Segregation of Duties

The purpose of this policy is to provide guidelines around a single member holding two or more official roles or two or more members of the same family taking official roles within the club.

Background

Local sporting clubs can only operate successfully with volunteers taking official roles to assist with running the club (Executive Committee, General Committee) and running the game day operations (Coaches, Team Managers, Trainers etc.).

Certain combinations of roles, if held by two members of the same family, has the potential to create either a real or perceived segregation of duties issue.

The other instance where a potential issue could arise is where a single person holds multiple official roles within the club.

The constitution deals with two specific example as follows:

7.(b) A person may hold no more than one position of Club Officer (member of Executive Committee) at any time

7.(h) At no time shall two or more members from the same family hold a position on the Executive Committee

This document will provide guidelines on other potential combinations that could give rise to segregation of duties issues and steps to take to address the issue.

Scope

These guidelines are to apply only for the combination of roles as follows.

Guidelines

1. Single person holding multiple roles
   • President / Vice President / Secretary / Treasurer / Registrar
     • GUIDELINE
       1. In no circumstances can a single person hold any two of the above roles concurrently.
     • WHY
       1. Reduces the opportunity for a single person to exert greater influence over club decisions and direction.  
   •  Coach / Assistant Coach / Team Manager (within same team)
     • GUIDELINE
       1. In no circumstances can a single person hold any two of the above three roles within the same team at the same time.
     • WHY
       1. Reduces the opportunity for a single person to exert greater influence over an individual team. League regulations require all roles to be filled on game day (which obviously cannot happen if one person has multiple roles)
   • Coach / Coaching Co-Ordinator (within same age bracket)
     • GUIDELINE
       1. In no circumstances can a single person hold these two roles concurrently.
     • WHY
       1. Coaching Co-ordinator assists with managing individual coach requests and issues.  
2. Two members of the same family
   • President / Vice President / Secretary / Treasurer / Registrar
     • GUIDELINE
       1. As per the constitution in no circumstances can two members of the same family hold two of the above roles concurrently.
     • WHY
       1. Reduces the opportunity for a single family to exert greater influence over club decisions and direction.
   •  Coach / Assistant Coach / Team Manager (within same team)
     • GUIDELINE
       1. In no circumstances can three members of the same family hold these three official team roles within the same team.
       2. Generally it is preferable to have three different member families represented on these three official team roles.
     • WHY
       1. Reduces the opportunity for a single family to have full control over all team on field and off field decisions.
       2. Extra family involvement as a volunteer within the club. Provides three different “official” avenues of communication for players / parents within the same team.
   • Coach / Assistant Coach (within same team)
     • GUIDELINE
       1. Two members of the same family can hold these two roles if there is agreement from 75% of the parents within that team. This agreement can be sourced through an email response from parents. No response by a certain timeframe is considered agreement.
     • WHY
       1. If there are two members of the same family that are prepared to hold these two official roles and the majority of parents are comfortable with that position, then there is not a problem.
   • Coach / Team Manager (within same team)
     • GUIDELINE
       1. Two members of the same family can hold these two roles if there is agreement from 75% of the parents within that team. This agreement can be sourced through an email response from parents. No response by a certain timeframe is considered agreement.
     • WHY
       1. If there are two members of the same family that are prepared to hold these two official roles and the majority of parents are comfortable with that position, then there is not a problem.
   • Treasurer / Assistant Treasurer
     • GUIDELINE
       1. In no circumstances can a two members from the same family hold these two roles concurrently.
     • WHY
       1. These positions handle the majority of money within the club and as such should be completely independent from one another.