Jason Wilcox - New technical director

I am no legal eagle but surely if he has a 12 month notice period then wouldn't the courts rule the maximum ' compensation' to start immediately would be 12 months salary? Seems a bit odd they are holding out for more bunce
 
I am no legal eagle but surely if he has a 12 month notice period then wouldn't the courts rule the maximum ' compensation' to start immediately would be 12 months salary? Seems a bit odd they are holding out for more bunce
Not necessarily — it’s a bargaining position from Southampton which is: either your man serves his full notice or you pay us £X to get him early and we won’t hold him to that notice. No reason why their settlement figure needs to be capped at his notice period sum.

Also the hassle of legal fees and actually getting a court hearing date and dispensing through all the procedure is a massive faff in and of itself.

They will ultimately negotiate at some point.
 
What does a technical director do?
Based on football manager, it seems to say that the technical director focuses more on the collection of staff members (coaching, scouting, medical etc) while director of football focuses on the player building and recruitment of players aspect.
 
Based on football manager, it seems to say that the technical director focuses more on the collection of staff members (coaching, scouting, medical etc) while director of football focuses on the player building and recruitment of players aspect.
Thanks, that might actually be accurate :lol:
 
Based on football manager, it seems to say that the technical director focuses more on the collection of staff members (coaching, scouting, medical etc) while director of football focuses on the player building and recruitment of players aspect.
To be fair that’s not a terrible answer from them.
 
Seems like we need a sub transfer forum for these executive footballing roles these days. It’s becoming like player transfers these days - a real farce.

It's more entertaining than whatever we're serving up on the pitch. Just waiting for the summer so we can all breathe in some fresh doses of hopium without any actual football to prove us wrong.
 
Not necessarily — it’s a bargaining position from Southampton which is: either your man serves his full notice or you pay us £X to get him early and we won’t hold him to that notice. No reason why their settlement figure needs to be capped at his notice period sum.

Also the hassle of legal fees and actually getting a court hearing date and dispensing through all the procedure is a massive faff in and of itself.

They will ultimately negotiate at some point.
That's why I think they have made the noise now, if they come up they'll take the fee, if they don't, they will make out it disrupted their season and has cost them huge PL money. I don't think they really have much to stand on unless it's in his contract but why would you not try and milk a bit more out of United?
 
It's fascinating that execs move all the time between clubs but when Man United are involved then the current employers insist on ludicrously long gardening leave unless a king's ransom is paid.

We should tell them to do one and move on without all this daft drama, until we do then it's going to continue. It's exactly the same that happens to us when trying to sign players.

Let’s tell them loud and clear
If we were drama Queens
We’d want a Queen’s Park
But for a King’s ransome
We expect nothing less
Than a King’s Garden
And leave it at that
 
In terms of gardening leave , there is a string argument for the practise to be fair.

I remember Peter Kenyon leaving United and taking our shopping list of transfer targets to Chelsea. Always felt at the time we misssd out on some players and it set us back a bit. Klebersom , Djemba and Bellion being signed that season probably played a role in that ! :D
 
That's why I think they have made the noise now, if they come up they'll take the fee, if they don't, they will make out it disrupted their season and has cost them huge PL money. I don't think they really have much to stand on unless it's in his contract but why would you not try and milk a bit more out of United?
Because it’s spoiled?
Will he be learning the ropes from Darren Fletcher then?
He’ll be dangling from them.
 
Just read on Wikipedia :-

Wilcox is a black belt in judo and even represented England before he became a professional footballer.[20][5] When he reached the age of seventeen he was made to choose between the two sports, only being able to fully commit himself to one of them as a potential career path.

So hopefully he has been brought in to deal with a few of the egos in the club :wenger:
 
Just read on Wikipedia :-

Wilcox is a black belt in judo and even represented England before he became a professional footballer.[20][5] When he reached the age of seventeen he was made to choose between the two sports, only being able to fully commit himself to one of them as a potential career path.

So hopefully he has been brought in to deal with a few of the egos in the club :wenger:
Ironic judo got the chop.
 
I expect Southampton have seen what Newcastle are doing with Ashworth and have decided to do likewise with big pound signs in their eyes.
 
We would probably get asked for compensation money from someone even if the guy was unattached.
 
12 months notice period is mad
You’re never getting a new job with that
 
12 months notice period is mad
You’re never getting a new job with that
I guess that's the idea, if you're appointing someone director of football you'd want them encouraged to at least stay for the length of their contract.
 
Fletcher didn’t/doesnt do any of those roles
I wonder how long it will take for the fanbase to understand what Fletcher does in his role.

So firstly, Fletcher is officially listed by the club as our Technical Director. Secondly, most of us are well aware that he has been primarily acting as a coach and first team liaison.

There has been talk of giving him a more accurately defined role within the new set up, and so my original point stands. It will be interesting to see what role he plays in the new structure.
 
Not necessarily — it’s a bargaining position from Southampton which is: either your man serves his full notice or you pay us £X to get him early and we won’t hold him to that notice. No reason why their settlement figure needs to be capped at his notice period sum.

Also the hassle of legal fees and actually getting a court hearing date and dispensing through all the procedure is a massive faff in and of itself.

They will ultimately negotiate at some point.

How can he serve his notice if he's already resigned?
 
