Daegu FC's Current Situation and A Proposal for Future Developments

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering

Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 9, Issue 1, January 2019)

57

Daegu FC's Current Situation and A Proposal for Future

Developments

Jae-Soo Do

1

, Kyoung-Seok Kim

2

1_{Doctor’s Course, Department of Management, Kyungpook National University, Daegu, SOUTH KOREA}

2_{Professor, Department of Management, Kyungpook National University, Daegu, SOUTH KOREA. (Corresponding Author)}

Abstract— Today's professional sports teams are in a

highly competitive environment with no prospect in sight. While the team that was considered the favorite to win the championship is suffering from severe slump, the team that was expected to join the team at the bottom is making a long drive taking advantage of victory. The unexpected situation is continuing to repeat. This is also a sign of the need for agony over the use of human resources and strategies in the sports industry, the most important checkpoint for human resources. Accordingly, this study selects Daegu FC soccer team, Korea's first team for citizens, as the subject of its research and conducts a case study on human resources. First, this introduces importance of common resources from Frey, et al. (2015) for case analysis. Through subsequent analysis, this study will determine the direction Daegu FC should proceed. The main contribution of this research is that it presents the importance of human resources which is one of basic tactics sports teams should utilize. In the sports industry, where the temporality is underlined for its clear beginning and ending, teams are more likely to use diverse sports tactics to get superior grades. This enriches the basis of their tactics.

Keywords—Pro FootBall, Strategic Resources, Common

Resources, Human R Resources, Competitive Advantage

I. INTRODUCTION

The world of winning is cool. The collaboration and enthusiasm of the players, or organizational members, to win the victory will soon lead to better team intelligence and innovation. It is important to gain the superiority over the other team in the competition of collective intelligence and innovation. Thus innovation is also a permanent challenge for management (Posner&Mangelsdorf, 2017). The world of professional sports is in a variety of highly uncertain competitive settings. Every season, teams plan to deal with a variety of risks, but always play in league games with uncertainty in mind. Recent dramatic changes in the sports management environment have begun to occur as a response to many uncertainties, and the strategic response to that has already become very important (Lee Jang-woo, et al, 2015). With the support of the parent company, which has strong capital, Korea is able to recruit highly qualified players through the free agent (FA) system.

Professional sports teams have a definite goal of always having the best performance of the season. Consequently, team managers put a lot of effort into managing and managing their players efficiently. But there are no long-touched business management formulas. The conventional approach is now facing a limit, and the desire for a new method is already substantial. With the support of the parent company, which has strong capital, teams are able to recruit highly qualified Korean players through the free agent (FA) system and the recruitment of foreign players from the world's top leagues allows the team's competitiveness to soar at once. Like these, many factors have emerged that could change the team's strength in a short period of time. Professional sports teams have a definite goal of always having the best performance in every season. Consequently, team managers put a lot of effort into managing their players efficiently. However, there are no long-touched business management formulas any more.

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In particular, there is a series of agony over the efficient and valuable strategic composition, with the highest emphasis placed on the management and utilization of their players. Although we may be using human management tools such as discovery and recruitment and compensation based on the highly sophisticated Big Data analyses that have evolved in recent years, it is important to remember that the results are not always positive (Henri et al., 2016). This study addresses the most important areas of human resources considered by the sports team. Companies are always laying out strategies around rare and valuable resources, but they are not well prepared in the event they are lost.For this reason, it is necessary to start to think about the ordinary resources, or the relative concept of rare and valuable resources. It will conduct a case study on the human resources aspect of Daegu FC, the first Korean professional soccer team. Through this, it proposes a hint about human resources innovation that Korean sports teams should pursue.

II. THE DEVELOPMENT OF KOREAN PROFESSIONAL

FOOTBALL LEAGUE AND DAEGU FC

Korean Professional Football League is league games with a professional soccer teams that belongs to the K-League (K-K-League 1, K-K-League 2). Soccer in Korea, which had failed to make a big break from the Asian level until the early 1980s, often suffered defeat whenever it had the chance to advance into world stages such as World Cup and Olympics. In particular, after losing the Asian games to Iran 0:1 and Japan 1:2 in 1982, the Korean soccer community started to reflect on itself and eventually created professional soccer.

