Gallop: "So Staj, have you stopped psychologically distressing your team yet."
Stajcic: "Go F--- yourself"
Gallop: "You're fired."

I bet they say they can't clarify how many Matildas actually responded ... because of confidentiality reasons. But it's being reported as "a handful".

Does the reporter have the full report or is this all that was leaked to them?

"A quarter of the players who responded reported feeling psychological distress and many were afraid to seek support, believing it would be held against them."

This is worrying, but also doesn't directly implicate the coaching staff for anything other than not actively fostering an environment that was supportive.

"Ms Bowman said most of the Matildas entered the program as teenagers with limited experience and ability to deal with stressful situations"

This is a good point, and something you'd hope the coaching staff would take into account considering how often teenagers are selected, but again, it seems more negligence than active decision making fostering a hostile environment.

The only explanation I can come up with for the board's decision at this point is that they brought these issues up with Staj (with whatever level of detail) and he told them to shove it and there was nothing wrong with his approach, so the board reacted by sacking him. All these problems seem like things you just tell him to change rather than immediately fire him for.

Excellent point - if there was a neutral option, then it is disingenuous for the reporter of this article to then infer that 80% of the survey respondents were dissatisfied, when that may not have been the case at all and most players were neither upset or elated by the Matilda's environment - it's just there.

It also indicates that, through the involvement of 'Our Watch', that the FFA believed the environment of the Matilda's was disrespectful and harmful to women - pretty bold claim to make, especially when so many players, including superstars such as Sam Kerr, have come out in support of their former coach. Can't have been too disrespectful if he had a whole team of women willing to work with him.

"The full Our Watch report is expected to be delivered to FFA headquarters this week"

Uhhh what.

-PB

"Fewer than 20 per cent of them said they felt the team environment was conducive to making them better players or people."

This is worrying, but in and of itself doesn't seem enough to sack the coach, especially without warning or a chance to fix it. Obviously this means that a lot of the players who cam out in support of Staj weren't thrilled with the environment, but didn't think they're comments would be used as grounds for dismissal.

Although a question that popped into my head as I read this is what scale did they use for the above question? Is there a neutral midpoint option i.e. "I think the team environment is conducive to making me a better player" on a scale of "strongly agree" to "strongly disagree", with "neither agree nor disagree" as the midpoint option. Conceivably the majority chose the last option, especially if they didn't take the survey that seriously. 

So this seems to be the crux of it.
"A quarter of the players who responded reported feeling psychological distress and many were afraid to seek support, believing it would be held against them."
Other journos reporting that only a handful of the Matildas actually responded to the survey. So we might have possibly a couple of stressed players.  But somehow there is only a quarter who are distressed but MANY are afraid to speak out about their distress.  And obviously it is 'confidential' so we can't find out if this was Sam Kerr and Caitlin Foord or just a couple of peripheral players who weren't cutting it so wanted to blame something for their woes.
This ABC piece looks like it was written by Our Watch media department.  No surprise it was leaked to 'Their ABC'.

So the ABC has a full copy of this supposedly confidential report that the players weren't allowed access to?  Very interesting way to run an organisation Mr Gallop.

Arthur mate, get rid of that article. It destroys the formatting and is a real hassle to scroll through. 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-22/matildas-environment-of-stress-and-fear/10734412
 
Matildas coach sacked after quarter of players revealed they were afraid to ask for help
  By Tracey Holmes
Posted  22 Jan 2019, 11:25am      
Matildas face 'very, very tough' draw at women's World CupOne of the two key reports that contributed to the sacking of Matildas coach Alen Stajcic reveals a culture of fear and unacceptable levels of stress among the players.
Key points:

• The full Our Watch report is expected to be delivered to FFA headquarters this week
  
• There is no suggestion of sexual or physical impropriety from the surveys
  
• FFA CEO David Gallop said the surprise sacking of Stajcic was not based solely on the surveys
  

