- Statutes are the operating system of associations and, most of the time, rather boring legal texts from the outside. They become relevant when decisions must be taken and the persons or bodies to take the decisions have to be selected. Most of the time, there are no discussions about statutes as associations follow well-established routines in deciding who is responsible for taking which decision.
Statutes are centre stage when different factions are warring for leadership, when outside forces plan takeovers, or when they must be adapted to a changed environment. While power struggles occur naturally from time to time, outside takeovers are a threat that is frequently discussed by fan-based football organisations. The protest of German fans against outside investors in the Bundesliga was a clearly visible reaction to such plans. SK Rapid clearly is a fan-based club with high involvement of supporters who discuss all things concerning the club.
The new board of SK Rapid decided to update the statutes and therefore to have an open and transparent discussion about the changes with its around 17,000 members (out of more than 20.000) who were invited to participate.
Setup and participation
The discussion was hosted on Cbased’s platform Discuto, which was connected to SK Rapids IT infrastructure to allow login with the club members’ account information. All club members over 16 were invited to discuss a renewed version of the actual statutes over a 3-week period.
Discuto document discussions (see figure 1) – vis-à-vis ideation processes that can also be organised on the platform – allow the discussion of lengthy documents and proper analysis of the generated feedback. Discuto breaks each document down to the paragraph level where a discussion of arguments is possible. Participants can vote and comment on each of the paragraphs.
A total of 1,621 Rapid members joined the discussion, formulated 719 comments on various passages of the statutes, and submitted 30,211 votes. This documents a surprisingly high level of interest in this topic and in the chosen approach.
Figure 1: Structure of a document discussion on Discuto
Note: This was taken out of a discussion on the Danube Region Strategy we did some years ago. See https://www.discuto.io/en/consultation/8959
Decision rules
The discussions on the Discuto platform were extremely focused, to the point, and soberfact-based. Participants not only provided various suggestions on how to improve the statutes but also identified issues that are really important for SK Rapid supporters.
Given that the feedback was substantive, it took time to analyse it. To help with this task, Cbased has developed tools that make taking the right decisions easier by highlighting what is really important and controversial. Based on the voting and commenting behaviour as well as a sentiment analysis of comments, the suggestions in the discussions can be sorted into four quadrants (see Table 1) that suggest the following decision rules:
● Important and not controversial paragraphs – remember, Discuto discussions are conducted at the paragraph level – should be implemented as soon as possible or, in the case of statutes, can remain as formulated in the proposal and should not be changed. We have observed that in the texts discussed on Discuto, most of the paragraphs are not controversial, i.e., only a small single-digit percentage of paragraphs falls into this category.
Table 1: Decision making quadrants
Discuto discussion reveal the level of importance and conflict of each paragraph. | Important | Not important |
Controversial | Work on finding solutions with the community by doing surveys, discussions, workshops etc. | Find quick fixes or ignore |
Not controversial | Focus on the implementation of these suggestions as they are generally agreed and important for participants | Do if resources are available |
● Important and controversial issues deserve the most attention as these contain the issues that stir up discussions. Having a discussion on Discuto not only helps to clearly identify these issues but serves the solution on a silver platter: the comments of users might offer solutions that are acceptable for stakeholders. This is not always the case as the suggested solutions may be contradictory or conflict with other issues. There are basically three options: postpone the decision on these issues, take a decision, or continue the discussion on the few controversial issues. The first option is not really viable for statutes as they cannot leave a void in the area concerned. The second option can be taken if the decision-makers are convinced that this is the way forward. The third option should be taken if the disputes are fundamental or if there is a need to explain or explore the issue. This can be done by designing a survey on contested issues, releasing additional information and better explaining the situation, or setting up new discussions, meetings, workshops, etc., where the options will be sorted out with stakeholders.
● There are two more quadrants to be considered: Not important and not controversial paragraphs should be implemented but are of lesser importance than the important and not controversial issues. Not important but controversial issues are not really show-stoppers but should be adapted if a quick fix is available.
Whatever road is taken, the discussion on Discuto has created better-informed decision-makers who know controversial areas and the associated arguments. This also applies to both active and passive participants. They learned how their peers assess issues and can reevaluate their positions given the new input. In some cases, outspoken critics may notice that they receive little support for their proposals and may decide to tone down their contributions.
One of the key steps in every consultation process is to give feedback on the course of action. This involves thanking participants for their contributions as well as informing them about the next steps in the decision-making process, the decisions taken, and the reasoning behind these decisions as well as the consolidated final outcome. Without sufficient feedback demonstrating that input was considered and implemented, stakeholders may not participate in future consultations.
What actually happened
The Vice President of SK Rapid, who initiated and managed the consultation process, conducted a profound analysis of the interactions on the Discuto platform and the feedback from club members. She also organised further meetings to discuss solutions that either came up or were motivated by the discussion. Based on the information created in these formats, the statutes were adapted and eventually put up for voting at the club member meeting. They were adopted with only 3 votes against them which means the new version of the statutes had an approval rate of over 99%.
This is a phenomenal result, especially considering that other football clubs have engaged in often bitter statute discussions with their members for years. The outcome was remarkable because the decision-making process was open to all members, fully transparent, and comprehensive, providing feedback all along, integrating the input of participants into the final document, discussing important but controversial issues, and explaining the decisions taken by the board of directors.