Our governance structure is a joke

[RoadTrip]

If any billion pound entity was run as poorly as we are, heads would roll.

Proper committee’s, roles and responsibilities, objectives, strategies… does the club have anything like this except “top 4”? I know it sounds like “corporate spiel”, but I do think it’s important.

Since the Glazers bought the club, they were fortunate to have Fergie (and Gill), who together had the respect and authority to run many aspects of the club.

When he left, along with Gill, I feel this was a really pivotal moment. The succession planning was awful and it still shows today. In effect we were left with one man, Woodward, who ran everything except the pure manager responsibilities. This meant he picked up everything Gill did, + all the non-football related things Fergie did.

It’s no surprise every single thing we do across any area of the club is disjointed and unorganised. We had an unsustainable model because of two unique men who cannot be replaced. When they left, we tried to fill them in the same way and it’s totally failed

I am 100% in the Ole out club. And we’ve got a good playing staff now that with a really good manager we can mask many of our other problems across the club. But the way I see it is (arbitrary):

- A good playing staff only can make you competitive.
- This and a good manager can get you to be a contender and win on the odd occasion.
- These and a proper structure at the club will make you consistently contenders.

So it’s not the most important thing, but it’s critical for prolonged success. And importantly it gives some insensitivity to whenever you change manager.

I really think until this is addressed and the way we operate is modernised, we will continue this up and down yo-yo. Sure we might get a manager and a team together who will win one year, but to remain consistently at the top we need to fix this.

 

[Skills]

Good post. The lack of accountability throughout the club is shocking for such a big organisation

 

[TheLord]

With the way we've been operating for the last 10-15 years, I wouldn't be too optimistic about our near future. The club needs a complete overhaul. Sad state of affairs.

May be another 5-10 years when we actually challenge for the Premier League title.

 

[tenpoless]

I'd love to work at United one day. It has loadsamoney, too big not to generate more money and the leaders seem to accept mediocrity and lack of cricital thinking. All I need to do is to be nice to everyone, do the best I can and I will have a salary better than at least 50% of companies in the world for the same position and responsibility.

 

[tenpoless]

Also the board sent Ole to Norway for a break and we had an international break. Thats the perfect time to replace him and prepare everything for the new manager/caretaker you would think but nooo all these balding ogres did was to sit there sit there with their mouths open while preparing for the next dividends payment. Only after we lost 4-1 to british Mallorca did they start to move their arses and held a fecking online meeting just to discuss compensations, only compensations. Who is the next manager? who gives a shit. Fred the red is good at dancing so lets make him manager.

 

[RoadTrip]

Good post. The lack of accountability throughout the club is shocking for such a big organisation

Do we even know who does what to be able to hold someone accountable?

Just think about this cluster feck of a situation (and there are many more examples). We’ve been shit. But not just shit results, playing shit. So manager getting sacked. But no one thought to think about who to replace him. So current fix is Fletcher - the same technical director (presumably responsible for the technical element of our footballing play…) who was part of our shit football. Keeping Carrick - one of the handful of coaches responsible for our shit football.

So even in sacking him, they haven’t actually done anything.

And as you say, who is accountable for this?

As a fan base, we are always quick to point to the Glazers. But taking a step back, owners of big entities (shareholders in effect) are not typically involved in day to day operations of the organisations they own. Usually, these organisations are run but not just by a CEO, but a collective of individuals Who run different aspects of the organisations. Eg, CFO, CRO, CCO, etc. And in place to ensure they are effective at the jobs are various committees, such as Board, Risk, Audit, etc etc. with non executives who don’t work in the business and provide independent challenge. This creates (ideally) a structure whereby everyone is governed and held accountable and incentivised to do their jobs.

Obviously these roles don’t directly translate to what they’d be at a football club, but the model is absolutely replicable. We just don’t have anything like this.

 

[RoadTrip]

With the way we've been operating for the last 10-15 years, I wouldn't be too optimistic about our near future. The club needs a complete overhaul. Sad state of affairs.

May be another 5-10 years when we actually challenge for the Premier League title.

If we stumbled across the right manager, we’ve got a sufficiently good playing team that we could really get close next year. But then when it comes to the few years after that, without a proper strategy and coherent transfer approach etc, it’ll never be sustainable.