A quarter of the players who responded reported feeling psychological distress and many were afraid to seek support, believing it would be held against them. Players were asked a series of questions under specific headings including Health & Wellbeing, Psychological Distress, Psychological Safety and Player Insights. Fewer than 20 per cent of them said they felt the team environment was conducive to making them better players or people. The Matildas Wellbeing Audit was conducted jointly by Football Federation Australia and the players' union, the PFA, to ensure players had "access to world class support" to be able to perform at their best at the upcoming FIFA World Cup.The results, distributed to coaching staff and other key people in December, were to be discussed with players and officials in Sydney this week at a planned leadership conference. Alen Stajcic was supposed to be at the conference but soccer bosses felt they could no longer risk keeping him as coach. Stajcic's position became untenable after the FFA received the first instalment of a report by Our Watch — a group tasked to change cultural behaviour that underpins violence against women.By working with organisations to change entrenched attitudes to women, Our Watch hopes to positively impact the wider community.  
FFA criticised for not knowing cultural issues, acting too swiftly
While there is no suggestion of any sexual or physical impropriety in this case, the ABC understands the Our Watch report highlights a culturally unsustainable environment. The ABC has spoken extensively to parties involved in this case and has seen the Matildas Wellbeing Audit. FFA CEO David Gallop met with the Matildas on Monday to answer their concerns over the surprise axing of their coach.The governing body has been criticised in some circles for not knowing of the cultural issues, and criticised in others for acting too swiftly in cutting the head coach. "It's a misconception that the decision in relation to the head coach was solely based on surveys, it was based on a range of reasons and a range of information," Mr Gallop said." These matters are accumulative and there was a real view that things had deteriorated over a period of time … and that's why the decision was taken."Mr Gallop confirmed work on the Wellbeing Audit began in August 2018, looking specifically at the needs of Matildas players. The Our Watch survey was federation wide — players, coaches, and FFA staff. It is believed there were around 140 completed responses. While not directly addressing the work being done with the FFA, the CEO of Our Watch told ABC Newsradio the organisation's mandate is to stop violence before it happens. "We work collaboratively … to help other people change the cultures, norms and practices that disrespect or devalue women," Patty Kinnersly said. "Of course there are people who are resistant but not people we are working with. "People we are working with say, 'I understand this is an issue, I understand that I have influence', whether it's as a parent, or a coach, or a CEO, 'can you help me understand how I do that?' "Our Watch is currently reviewing the culture of a number of sporting organisations and Ms Kinnersly said sporting bodies were no different to any other. "What we find is whether it's a school, or a workplace or a sporting organisation, that they are representative of the community."
'Hardening up' is not the answer
Leadership expert Nicki Bowman, who is also a member of football advocacy group Women Onside, said leadership in the corporate world had changed in Australia while sport was slowly catching up. "What you need are leaders who create conditions for people to do their best work and whether that's in a corporate context or a sporting context it means the same thing," she said. "It means creating an environment where people are secure enough to perform at their best. "I'm really frustrated with the views around social media that people just need to harden up, you know this is elite sport and they just need to harden up and suck it up. "Matildas head coach Alen Stajcic speaks to the media at an official press conference.
Ms Bowman said most of the Matildas entered the program as teenagers with limited experience and ability to deal with stressful situations "Things you say to people at that age are far more formative and influential than they are if you said them to you or me with 20 or 30 years of experience," she said. The ABC contacted Stajcic on numerous occasions but was told he was unable to comment. It is understood to be for legal reasons. It is expected the full Our Watch report will be delivered to the FFA headquarters this week. The ABC understands there may be further fallout.

OK, so it seems the Our Watch survey was the main reason, as a large number of the players reported feeling stressed and being afraid to ask for support. Seems pretty weak tbh. 

https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-22/matildas-environment-of-stress-and-fear/10734412

Hush money. Pay him enough so he doesn’t put up a fight and there is no need for dirty laundry to be aired.

So given you have provided multiple examples of harassment occurring in teams you were responsible for, would you agree that you had created a toxic environment ... or just that some individuals behaved inappropriately?  Should you have been sacked?

