The Importance of Communication and Engagement in Our Current Plight

Graeme Sharp, because of his special status, was issued with an open letter that allowed him a unique chance for redemption.

The lack of response says everything.

Never in my 58 years in all things Everton and in business have I witnessed such apparent contempt for the very people who put their faith and loyalty behind a brand and back it up with their hard-earned cash. Lots of it. Lots of both.

So, Board of Everton Football Club, please talk to us now or go now. Let those who care most about this (still) venerable institution support it like we have never before, when the club and its existence need it like never before, and without incurring the bitterest taste of feeding the egos of those who seem happy to witness - on their watch - its final demise.

Sack the board, indeed.

As fans, our sole focus should be on helping the team to gain as many points as possible in the fight for survival. It's only 7 weeks remaining of the season, and we can all react to the board more vehemently when the last game has been completed.

It's not an ideal situation, but it's been a crazy season so far, and who knows there may be a rational explanation for the board's stance, although I very much doubt it. I think they have painted themselves into a corner and have no idea how to extricate themselves from it.

The results of the first team in the run-in override everything – and that includes our need to have the board account for itself.

Peter #1, the board have long reached the point of no return, I think they know that and appear to have given up on us.

Graeme Sharp seems reluctant or afraid to rock the boat but I really don't understand why. His loyalties appear to be with Bill Kenwright and the other board members rather than the best interests of the club. He must know (mustn't he?) that, should he choose to speak out and show some loyality towards the fans, he would be accepted (albeit over time) back into the fold.

In some ways, his actions make him the worst of the lot. Graeme has become a puppet, soulless and without meaning. Sad that a club legend – or maybe that will soon be former legend – has chosen to take a path which leads him away from his biggest allies – the fans.

I always thought he had more to him….

Sharp is likely reluctant because of the money he is getting paid. He is not getting paid this much anywhere ever again and was only ever added to the Board by Kenwright to try and appease fans by appointing a legend player but someone who has no attributes or experience to add value to a serious Board of a serious organisation.

I remember reading a post from Kieran Maguire a year ago that read “Highest paid director had an £800,000 pay rise to just over £2m.” The Esk's numbers at the time pretty much confirmed that.

By contrast, just last week Football Insider reported that the club had reduced its board spend by £1.2 million in 2021-22, partly because the highest-paid director took a pay cut from £2.04m to £870,000.

Everton paid its four directors a combined £3.05 million in 21-22, down from £4.2m to five directors the previous season.

I'll leave it to smarter people to explain what that all means, if anything.

But one thing Paul has said, like many others have said before (me included), that really strikes the mark -- this club absolutely sucks at communicating with its stakeholders. I predicted early on that Moshiri would have to learn how to do that better. He hasn't. And he hasn't.

I doubt we will hear a word from the current board prior to their inevitable departure at some point in the coming months. Indeed, it would not surprise me if they have been instructed by the owner, or his legal team, to keep quiet until the financial position is resolved and they are replaced.

The reason Everton's figures are so high is because some of the directors are also full-time salaried employees.

Fucking, “Circus Maximus”, the Everton Board, in terms of dereliction of duty and in competence to EFC and Evertonians across the Universe.

I'm praying and hoping that in all aspects known and considered, Everton, can start with fresh hope, genuine hope to have a great football club with the outstanding diehard,best supporters in the world to a real start next season and see in Everton into the new stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock.

That would be the opening of a new era, for Everton FC.

UTFTs!

The reason Everton's figures are so high is because some of the Director's are also full-time salaried employees.”

Is that a joke Brendan?

Every measure spells it out.

If there is to be any surprises, it would be finding out why new owners would allow such a failing Board to remain in place after purchasing almost all of their shares in the club, but don't hold your breath.

If you launched a deliberate Comms strategy to enrage and alienate your stakeholders and customers, it would look much the same at an outcome level.

Likely the lack of coherence comes from the culture and mindset of the hierarchy - "we never apologise and we never explain" seems to be their motto.

He has a board who toe the party line, say nothing to no one. Silence is golden.

I have news for this contemptible board. We actually only want to hear you say one thing. Goodbye.

I would imagine that upon hopefully securing Premier League status there will be some announcements and explanations, which will be totally worthless without being accompanied by much needed change.

