Seeing the recent FIFA spectacle unfold feels akin to watching an unthinkable psycho-thriller. Can this really be happening?
As a leader, I personally cannot comprehend separating myself from the accountability of those I’m responsible for… but maybe that’s just me.
This debacle calls for sponsors to remember why they got into it in the first place. Their marketing objectives most likely had something to do with building brand value, relating to the fans and perhaps even developing the sport. And of course, there’s always the secondary objective of not letting their competitors have it. I doubt their marketing plans ever called for sorting out the sport’s business problems.
At the end of the day, the associations we allow our brands to stand alongside need to be credible and respectable… and we have the right to put pressure on the organisers to behave in a manner that’s fully transparent and worthy of our relationship. Afterall, the sponsor’s money is the oxygen that allows the governing body of the sport to exist and the fans will not be very happy with those seen as feeding corruption.
Question to be asked – if the governing body is tarnished, do the fans see the game itself as tarnished and therefore question the integrity of those who are funding it?
We look forward to seeing which sponsors are brave enough to do the right thing for the sake of the sport and it’s fans.
