Conflict in Sports TodayA look at the Conflict Management process in sports

Joseph Okaiye

Article Overview• An article from applied sport psychology provides a brief overview

of organization’s processes to identifying and resolving conflicts in sports

• This sport psychology organization is seem to be held on a platform for other organizations to model, in terms of how they operate as managerial. They serve as a mediating tool that assesses many aspects of not only team conflict, but conflict on all platforms.

• This article identifies some typical issues that tend to arise within many sport organizations. These issues tend to be categorized as hazing/bullying, retention of athletes, severe legal issues, team politics and organizational issues

Article Overview Cont.• The article also pinpoints many consequences of conflict

that isn’t resolved:• Ruined reputations, detrimental blows to management,

culture erosion, and balance within the organization issues.

Article Overview Cont. Sport Psychology group implements conflict

management systems/training to all of its members, also incorporating accountability for the team as a whole. These tactics help their team guide sport organizations towards resolving conflict.

The team holds its values for framework, implementing a conflict management system that analyzes things such as:

Manageable resources, team/organizational goals, success that follows accountability, and structure that stems from fundamental structures instilled by the organization or team.

Levels of Organizational Conflict According to the text, Organizational Communication:

Approaches and Processes, by Katherine Miller, There are a variety of levels that distinguish organizational conflict.

Interpersonal: the individual members of the organization perceive goal incapability.

Intergroup: considers aggregates of people within an organization, work teams, departments, as parties in the conflict.

Inter-organizational: disputes between two or more organizations. The kind that can involve some form of competition in the marketplace.

Phases of Organizational Conflict According to the text, Katherine Miller defines five phases of

Organizational Conflict. Latent conflict: Parties interact in interdependent relationships,

making incompatible goals impossible. Perceived conflict: At least one of the parties realize that their

situation is characterized by incapability and interdependence. Felt conflict: parties personalize perceived conflict by focusing on

the conflict. Conflict management strategies begin being planned. Manifest conflict: this is the communication aspect of the conflict

amongst parties. They implement their own personal strategies when interacting about the issue.

Conflict aftermath: whether the conflict is resolved or not, there will be either positive or negative consequences from the conflict. It affects the individual, relationship and the organization.

Real-Life Examples I will illustrate some real-life examples of sport conflict to

illustrate how situations went about in the five phases of conflict, defined by Katherine Miller

The type of issue Sample framework for a conflict management system Return on investments Consequences for conflict not being resolved

FIFA Corruption Case In 2015, U.S. federal prosecutors disclosed cases of corruption

by officials and associates connected with FIFA. The governing body of association football, futsal and beach soccer.

Near the end of may 2015, 14 people were indicted in connection with an investigation by the united states Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the internal revenue service criminal investigation division into wire fraud, racketeering, and money laundering.

FIFA Corruption Case cont. In total, 7 current FIFA officials were arrested at the hotel Baur

au Lac in Zurich on may 27th. The officials were preparing to attend the 65th FIFA congress, which was scheduled to include the election of the president of FIFA. They are expected to be extradited to the united states on suspicion of receiving $150 million in bribes.

FIFA Corruption Case Phases of Conflict

Phase #1- Latent conflict: there are several phases of this conflict. First, the officials regarding the highly popularized FIFA world cup game, were already suspect of receiving outside assistance in terms of bribes, purposely misjudging play calls, ejecting players with harsh regulations, based on their commitment to outside sources.

Phase #2 Perceived conflict: FIFA, just like the rest of the public, began to get word of the reports that the scheduled games were not going to turn out how they should’ve, at the hands of the officials in schedule for the 2015 FIFA world cup game.

FIFA Corruption Case Phases of Conflict Phase #3 Felt conflict: Although not certain FIFA as a

whole was in on the whole scheme, the organization hires private investigators to judge the incident at hand, possibly find the source and track forward from then on.

Phase #4 Manifest conflict: with the help of the media and press alike, FIFA had provided the public with incentives for their own insight on the case, throughout the investigation.

