banter from a CEO earning the guts of a grand a day.

Anyway, no harm no foul in that, in and off itself. Except that somehow, this turned out to be The Little Joke That Could. Without Hill knowing a thing about it, the joke travelled all the way across the desks of the senior officers in the FAI – the then Chairman, the then Finance Director, the People and Culture department – and next thing you know, some months down the line, Hill got paid. Sadly for him, it meant his salary for 2022 leapfrogged that of the government secretary general against which he is supposed to be benchmarked. And so here we are.

In the pantheon of FAI ****-ups, this one admittedly lacks a certain glamour. Not only is the money pretty small in the scheme of things, it has already been paid back. No grassroots scheme got nixed because of it, there was no real consequence to the whole thing beyond embarrassment.

And even if Hill’s version of events strain credibility somewhat (a joke, seriously?) the board of the FAI is standing over it. There was a slight whiff of jeopardy in proceedings soon after when McAuliffe turned to FAI president Paul Cooke and asked if he had confidence in Hill and Cooke would only say he had confidence in the leadership team. Pressed four times to express confidence in his CEO, Cooke couldn’t quite get that far and instead said that his “confidence had been challenged by events”.

Had Keohane followed suit when McAuliffe immediately popped the question in his direction, it could have been curtains. As it was, the chairman said he had confidence in the CEO because of all the great things the FAI had done to itself since the bad old days. And on we went.

But the hits kept coming. The PAC chairman Brian Stanley was particularly exercised by the quality of the submissions from the FAI. He held up one of the redacted emails with disgust, as if it was an old sock he’d found behind a school radiator. “This is just not acceptable. We get many redacted letters in here. But in my time here, I’ve never seen a letter like that.”

This is the thing. Even when the FAI scandals are small in nature, they are big in impact. It is a basic requirement for any sporting body is to have a reputation for being good at governing their sport. When the chap in charge of the government body overseeing the spending of taxpayer money is losing patience with you, you look like fools.

It ripples out, too. Una May, the CEO of Sport Ireland, is usually a decent enough performer at these committee hearings. But she had a bad day here, twice getting caught in the crossfire and not seeming to know how to get out of the way of it.

When Fianna Fáil TD James O’Connor pressed her on why a portion of Covid funding appeared to have been spent on FAI debt, she faffed for a bit about terms and conditions before trying to deflect to her finance chap. When Stanley reminded her that the request for the FAI emails went through Sport Ireland and asked her if she was happy with what had transpired here this morning, she responded with a feeble: “Can I just clarify, happy in what way?”

Ultimately though – and not for the first or last time – the greatest harm done was to the FAI itself. There was one item on the agenda for the meeting that they were keen to talk to the government about – the proposal to find a way to distribute more betting tax to other sports, including soccer. This will be a key building block to securing revenue streams now and into the future, if it ever comes to pass.

But there wasn’t time to get to it. They spent their time apologising and explaining a joke instead.

Can’t get much more FAI than that.

[zero]

knives out for Hill it seems.

https://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/international-soccer/jonathan-hills-future-as-fai-chief-executive-under-threat-ahead-of-board-meeting-on-wednesday/a239680975.html

[John83]

I'm trying to think of a win he's had.


The Sky deal is for no announced amount of money, which I take to mean it was embarrassingly little.
The seeming pivot towards O'Shea as manager that everyone is suddenly backing away from suggests they either made a hames of finalising a manager or the April talk was a bluff from the start.
The stuff around holiday pay was a big own goal for an organisation supposedly trying to distance itself from the Delaney years.
Promising to move over to Ireland and then deciding he wouldn't looks very half-hearted too.

The only positive seems to be that he's shored up some of the leakiness to the press, if he even gets credit for that. I don't know that it adds up to sacking him, but I sure as hell wouldn't be extending his contract.

[Razors left peg]

Shoring up the leaks to the press could come back to haunt him though. Hill and Canham haven't fostered any relationships with Irish journalists and haven't exactly built up any goodwill over 5 months of keeping everyone in the dark on the manager front. If they nail it brilliant, but if they don't I'd expect a sh1tstorm of criticism coming their way for quite a while from every media outlet in the country.

[Stuttgart88]

Lots of social media chat among journos yesterday suggesting Hill is toast. He's lost the confidence of the rank & file.