He’s trying desperately to hang on for the photoshoots and to cut the ribbon at BMD but Bill Kenwright’s amateur, inept and damaging tenure as chairman is all but over.

The worry of course is the club is in a very precarious position, not only in keeping hold of its Premier league status, but even more worrying the financial implications if we do get relegated. As has been quoted 96% of our income goes out in wages this is unsustainable at any level. I believe relegation would be a disaster for this club, because the steps needed to steady the financial part of the organisation would see a mas exodus of players and very little money to attract new players. According to the press Jordan Pickfords newly signed contract has a £35m get out for him if we get relegated. So should we go down our prize assest will be sold for a paltry £35m for Englands keeper.

But even if we hopefully can retain our Premier league status we will still have to sell many of the first team squad, and their values will be very average. So even escaping relegation could well mean because of the financial constraints we will be back fighting relegation next season. Just to add that even if the richest man in the world bought Everton he couldn't improve our financial position very much.

That's a reasonable viewpoint.

Having said that, there's also an argument to "keep your powder dry", to wait until any hearing before revealing your evidence, your case; not allowing this to dominate the sports pages; not allowing others to pinpoint potential weaknesses in your case before any hearing. Allow yourself time to prepare how you'll present your case, how you'll present your defence.

Football is massively volatile the last thing a club needs is more volatility via shouters in the stands muddying the waters at an influential level.

Business folk always keep grim news under wraps in the hope they can pull a rabbit out of the hat and the last thing they're looking for is a posse of potato heads constantly carping on without any idea of what to do about it.

Unless a group of footy fans have billions to shove into the club the overwhelming majority need to get real, get on with supporting the team, have a bitch about things on forums and eat pies at the ground - nothing more

Troubling Times

Second to none? For once I agree with our board. Second to none in their incompetence, silence, communication and now absence. Definitely second to none. I can't dispute that.

Communication or lack of, and blatant lack of respect has burned bridges beyond repair. Randomly, and for those who have read it, George Orwell's 1984 and the character Napoleon springs to mind. They simply cannot survive and are clinging on.

Graeme Sharp, boyhood hero, had an opportunity to at least make a moral stand. He has chose not to. He's gone to.

I've watched and supported this club all my life, as have all of us. It's the first thing I ever remember about football. It's all I've ever known and I never stood in a boys pen.

Neil @4, definitely the point of no return.

Tony @24, the cheeky bastards sent me an email saying I wasn't eligible for a season ticket as I don't collect rewards.

They had referenced the wrong membership number reference to the one I have used for home tickets the past few seasons since I've been able to. Incompetence even at the lowest levels.

Meanwhile, we have a team to support whilst they maintain silence and absence. Well we won't be absent. This season or next.

Sorry for the emotional outburst.

Impersonating Barry that way @ 25 is disgraceful.

This is football, not IKEA.

That's me busted

I think you miss the point, in fact several points. Here they all are:

1) The comments here relate to governance which means the board. They have not 'put billions' into the club (nor has even the owner but we'll let that pass). They are tasked with managing it effectively.

2) People do 'have an idea of what to do about it'. Paul's articles, even if I don't personally agree with all his points, exemplify that. I don't know him at all but it seems pretty clear to me he could do a better job than the current clowns on the board. Is it even possible to do worse?

3) A football club is not like 'the vast majority of businesses'. It has a relatively fixed customer base which gives a different weight to the term 'stakeholder'. I struggle to think of many enterprises like this. I was going to say a golf club, which has a fixed and largely loyal customer base, but you can always change golf clubs. You can't change your football team.

So when you are watching your club disintegrate in front of your eyes, you have every right to act as much more than a mere passive customer of some faceless corporation and call out the people who have taken it to these depths.

While I wouldn't call my fellow blues (even you!) "potato heads", I do agree, as I've said above, that it might be better if the club says nothing and keeps its powder dry, for the very reason you state - in the hope they can pull a rabbit out of the hat, without alerting all and sundry in advance as to what that might be and thus potentially weakening their hand.

Glad you saw through my mistake!

They are not interested in accountability, budgets or explaination of the Financial Standing of the Club.I doubt they have the ability to understand any of those areas.

