FIFA Draws Penalty with Nonexistent Crisis Management

Jonathan Bernstein crisis communications, crisis management, Crisis Prevention, crisis public relations, Crisis Response, Erik Bernstein, Jonathan Bernstein, public relations, reputation management Leave a Comment

Arrogant is not the word you want to be associated with when you’re caught with your hand in the cookie jar

FIFA has been facing growing global pressure over its (allegedly) bribe-fueled FIFA Draws Penalty with Nonexistent Crisis Managementdecision to award the next two World Cups to Russia and Qatar, and the organization clearly still doesn’t understand that it’s desperately in need of crisis management.

Last week, Hans-Joachim Eckert, chairman of FIFA’s Ethics Committee, announced that any decision regarding corruption in the bidding process would be delayed until at least this coming Spring, and wasn’t apologetic in the slightest about the organization’s utter lack of urgency or transparency:

Here are a few choice quotes from his brief press conference:

“There will be some decisions, maybe in spring, and then we will go on.”

“We are not allowed to tell anybody anything. It’s our duty not to tell”

“I know the interests of the public but please, we have to do our work, we are bound by the code of ethics and later the decision will be made public.”

“I will not be the guy to be pressed, to feel pressed.”

“It’s my job for 40 years doing cases like that. You will have to wait and I will read.”

Telling your stakeholders what equates to, “shut up and you’ll be lucky if we give you an answer” is pretty much the worst possible thing you could do when you’re caught looking awfully guilty about something, yet that’s exactly the message that FIFA is sending.

The BCM Blogging Team
https://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com

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