 

[Rams]

If any billion pound entity was run as poorly as we are, heads would roll.

Proper committee’s, roles and responsibilities, objectives, strategies… does the club have anything like this except “top 4”? I know it sounds like “corporate spiel”, but I do think it’s important.

Since the Glazers bought the club, they were fortunate to have Fergie (and Gill), who together had the respect and authority to run many aspects of the club.

When he left, along with Gill, I feel this was a really pivotal moment. The succession planning was awful and it still shows today. In effect we were left with one man, Woodward, who ran everything except the pure manager responsibilities. This meant he picked up everything Gill did, + all the non-football related things Fergie did.

It’s no surprise every single thing we do across any area of the club is disjointed and unorganised. We had an unsustainable model because of two unique men who cannot be replaced. When they left, we tried to fill them in the same way and it’s totally failed

I am 100% in the Ole out club. And we’ve got a good playing staff now that with a really good manager we can mask many of our other problems across the club. But the way I see it is (arbitrary):

- A good playing staff only can make you competitive.
- This and a good manager can get you to be a contender and win on the odd occasion.
- These and a proper structure at the club will make you consistently contenders.

So it’s not the most important thing, but it’s critical for prolonged success. And importantly it gives some insensitivity to whenever you change manager.

I really think until this is addressed and the way we operate is modernised, we will continue this up and down yo-yo. Sure we might get a manager and a team together who will win one year, but to remain consistently at the top we need to fix this.

And this is the real problem.

 

[AaronRedDevil]

It is pretty strange how badly it's run. Guess the success of Sir Alex papered over all the cracks and the Glazers couldn't see any problem's. Even then during the Moyes season i thought there was still some stability and plan. But no, they just left everything fall apart for so long. Idiots.

 

[TheLord]

If we stumbled across the right manager, we’ve got a sufficiently good playing team that we could really get close next year. But then when it comes to the few years after that, without a proper strategy and coherent transfer approach etc, it’ll never be sustainable.

Defense, central midfield, striker (arguably goal-keeping) - I don't think it is doable in or yea!

 

[Fortitude]

I've made the point that I believe all business acumen departed when Malcom died in other threads and what we're left with is an utterly clueless bunch who have no idea how to make their biggest investment work for them.

They seem to be utterly reliant on incompetent staff who are continuously making the golden goose push out rotten eggs and - if Woodward is again doing the hiring or making the call on the interim - will continue to make the same mistakes ad nauseum.

We're the Blockbuster Video of football clubs.

 

[RedCoffee]

There are lots of complaints about the structure of the board and so on which I do agree with but what is the solution?

Which clubs have this so called perfect structure that everyone longs for and what is it.

You look around Europe and there's not that much stability anywhere. Lots of top clubs chop and change managers.
Lots of clubs are run by imperfect boards and owners. Not many boards have sanctioned the spend we have.

Fergie and Gill are both non execs and that has made little difference.

There's not much point in bleating on about the owners and directors as its highly unlikely to change so realistically what is it that needs to happen other than the same old Glazers Out routine.

 

[Josep Dowling]

There are lots of complaints about the structure of the board and so on which I do agree with but what is the solution?

Which clubs have this so called perfect structure that everyone longs for and what is it.

You look around Europe and there's not that much stability anywhere. Lots of top clubs chop and change managers.
Lots of clubs are run by imperfect boards and owners. Not many boards have sanctioned the spend we have.

Fergie and Gill are both non execs and that has made little difference.

There's not much point in bleating on about the owners and directors as its highly unlikely to change so realistically what is it that needs to happen other than the same old Glazers Out routine.

People want someone to blame. If we are doing well on the pitch, no one is going to talk about the club structure.

 

[Borys]

Correct, that's the biggest issue we as a club have.
Who would've thought appointing a carataker manager for 2,5 years and giving him hundreds of millions pounds is not going to work out.

Not to mention the carataker manager was chosen based on sentimental and club values, what obviously (and we also knew it from day one) makes it more difficult to sack him.

Glazers are business people, but they just act like they don't really care.

 

[Fortitude]

Correct, that's the biggest issue we as a club have.
Who would've thought appointing a carataker manager for 2,5 years and giving him hundreds of millions pounds is not going to work out.

Not to mention the carataker manager was chosen based on sentimental and club values, what obviously (and we also knew it from day one) makes it more difficult to sack him.