The Chief Executive Management speak is her own invention.You won't find any of it in a Business reference book.Just words she picked up on some in-house course,never understanding them.As for Sharpe we all know he knows nothing.

Paul the Esk the explaination is simple they do not have Clue.It is total incompetence and trying to bluff they know what they are talking about

I now believe that they thought the unaudited Financials accounts, where right and within the rules and got a shock when the audited Financial Accounts proved otherwise when the Premier League brought it to their attention.

As for Moshiri he seems to be on some type of binary dream.

You were right when you said the whole lot need replaced by a expert Corporate recovery team.

While Moshiri lacked creative edge it did appear that getting the team through these times while increasing capacity and thus future investment made sense. Had the managerial carousel not thoroughly destabilized the squad he could well have made it to a station of progress where a reassessment or an organisational genius could be hired.

Moshiri was never a visionary or fix it man. He largely needs a stable environment and can probably operate well there. The interest rate shocks knocked down many offers and that left him with little room and his cortisol levels probably keep him from coming with anything new. Not making excuses for him but we will soon find out about a few more who do not have the skills for this in a high interest rate environment. We were just the most obvious initial case.

No, you have confused yourself.

If fans are trying to address “governance” by default they are trying to affect some control of the club. Reasons why that is not a good idea I have given. Nobody, least of all me, has said they (the board) have put billions in not sure where you magicked that idea from.

People don’t have a clue about how to turn the good ship Everton into challengers as per our historical status because lets be clear mid table security was established by Kenwright and he got pelters for it THAT IS NOT WHAT WE’RE TALKING ABOUT. Accounting wheezes and improved merchandising will do zip all in the grand scheme of things no matter how many times people waffle about it.

Yes, football is unlike any other business the most important point being the unique volatility and the last thing needed is added volatility from fans pushing massively disparate opinion.

The only solution taking us back to where we think we belong is big oil money or similar. It really is that straightforward. But that precludes desperate fringe solutions proffered by financial wizards on Everton forums - heaven forfend

I am not confused at all but I think you are, including by your own posts.

- Stakeholders in the shape of supporters of a football club can most certainly affect control of a club by putting pressure to hold the board to account. This is precisely what is happening now. This is different to stakeholders being in control of the club. You did not at all explain why holding the current board to account isn't a good idea.

- Read the first line of your last para of your initial post. You say 'unless fans 'have billions to put into the club' they should do 'nothing more' than eat pies. The current board have not put billions into the club. Does that mean they should also stick to eating pies? That might be an improvement.

- You keep repeating that fans, like Paul, the OP, 'don't have a clue'. That is manifestly not the case. Read the waffle that went with the report and accounts, let alone the horrific numbers in there, and tell me that what Paul writes is less competent and professional in its assessment of the club's plight. You'd have to be joking.

- The only aspect that is volatile about football is relegation and even that can be mitigated provided you don't start with a basket case position like ours. It's actually relatively stable within reason, otherwise PE guys wouldn't be getting into it. But as I said, we cannot just sit on our hands and watch us become an ever bigger basket case, we can all play a small part in changing the delinquents who have caused that, not by direct control but through influence. You ignore your stakeholders in a football club at your peril.

- Big money or even some more money would help but a) we did, as Paul has itemised, have a huge cash injection from the current owner which the current delinquent board has entirely squandered and their capacity to build the basket case we now are is quite clearly putting off investors who might otherwise have injected some more money, to try and right the ship.

I'll watch Everton in the Championship and even Division 1, like almost all of us will, but we should not be allowing that to happen under the current board, without challenging them and pointing out their shortcomings.

The fact that the Club was of the opinion that it was within the Profitability and Sustainability Rules giving the Premier League the impression they were, calls into question letting any of the Board near an Independent Commission to argue the rules were not broken is ludicrous.

To allow them anywhere need dealing with the welfare of Dele Alli as the Premier League are reported to be about to query them on, given they did not follow proper procedures in his recruitment and appear to be claiming a hip injury that is not an issue with the Club he is returning from is also ludicrous.

These two examples are the most recent of a long line of incompetence and mismanagement.

There is no way this is going to change soon .What Paul the Esk has outlined is something proper management would be able to implement. What exists, which I refuse to call management, never will. They actually could make things worse and other examples will surface.