Between 11 and 13 November 2015, representatives of International Federations (IF) gathered in Lausanne for the IF Forum 2015. This year’s Forum was devoted to the topic of “Governance of sport”.
The SIGGS or “Support the Implementation of Good Governance in Sport” Project, managed by the EOC EU Office, was asked to present its objectives and its tools during a session on “Implementing good governance”. This session was opened by Pere Miro, Deputy Director General of the IOC, and Kit McConnell, Sports Director of the IOC. In their presentation, they clearly stressed the importance of good governance, for instance by stating that “good governance and autonomy are two sides of the same coin”. They also confirmed that for the IOC, the key document is the Basic Universal Principles of Good Governance of the IOC (PGG). In terms of the implementation of Olympic Agenda 2020, they announced that the IOC is developing supporting and practical tools to help National Olympic Committees (NOCs) and IFs, and their stakeholders: the National Federations (NFs). In particular, the IOC is developing implementation and self-evaluation tools, for which they are currently collecting best practice examples.
The SIGGS Project, which was presented by Project Manager, Matthias Van Baelen, and Thierry Zintz of the University of Louvain-la-Neuve (UCL), is one of the projects that the IOC is following with close interest. In the presentation on SIGGS, it was highlighted that the objective is to provide practical guidance to NOCs and NFs on how to implement principles of good governance and that the PGG together with the EU Principles of good governance in sport are the main reference documents. Furthermore, the methodology was further explained thereby stressing the tailor-made, customised Action Plans that will offer support on the actual implementation of a certain principle for each organisation.
The SIGGS Project, which is still running until the end of 2016 with the main tools to be finalised in the first half of 2016, was welcomed by many IFs and it was concluded that the tools of the SIGGS Project could become very valuable for NFs, NOCs and even IFs.
At the end of the discussions, the IFs adopted the following statement: “Today the IFs welcome and accept the IOC’s invitation to work together to not only establish indicators and assessment mechanisms, but to promote their use within their respective sports. The objective of this undertaking is to ensure that the state of governance within sports institutions can be readily assessed publicly and monitored on an ongoing basis. This will be done in an inclusive manner, taking into account best practices and using the most appropriate available tools so as to not only establish the right processes, but to promote and ensure a CULTURE OF GOOD GOVERNANCE within all sport Federations.”
The SIGGS Project Management will do its utmost to ensure that the tools of the SIGGS Project meet the high expectations of all stakeholders involved. The SIGGS Project is already in close contact with the IOC that officially supports the project. In this regard, the SIGGS Project wants to contribute to the sharing of best practices, to the day-to-day implementation.
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