Phase #5 Conflict aftermath: sometime after the whole ordeal, the accused tried to appeal their judgments, and FIFA organization to suspend the suspects for life, as well as sentencing upon full conformation. They argued that the lack of evidence about what was going on at the time, suggested bribery wouldn’t be penalized, which ultimately didn’t uphold in court.

Corruption Case Conflict Sport Psych

This significant issue was an organization, as well as global rule violation that initially was fueled by greed, suspicion and rumor. Later heightened to a serious legal issue where it went to court.

There was a multitude of consequences if FIFA decided to let the conflict slip under the rug, perhaps if that happened, the organization wouldn’t be what it is today.

FIFA suffered a damaged reputation for not getting the conflict settled before the infamous world cup game, the biggest tournament in sports today.

Corruption Case Conflict Sport Psych Potential Conflict Management System framework: Goals: to make sure everyone involved in FIFA organization, officials

and all, subject to the FIFA org rules, as well as global norms/rules that follow professional games.

Processes and structure: how the governing body of FIFA should go about monitoring suspicious behaviors, investigating conflict before the big stage arrives.

Resources: FIFA and all of its members, officials, governing body, fans and sponsors, need to keep the worlds most beautiful game alive and moving forward for years to come.

Success and accountability: online time will tell if FIFA learned from this unfortunate mishap, so it doesn’t ever disrupt the worlds most popularized game.

STOP AND THINK!In what ways can we improve

sports?

Tom Brady & The Infamous Deflate-Gate!!

In the 2015 NFL AFC championship game, there were reports released that accused the New England Patriots of intentionally deflating game balls, which ultimately is a violation of the NFL protocol.

News that New England deflated the visiting team of Indianapolis colts, and went to win the super bowl two weeks later in a more-so controversial fashion.

The idea for a deflated football, is for better grip, especially in harsh conditions such as the bitter cold.

Deflate-Gate Phases of Conflict

Phase #1 Latent conflict: point blank, Tom felt like he wouldn’t be able to win with his on skill and talents from his team alone, he felt like he needed to get the upper hand/advantage over his opponent, to solidify his position in the super bowl.

Phase #2 Perceived conflict: The NFL started to get word of the reports that the game balls for the AFC title game were deflated in the second half of the game, at the hands of the new England patriots.

According to an ESPN article published, the Indianapolis defenders got their hands on the balls and told their managers and staff that the footballs felt like they were deflated.

Deflate-Gate Continued

Phase #3 Felt conflict: the NFL hired a team to conduct a further investigation on the deflated football scheme, NFL commissioner will have planned potential penalties and consequences for New England

Phase #4 Manifest conflict: after the league revealed its findings on the case, the patriots were fined $1 million and sought to suspend Brady for the first 4 games of the coming season

Phase #5 Conflict aftermath: Brady and the NFL decided to appeal the decision of his suspension, argued that they had no prior knowledge of the incident, saying that it was unfair to solely penalize him for this action. This lead Brady to win the case and avoid suspension

REVIEW The types of conflict that tend to arise in sport vary in severity,

content, and consequence. Some smaller scale issues include: individual issues,

team/organizational issues. Some larger scale issues include: global distrust, ruined

reputations, terrorist attacks. Katherine Millers 5 phases of organizational conflict are evident in

almost every organization, the problem is that not every organization knows how to combat their conflict in a positive way.

Conflict is neither good nor bad, it is what we decide to make of it. It can motivate us to grow stronger, and become a better version of ourselves day by day.

WORK CITED

http://espn.go.com/blog/new-england-patriots/post/_/id/4782561/timeline-of-events-for-deflategate-tom-brady

http://www.appliedsportpsych.org/resource-center/resources-for-coaches/coaching-through-conflict-effective-communication-strategies/

http://sportsconflict.org/sports-conflict-in-the-news/ Miller, Katherine. Organizational Communication: Approaches and

Processes. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Pub., 1999. Print.