Ken Early today: "All the talk before the game was about the position of the CEO Jonathan Hill, whose days in the job had been reported to be numbered. It was widely speculated that the number of days remaining might be as low as one."

[Olé Olé]

Lots of social media chat among journos yesterday suggesting Hill is toast. He's lost the confidence of the rank & file.

Ken Early today: "All the talk before the game was about the position of the CEO Jonathan Hill, whose days in the job had been reported to be numbered. It was widely speculated that the number of days remaining might be as low as one."

What are the key issues he's facing?

1) Pay scandal
2) New manager
3) New sponsor

I would have said that he lost confidence on 1) a while ago as we heard during the hearings. Given that he has addressed 3), wonder if this is the long tail of 1) or related to point 2)...

[Stuttgart88]

I'd say a comibination of things but heavily weighted by 1. A clandestine pay rise might be overlooked if other KPIs were heavily positive, but they're not. He's also a Brit!

[Olé Olé]

I'd say a comibination of things but heavily weighted by 1. A clandestine pay rise might be overlooked if other KPIs were heavily positive, but they're not. He's also a Brit!
Correct. What I'm getting at is 1) would be overlooked but could it be inferred that 2) is a mess? I'm reaching but the board were happy he had something lined up that wouldn't make them look silly then he might be okay for another bit of time.

[pineapple stu]

What are the key issues he's facing?

1) Pay scandal
2) New manager
3) New sponsor
Remote working too I guess? Is he getting his hands dirty in the job?

[sbgawa]

Remote working too I guess? Is he getting his hands dirty in the job?

Its an absolute farce that the board allowed the CEO work from a different country.
How are you supposed to lead a company and motivate people if you dont even see them anyway regularly in person.
It the chats around the office and social interaction that create atmosphere and culture, especially given evteryone knew the morale and atmosphere withoin the FAI was poor to start with.
Sooner the better he is gone and the FAI get a leader who will actually leed rather than worry about how many holidays he has taken and whether he has been paid for them.
Even the fact the guy had the cheek to look to be paid for holidays when he is "working" from home says it all

[ifk101]

The Sky deal is for no announced amount of money, which I take to mean it was embarrassingly little.

It is a reported €8m deal over 4 years. Which compares with a previous sponsorship deal with 3 of €30m over ten years.
https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/2024/03/20/skys-sponsorship-deal-with-republic-of-ireland-teams-worth-up-to-8m/#:~:text=The%20Football%20Association%20of%20Irela nd,over%20a%2010%2Dyear%20period.

Note it took four years to find a new sponsor and one, if not the main reason Hill was appointed, was his supposed revenue generating abilities.

[JR89]

If they didn't act the clowns regarding the Oireachtas committee this likely would have all blown over eventually.

[seanfhear]

If they didn't act the clowns regarding the Oireachtas committee this likely would have all blown over.
It seems there is always come clowns in the circus !

[Stuttgart88]

If they didn't act the clowns regarding the Oireachtas committee this likely would have all blown over eventually.

That 100% redacted email except for the recipient's email address was absolutely comical.

[Stuttgart88]

Hill safe for now

https://www.thesun.ie/sport/12621495/jonathan-hill-fai-ceo-board-meeting/

[Diggs246]

He mislead the dail, did he not?
Re the pay scandal. I'm pretty sure his emails to the accounts people in the fai were leaked and he was lying through his backside

[Stuttgart88]

Papers are saying the EUR 500k contract termination cost was a deterrent against removing him. Why is he even on a fixed term contract? He should have a normal employee contract. Effing outrageous.

And surely his contract allows for some kind of "failure to execute duties" clause? He jeopardised essential government funding by accepting pay terms, disguised by the untaken holiday pay, that exceeded the MOU terms with the government.

Honest to Jaysus, I wish I was able to manipulate my way into a role that rewards failure and dishonesty so well. I have compliance on my back 24/7 and I double/triple check every email I send to make sure I'm staying within rules. Personal pride and moral standards encourage me to do my job as well as I can. No wonder populists around the world are gaining popularity. Over here in UK the sheer number of people in high profile roles, often related to the public sphere in some way, who "fail upwards" boils my pi$$.

OK, I've probably spent over 10% of my total career hours on this site since I discovered it in 2004, but that's mental health hygiene!