So firstly, Fletcher is officially listed by the club as our Technical Director. Secondly, most of us are well aware that he has been primarily acting as a coach and first team liaison.

There has been talk of giving him a more accurately defined role within the new set up, and so my original point stands. It will be interesting to see what role he plays in the new structure.

Technical director, Sporting director or even DOF aren't really clearly defined roles, they mean different things at different clubs/countries and are often interchangeable.

His role isn't the typical idea people have of TD but he is a technical director with a focus on the pathway from Youth team to First team. He was only coaching to help out RR as far as I'm aware. I don't necessarily see his role changing but his job title will have to become more specific if we bring someone in as a more traditional TD and give them that title.
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So he's given the 12 months notice of his resignation date? I can't see how that helps him in any way.
You’re confusing yourself. A notice period is written into an employment contract. When you resign you have no choice but to work off the notice period in the contract. Or your employer may place you on gardening leave to cover the notice period.
 
You’re confusing yourself. A notice period is written into an employment contract. When you resign you have no choice but to work off the notice period in the contract. Or your employer may place you on gardening leave to cover the notice period.

Maybe it's a cultural thing. You usually stipulate a leaving date when you hand in your notice or you resign with immediate effect. When they said he resigned my assumption was he walked out the door.

I wouldn't usually describe it as someone having resigned if they handed in their notice.
 
That makes it worse if anything though. Because it means it was a sham appointment from conception, only made to hoodwink United fans into accepting an internal appointment of someone unqualified to be football director.

At least if they'd given him the chance to learn some parts of the job it wouldnt look so bad. There are several very competent directors who were recent players. VdS, Edu etc.
Are you purposefully trying to miss the point?
 
So firstly, Fletcher is officially listed by the club as our Technical Director. Secondly, most of us are well aware that he has been primarily acting as a coach and first team liaison.

There has been talk of giving him a more accurately defined role within the new set up, and so my original point stands. It will be interesting to see what role he plays in the new structure.
He is listed as they, yes, but if anyone read his JD or listened to the man himself you’d recognize that the job title was a complete botch job, either a deliberate sham or a misguided error by the club. He’s never been a technical director in reality. I said it at the time, the club were doing him no favours at all with the title not matching his actual job. Many fans couldn’t understand what he did and it looks like that there are still fans who unbelievably still don’t know
 
Maybe it's a cultural thing. You usually stipulate a leaving date when you hand in your notice or you resign with immediate effect. When they said he resigned my assumption was he walked out the door.

I wouldn't usually describe it as someone having resigned if they handed in their notice.
The point is that he can’t just stop immediately. Southampton could legally enforce the contract and make him work for another 12 months if they want to. You specify a leave date to acknowledge the terms of your own contract. Wilcox can’t say he’s leaving before his notice period, only Southampton can terminate his employment before his notice period if both sides agree, hence their demand for a fee from United to do that.
 
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Maybe it's a cultural thing. You usually stipulate a leaving date when you hand in your notice or you resign with immediate effect.
Not in the UK you don’t. You confirm to your employer you wish to leave, and to do so you must provide them with your notice period which is written into your contract.

As I said before, a notice period works both ways — if the shoe was on the other foot and Southampton wanted to sack him, they’d have to give him 12 months notice before doing so, or pay him for his full notice and let him go.

Something that a lot are missing here — we aren’t talking about ordinary junior staff members who normally have a 1-3 month notice period — these are senior executive level employees at director status of huge companies. Large notice periods, garden leave provisions, and restrictive covenants preventing staff and information poaching is very commonplace in this market.

Where are you from, out of interest?

Edit: I think the “resigned” wording has come from dramatic journalists like Romano and has since been reigned in by other tweets.
 
Do we have any UK labour lawyers on here? Are these extremely long notice periods actually upheld in courts? I cannot fathom a court saying yep, you signed that piece of paper and now you have to serve out 2 years of your life working for an employer you wish to leave.

I also don't entirely get how that's enforceable. What would prevent an employee from simply showing up in the required hours, and literally doing nothing? Getting fired would seem to solve the problem too!
 
Not in the UK you don’t. You confirm to your employer you wish to leave, and to do so you must provide them with your notice period which is written into your contract.

As I said before, a notice period works both ways — if the shoe was on the other foot and Southampton wanted to sack him, they’d have to get him 12 months notice before doing so, or pay him for his full notice and let him go.

Something that a lot are missing here — we aren’t talking about ordinary junior staff members who normally have a 1-3 month notice period — these are senior executive level employees at director status of huge companies. Large notice periods, garden leave provisions, and restrictive covenants preventing staff and information poaching is very commonplace in this market.

Where are you from, out of interest?
In my industry we have gardening leave for all market-makers, but given almost every single one of them was hired from somewhere else, most firms are pretty flexible. Worst case would be a year, but typically when I've seen that the employee is very keen on that year of pay without labour ;)

I'm pretty sure when I was working in California you can't actually enforce gardening leave, and workers are free to join a new employer after a really short period of time, maybe 2 weeks.
 
They’ve turned down the compo offer so if he’s resigned, we will see the current hot phrase “gardening leave” while he sees out his notice period. Unless they accept the offer eventually.

We have offered a year's salary as compensation and are at an impasse but pay GBP300,000 a week to someone who doesn't try, GBP80,000,000 + fee for someone who has been a failure but we are now pissing with pennies about releasing somebody we want to be the club's technical director.