100% Burtzur

Something smells fishy, not because of WHAT happened, but the HOW

I don't see why they would have paid him out if there was a serious offence that occurred that made an instant dismissal the only option. 

At best, the situation is one where Gallop and the FFA have botched up the sacking and mishandled the situation.

At the very least, Gallop and the FFA need to put it clearly on record what has transpired to stop all this second guessing. The fact that Stajcic hasn’t said anything makes me think he is assessing his options.

Gee, you seem to have a lot of problems with the culture in your workforce.  Sounds like you need a survey. That environment sounds toxic. Is that you David?

Standard tactic. Anyone who isn't happy with the cover up by Gallop is by definition a supporter of bullying and harassment, eh?

BTW - you didn't answer the question about the survey in July.

This is football, not an office job. Sports rely on the interest and patronage of the fans to stay relevant, so it's only fair that said fans are kept informed and not subjected to corporate-speak bullshit when something goes wrong. This is why reasons for sacking a coach are usually widely known and publicly disseminated in a way that sacking an office worker would never be. 

They don't even have to say the exact reason if there are legal issues, but at least give us a general idea. "toxic culture" simply doesn't pass muster. 

Not that bullying and harassing specified employees is an issue to you anyway. But I would think inappropriate treatment of employees (specificed or not) is part and parcel of a 'toxic environment', again it doesn't have to be across the board.

Some of those not directly involved with him did.

Had another scenario at a previous work where a male colleague would make inappropriate comments to the younger female staff members. He didn't make the comments when others were around, so no one really saw the issue until three of the younger staff members came forward and let me know. No one else at the office had any idea that there was a problem, and I dealt with it discreetly with his manager ... no one at the office was none the wiser after the fact either.

But this was to do with a 'toxic environment' - as Gallop said.  Not to do with treatment of specific employees.  You are making up this story about treatment of specific employees based on zero evidence.

They have said why though ... they don't need to be specific. Most employers do not give explicit details to their employees (let alone the general) public on sackings, especially if it is to with the treatment of other employees. This is to protect the employee(s), also that of the terminated employee. There are a lot of legalities surrounding employment in Australia, which most Australian's have fought for decades to have in place to protect themselves and others.

Funny that the media was reporting that he was going before the meeting, eh?

Nice story, but did all the staff come out in support of the sacked employee who was harassing them?

I have no qualms in his sacking if it was a clear cut harassment case/incident.  But here's the flaw in the argument.  If it was something serious like that, why try and say it is to do with two surveys (one of which occurred back in July) - just say that an unacceptable issue was brought to their attention.  If that survey in July identified your 'hypothetical' harassment of an individual, why wasn't he counselled and/or sacked back then? Even if there was a hint of harassment the FFA should have been all over it back then. But according to Gallop's own explanation, that July survey was insignificant enough that zero action was taken, and the status quo remained, but then significant enough to be part of the reason for the sacking.
Anyway, Gallop also specifically said it was about a 'toxic environment', not a specific issue. 

It's becoming increasingly difficult for you or the FFA to come up with any plausible story that fits the evidence as presented by Gallop.

They really must explain it soon. It's just weird to abruptly sack a successful coach and then refuse to say why. I don't think I've ever seen that happen. "Cultural issues" is far too vague and general. It's pretty shocking how poorly they're handling this. It's a joke. 

I had an employee at my work who was given a redundancy after bullying and harassing his staff (and everyone else in the office) for well over 10 years. We weren't told the details, but it appears he was given an option to take the redundancy or be fired. He was given the option because his line manager (and their line manager) had knowingly allowed the behaviour to persist over that time ... they were finally forced to act when his staff called in sick too often and HR chased up why so many were missing work (he was harassing them so much that they couldn't come into work). His line manager had to take action as HR and the directors got involved. To cover all their ineptness in dealing with the situation when it arose (10 years ago) they gave him a redundancy, to go quietly.

We don't know if a similar deal was made with Stajcic, or if FFA failed to act over a period of time because he was getting the results on the field (and Matilda's were a marketing wet dream for FFA).