[JR89]

Papers are saying the EUR 500k contract termination cost was a deterrent against removing him. [B[Why is he even on a fixed term contract? [/B]He should have a normal employee contract. Effing outrageous.

This is why they're finding it hard to fill Gleeson's old role. Gleeson didn't have a fixed term contract but they want her replacement to have a fixed term contract which happens to end when Gleeson's contract as manager ends. Supposedly applicants have said no because they feel the FAI are leaving the door open for Gleeson to step straight back in when she's finished as womens manager.

[Stuttgart88]

Hill gone

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/2024/04/15/fai-announce-departure-of-chief-executive-jonathan-hill/

[pineapple stu]

Jonathan Hill has walked as CEO in the last few minutes (https://www.rte.ie/sport/soccer/2024/0415/1443605-hill-leaves-his-position-as-fai-ceo/).

Seems he brought very little to the table all told?

So now we're on the lookout for a new manager and a new CEO. The salary savings will be huge if nothing else.

[Stuttgart88]

Jonathan Hill has walked as CEO in the last few minutes (https://www.rte.ie/sport/soccer/2024/0415/1443605-hill-leaves-his-position-as-fai-ceo/).

Seems he brought very little to the table all told?Other than a welcome sober presence on Twitter, nothing.

[seanfhear]

The FAI is a mad-house !

[Diggs246]

I wonder did he tell the board who the next manager is i.e. john O shea and they just said ....get out

[CraftyToePoke]

I wonder did he tell the board who the next manager is i.e. john O shea and they just said ....get out

& where is Mr Canham in all this.

April 30th is Hills last day but do we still have an appointment this week ?

[Stuttgart88]

You can just imagine the Board discussion.


Hill's gone. What shall we do with the other fella?

Canham?

OK, we'll can 'im.

[JR89]

& where is Mr Canham in all this.

April 30th is Hills last day but do we still have an appointment this week ?

Have to imagine the search is coming to an end or they'll use this as an excuse to keep O'Shea as interim until June till a new CEO is found.

[Diggs246]

That's the best possible result
I fear they have nobody and will panic

[Jolly Red Giant]

April 30th is Hills last day but do we still have an appointment this week ?
The FAI's chief operating officer David Courell has been appointed interim CEO ahead of what the FAI said would be "a structured search for a full-time successor".

[John83]

The FAI's chief operating officer David Courell has been appointed interim CEO ahead of what the FAI said would be "a structured search for a full-time successor".
Great. We should have a new CEO in time for the return of Halley's commet.

[Eirambler]

And it will probably end up being David Courell.

[Razors left peg]

And it will probably end up being David Courell.

He looks qualified for the role looking at his CV

[elatedscum]

My money is on Mark Canham to get the job in September. Then him to insist on appointing a new director of football (or whatever his title is) before appointing a manager. His replacement comes around in say March and then we have a new manager in place for our failed attempt at qualifying for Euro 2028. Hard to do I know...

[seanfhear]

He looks qualified for the role looking at his CV
Ealing Green would be wanting somebody with a VC !

[Stuttgart88]

My money is on Mark Canham to get the job in September. Then him to insist on appointing a new director of football (or whatever his title is) before appointing a manager. His replacement comes around in say March and then we have a new manager in place for our failed attempt at qualifying for Euro 2028. Hard to do I know...If it's Canham then he's clearly one to keep an eye on, and not in a good way. It'd imply to me he's obviously a capable political manoueverer and on some sort of Delaney-like grab for control amidst the chaos.

Alternatively, in his favour, it could just be that he's good and the lack of a manager so far is not his fault but instead it's because it's been a hard sell at the financial package offered or the candidate is ready to commit but has to wait (Carsley(!), Sagnol, AN Other...).

[Stuttgart88]

In context of Hill working from UK, Neil O'Riordan had a funny line today:

"For a sport that needs to move mountains to realise its potential, relocating Hill would have been a good start".

Well I thought it was funny...

[seanfhear]

In context of Hill working from UK, Neil O'Riordan had a funny line today:

"For a sport that needs to move mountains to realise its potential, relocating Hill would have been a good start".

Well I thought it was funny...
Trying to make a mountain out of a mole-hill ! !

[EalingGreen]

Ealing Green would be wanting somebody with a VC !
Eh?

Don't understand :confused: