Concacaf begins search for key positions
- by Paul Kennedy @pkedit, Mar 10, 2016
Candidates for general secretary must have a proven track record of running a successful business, managing profit and loss statements, overseeing a regional staff, organizing large-scale events and managing broadcast, commercial, and digital media rights, in addition to a passion for soccer.
The chief legal/compliance officer must have appropriate legal credentials, extensive experience working in legal or compliance positions within multi-national corporations, and strong management skills.
Additionally, candidates for both positions are required to have experience with and an understanding of cross-cultural work, and impeccable reputations on issues relating to integrity and ethics.
Governance and compliance are, of course, huge issues, given Concacaf's recent record. The last three presidents have been indicted or pleaded guilty on Federal corruption charges, while the last two secretaries general (Chuck Blazer and Enrique Sanz) were at the center of the conspiracies.
Sanz was hired from Traffic to replace Blazer but it turned out, according to the allegations in the Federal complaint, he had been in effect a plant to further Traffic's widespread scheme of kickbacks to buy up commercial soccer rights in the Americas. Blazer was the first person to plead guilty in the corruption case, while Sanz, who suffers from leukemia and left Concacaf last year, was named an unindicted co-conspirator.
Longtime soccer executive Ted Howard, who has worked for many years in the old NASL, NBC and at Concacaf, is serving as acting secretary general. Jurgen Mainke, Concacaf's director of marketing and communications since 2012, was promoted to deputy secretary general in December 2015.
