Speaker
Description
Objectives
Trust is considered a success factor for cooperation in (sport) organisations and constitutes an essential feature of (good) governance. Creating adequate trust conditions, thus, seems to be a challenge for the management. The study aims at exploring preconditions, processes and mechanisms of trust formation and promotion within boards of sport governing bodies.
Methods
Addressing these objectives requires a qualitative approach to the specific research context. Data collection is based on semi-structured interviews with volunteer board members of regional sport governing bodies from a German federal state, all having a multi-year tenure on the board. The data is analysed by qualitative content analysis.
Findings
Whilst data collection is ongoing, preliminary results indicate that board work is mainly based on informal arrangements for which personal trust is crucial. Here, trust is mainly based on shared successes of long-term working together and fostered by benevolent, respectful interaction.
Discussion
Trust-related board leadership and culture depend very much on the president who can turn the board members’ trust in his or her personality into trust in the appropriateness of the decision alternatives he or she supports. Trustworthiness, however, is also assessed in the advance of joint board work by means of electoral procedures for the board positions.
Conclusion
With trust being based on personal characteristics and emotional affinity, very resilient bonds between board members emerge, fostered by the temporal stability of board memberships. However, while board decision-making mainly relies on a diffuse set of personal criteria beyond any control, problems of governance and organisational development may occur.
