Remove board expectations which aren't the responsibility of the manager

[Platinum]

I think some of the features in FM don't fit that of a modern manager, and even more so if you have a DoF in your staff.

We currently have too many board expectations that should not be the responsibility of the manager, for example:

- Make youth facilities world class - Improving the youth academy is not the responsibility of the first team manager

- Manage wage budget - It should not be possible for the manager to go over the wage budget as the board would block any transfers/contract renewals that would. Also oddities can occur where you can be judged badly on your handling of the wage budget even if its the DoF who has been handling contract renewals. 

- Expand stadium size request - This has absolutely nothing to do with the manager and the board should always be proactively trying to maximise there income by expanding the stadium if they are able to and if it would make financial sense.

- Negotiation of intricate contract details such as goal bonuses - This types of things are not the duty of the manager and instead are covered by the legal experts and the DoF

 

I understand you might not want to remove features from the game, so instead maybe these can be added to the Staff Responsibilities screen and then the manager shouldn't be judged on them.

 

[Mars_Blackmon]

On 10/09/2022 at 10:11, Platinum said:

I think some of the features in FM don't fit that of a modern manager, and even more so if you have a DoF in your staff.

We currently have too many board expectations that should not be the responsibility of the manager, for example:

- Make youth facilities world class - Improving the youth academy is not the responsibility of the first team manager

- Manage wage budget - It should not be possible for the manager to go over the wage budget as the board would block any transfers/contract renewals that would. Also oddities can occur where you can be judged badly on your handling of the wage budget even if its the DoF who has been handling contract renewals. 

- Expand stadium size request - This has absolutely nothing to do with the manager and the board should always be proactively trying to maximise there income by expanding the stadium if they are able to and if it would make financial sense.

- Negotiation of intricate contract details such as goal bonuses - This types of things are not the duty of the manager and instead are covered by the legal experts and the DoF

 

I understand you might not want to remove features from the game, so instead maybe these can be added to the Staff Responsibilities screen and then the manager shouldn't be judged on them.

 

Agreed, I would like to see more variety as in some boards should be more hands on than others. That would also add another layer in choosing which club you accept offers from.

[Michael Sant]

In regards to points 1, 3 & 4 I can see your argument they have all but practically become extinct but in each instance but there are times when managers have substantial influence in these areas. Sir Alex at Manchester United was heavily involved with the establishment of their youth setup was he not? It does tend to be an input reserved for more long term managers. Of course, the sport has largely moved away from that.

I believe its still the case that at a lot of lower league clubs managers can be quite heavily involved in negotiations for player contracts. It wasn't too long ago that Harry Redknapp would be the one who would sit down and negotiate players contracts under a more hands off set-up at Portsmouth. Clubs allowing a manager that level of control at the top levels is incredibly rare however. Coming back to points 1 & 3 specifically, they're something that gives you the player the option to trade-off some of your likely current investing power in the squad to yield longer term rewards. It's not a luxury many managers get these days, but would your suggestion be to strip these three away from players and forcibly assign them to the backroom staff? Or do you envisage them being there in a different capacity?

When it comes to point 2, you could come into a club who are cutting back and so that is a priority where you need to re-assess your playing squad through a different lens and look to move people on to bring this under control. It's not the managers fault but there may be an expectation placed upon them to ensure the club scales back and lives within its means accordingly and he needs to play an active part in helping offload/reduce the wage bill. I realise this isn't the only situation in which it could come about however. Hopefully this provides some additional lines of thinking to refine this and just ensure that it can be relayed correctly from your side.