Glazers are business people, but they just act like they don't really care.

But are they? Outside of Malcom's acquisitions, what have they, his offspring, done to prove themselves and make a mark?

Apparently, they won the superbowl last year via bringing Brady to the team? Was that seen as a masterstroke in America; was there any clever manoeuvres made behind the scenes there?

I've done zero research on them, but if how they run United is anything to go by, they are just clueless.

 

[RoadTrip]

There are lots of complaints about the structure of the board and so on which I do agree with but what is the solution?

Which clubs have this so called perfect structure that everyone longs for and what is it.

You look around Europe and there's not that much stability anywhere. Lots of top clubs chop and change managers.
Lots of clubs are run by imperfect boards and owners. Not many boards have sanctioned the spend we have.

Fergie and Gill are both non execs and that has made little difference.

There's not much point in bleating on about the owners and directors as its highly unlikely to change so realistically what is it that needs to happen other than the same old Glazers Out routine.

Obviously we as fans can’t enact solutions. But the solution is having the right people in rightly crafted roles.

You talk about other top clubs not having stability. This is the point though, this is not about stability. Chelsea have no stability yet are by and large consistently successful.

This is not a simple fix. It takes years to create cultural and structural change at any organisation. I don’t pretend to know the answers or what the way forward is or even what good or perfect look like. But I am pretty damn sure that if we want to get back to being perennially at the top, this needs to happen.

 

[PoTMS]

There will never be an Amazon documentary behind the scenes at Manchester United because it'll just highlight you how ineptly run as a club we are.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

And we're going to pay Woodward... The man who put this terrible structure in place... Actual real money to consult going forward...

 

[VanDeBank]

We just have unskilled, incompetent people making decisions and that starts with the glazers at the top. A guy who doesn't know offside has the final say on sacking a manager and a manager who's been retired for 10 years somehow has a say in how the club is run.

Corporate structure is overrated. You can have a good dictator manage the club, we had one for almost 30 years.

The solutions is the glazers either feck off or they appoint one competent football guy to make all the decisions for them.

 

[wolvored]

I've made the point that I believe all business acumen departed when Malcom died in other threads and what we're left with is an utterly clueless bunch who have no idea how to make their biggest investment work for them.

They seem to be utterly reliant on incompetent staff who are continuously making the golden goose push out rotten eggs and - if Woodward is again doing the hiring or making the call on the interim - will continue to make the same mistakes ad nauseum.

We're the Blockbuster Video of football clubs.

Yes agree with the Malcolm bit. All his kids inherited the club and haven't a clue. I read years ago they have failing businesses like arcades in USA that were profitable under the dad's stewardship. 3 of the kids want to sell the club or at the time of the article did, but the elder kids Joel Avram and Kevin I think didn't. Since then Kevin if that's the right name sold some of his shares.

 

[Steffa Barnesa]

It's been obvious since Fergie was still at the club, which is why I tired of talking about managers etc years ago.

We can talk about managers and players. Some will say the Glazers spend money and, that's true in a sense, we do spend some of our own money. But the bottom line is our owners would be happy for us to finish 3rd for the next 25 years. They're here to take, not build and every department suffers. Everything a modern club needs, we're behind in. We're a victim of our success. Abramovich wants trophies, Mansour and now the owners at Newcastle want to build a club. Ditto PSG. Bayern and Barcelona etc have to answer to their fans. OI'm not saying I want to be like all those clubs, certainly not the former, but our owners want to do the bare minimum and they're what we're up against.

They said for years before Fergie retired that they wouldn't make the same mistakes they made after Busby retired and then they lose Gill the same summer as Ferguson! Brainless. That was a basic mistake that shouldn't have been made. When SAF towing the line saying there was no value in the market, your heart had to sink. He was one man keeping it all afloat, when he left everything was fully out in the open, our flaws laid bare. When was the last time we got a gem like Kante from nowhere like Leicester did? Intead we threw money at Schneiderlin and Schweinsteiger, a vastly overpriced player and one past his best. This is just one isolated example that illustrates how ineptly we operate all across the board.

You see it in films and TV all the time - an absentee father, absent all year long, spends big on Christmas presents for his wife and kids and is suprised it doesn't fix anything, there's distance and some deeper issues there now that need proper attention.