The trickle‐down effect of ethical leadership in nonprofit soccer clubs

• Author: Bram Constandt,Annick Willem
• Published date: 01 March 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/nml.21333
• Date: 01 March 2019

RESEARCH ARTICLE

The trickle-down effect of ethical leadership

in nonprofit soccer clubs

Bram Constandt | Annick Willem

Department of Movement and Sports Sciences,

Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium

Correspondence

Annick Willem, Ghent University, Department of

Movement and Sports Sciences, Watersportlaan 2,

9000 Ghent, Belgium.

Email: annick.willem@ugent.be

Nonprofit soccer clubs are currently facing many ethical

challenges, such as abuse, doping and match fixing. While

research suggests that organizational (board) ethical lead-

ership may be effective to tackle these ethical issues,

empirical support in the context of sport remains limited.

Drawing on the perceptions of a sample of nonprofit soc-

cer players (n= 438) and coaches (n= 106), we indicate

that the coaches play an important mediating role regard-

ing the associations between board ethical leadership and

ethical climate. The theoretical underpinnings of ethical

leadership—formed by social learning theory and social

exchange theory—and the social distance between the

board and the players in nonprofit soccer clubs provide

support in this regard. In sum, our results demonstrate that

the influence of board ethical leadership in nonprofit soc-

cer clubs partly trickles down to the players via coach eth-

ical leadership. Finally, practical implications for

nonprofit soccer club management are discussed.

KEYWORDS

ethics, nonprofit leadership, organizational behavior,

reciprocity

1|INTRODUCTION

Numerous scandals within the international soccer community illustrate that soccer offers a setting in

which many ethical issues occur. For example, the testimony of a former British professional soccer

player, who was systematically sexually abused by his youth coach, provided inducement for many

people involved in soccer to report about sexual harassment and subsequent cover-up operations

(Bennhold, 2016). A striking element in this cluster of scandals—“one of the biggest crises in the

sport’s history”, according to the chairman of the English Football Association—was that its roots

Received: 21 December 2017 Revised: 19 July 2018 Accepted: 20 July 2018

DOI: 10.1002/nml.21333

Nonprofit Management and Leadership. 2019;29:401–417. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/nml © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 401

stretched from professional soccer to as far as the lowest nonprofit (amateur) levels

(Bennhold, 2016).

Although the boards of directors of soccer clubs bear a substantial responsibility concerning the

counteraction of abuse and other ethical issues such as doping and match fixing, they often react

rather passively (De Waegeneer, 2015). This passive attitude is even more noteworthy given the

potential impact of organizational leadership on the ethical climate in sport organizations (Burton,

Welty Peachey, & Wells, 2017; Constandt, De Waegeneer, & Willem, 2017). Therefore, it comes as

no surprise that the study of ethical leadership is gaining attention in sport management (Wells &

Walker, 2016).

While research indicates that organizational leadership positively affects the ethical climate in

college athletic departments (Burton et al., 2017), little is currently known about the operation of this

relationship in the specific situation of nonprofit sport clubs. The fact that organizational ethical lead-

ership in sport requires the support of lower leadership levels to render effect adds to the idea that at

least part of the ethical influence of the board of directors in nonprofit sport clubs takes place indi-

rectly (Burton & Welty Peachey, 2014). Organizational research tends to speak about a trickle-down

(or cascading) effect in this regard, in which the operation of organizational ethical leadership occurs

partly indirectly (partial mediation effect) (Hansen, Alge, Brown, Jackson, & Dunford, 2013; Ruiz,

Ruiz, & Martínez, 2011), or entirely indirectly (full mediation effect) (Mayer, Kuenzi, Greenbaum,

Bardes, & Salvador, 2009), via supervisory ethical leadership.

This trickle-down effect of ethical leadership is also suggested—but not empirically

demonstrated—to be operational in the context of sport (Burton & Welty Peachey, 2014). Given this,

the present study examines the associations between board ethical leadership and the ethical climate

in Flemish nonprofit soccer clubs. In a research area that is dominated by North American scholar-

ship, this specific context could provide additional insights on (the trickle-down effect of ) ethical

leadership, considering the obvious yet empirically largely unsupported ethical responsibilities of

organizational leaders in nonprofit sport clubs and given the many ethical issues that currently prevail

in soccer (DeSensi & Rosenberg, 2010).

In addition, our analysis hereby integrates the role of the coaches in terms of promoting ethics in

sport clubs. More precisely, we focus on the potential mediating role of the supervisory level of

coach ethical leadership. In fact, we believe that the coaches will be of crucial importance in the pro-

cess of ethical leadership due to their proximity with both the players and the board of directors. Mul-

tiple studies indicate that soccer coaches play a major part in determining and stimulating the ethical

behavior of their players and the ethical climate within their soccer clubs (Boardley & Kavussanu,

2009; Chow, Murray, & Feltz, 2009; Constandt, De Waegeneer, & Willem, 2018; Delrue et al.,

2017). However, current scholarship on the coach–player and coach–ethical climate relationships

analyzes these relationships without incorporating the potential influence of significant others such as

the board. Thus, it seems desirable to shed light on the mediating role of the coach in disseminating

desired organizational ethical practices on behalf of the board to the players.

In fact, we extend current scholarship on ethical leadership in sport by (a) showing how the inter-

play between different levels of perceived ethical leadership affects the ethical climate perceptions in

nonprofit soccer clubs and, consequently, by (b) highlighting the ethical responsibilities of both the

board of directors and the coaches in determining the ethical opinions of the players. In line with this

scope, the main research question of our work encompasses the following: to what extent do board

members and coaches play a role in the formation of the perceptions of ethical practices of nonprofit

soccer players?

402 CONSTANDT AND WILLEM