In 1983, the Korea Football Association (KFA) decided to create a professional soccer league in February that year, and on May 8, the Super League started at Dongdaemun Stadium to mark the opening of Korean professional soccer matches. Two professional teams (Hallelujah, Yugong) and three unemployed teams (Daewoo, Pohang Iron and Steel, Kookmin Bank) took part and the league ended in the final match in Masan on September 25. In February 1984, Pohang Iron & Steel switched to a pro team and major companies started to form a professional soccer team. At that time, Korean team made its debut in the 1986 World Cup in Mexico after 32 years. Since then, it has recreated its honor of advancing to the World Cup for nine times in a row until the 2018 World Cup in Russia. In 1989, the Ilhwa Chunma Professional Soccer League was created, the Suwon Samsung Professional Football League was formed in 1995, and the Daejeon Citizen FC in 1997.

Since the introduction of the split system in 2012, it has been operating under the K-League Classic, the league's first division, and the K-League Challenge(From the 2018 season, the League Classic will be renamed the K-League, and the K-League Challenge will be renamed the K2 League) its second division, since 2013.

As of March 2018, the K-League has 12 teams including Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors, Jeju United, Suwon Samsung Bluewings, Ulsan Hyundae, FC Seoul, Gangwon FC, Pohang Steelers, Daegu FC, Incheon United, Jeonnam Dragons, Sangju Military, and Gyeongnam FC. In the K2-League, 10 teams - Gwangju FC, Busan I-Park, Korea's professional soccer team, Asan Mugunghwa, Sungnam FC, Bucheon FC, FC Anyang, Seoul E-Land, Ansan Greeners, and Daejeon Citizen FC form a league.

Its official name is Daegu Civic Professional Soccer Team, and its location is Daegu Metropolitan City (Daegu). Daegu, the venue of the Korean and Turkish games, which was the third place match in the 2002 Korea-Japan World Cup, also raised the need for a team based on Daegu city on a national level. As a result, Daegu FC was created as the first civic team in the history of Korean professional soccer, which involved all citizens, organizations, and companies in Daegu. In August 2002, after the Daegu Civic Pro Football Team Development Committee was established, the corporation was registered as a corporation with capital of 5,350 million won in October and the first citizen stock subscription was held and raised a total of 7.35 billion won from November 15, 2002 through December 24. On December 26 of the same year, it was approved as the 11th K-League club by the Korea Professional Football Federation (Doosan Encyclopedia). The owner of the team is the mayor of Daegu Metropolitan City, and former directors include Park Jong-Hwan, Byun Byung-joo, Lee Young-jin, Collershir Ferreira, Dangsung Card, Baek Jong-cheol, Choi Duck-joo, Lee Young, and Son Hyun-Jun. A total of 10 directors have led the team including Andre this year.

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In 2016, it recorded 19 wins, 13 draws, and 8 defeats, and then, it was promoted to the K1 league with second place in the regular league after 2015. The team ranked eighth in the league with 11 wins, 14 draws, 13 losses in 2017.

The team's symbol is shaped like a shield, and each side has 11 golden leaves, a symbol of Daegu city, on its side, and an English logo with the name of its founder year and team, respectively. Its circular shape is a representation of the Daegu Stadium, a home field, viewed from the sky, and also represents the topography of the Daegu city located in the basin. The eleven golden leaves represent the eleventh team in the K-League and eleven most talented players. The mascot is a Victo, a representation of an alien, and represents victory.

III. CASE STUDY (ANEW PARADIGM OF COMPETITIVE

ADVANTAGE:'MUNDANE RESOURCES')

A Many previous studies have emphasized that knowing how to create, deliver, and acquire value is more important than any management activity to an organization (Nielsen & Lund, 2018). It is also emphasized that a good strategy must be based on the exclusive control of valuable and rare resources, such as unique brand names, talented individuals, and incomparable technology (Frery, et al. , 2015). In this view, strategic success requires non-substitutable and unmatched competencies, and competitive advantage is derived from unique and rare resources (Kraaijenbrink, et al., 2010). However, Frery et al. (2015) raises questions about this phenomenon and emphasizes that mediocre resources can play an important role in driving successful strategies. Given the recent emergence of a new business model that utilizes a myriad of mundane resources (Masanell & Ricart, 2009), one has to wonder about the rarity-based approach and the strategic focus on unique resources.

Theories that emphasize competition on the basis of strategic resources argue that the performance gap between competing firms is a direct result of resources (Frery, et al., 2015). They emphasizes that resources to gain competitive advantage can not be imitated or replaced completely, and companies must protect their resources with care. This approach has created a number of successful strategies and has become one of the theories of absolute truth. In order to achieve higher performance, their resources (Barney, 1991) and capacity (Teece, et al., 1997) should be improved through various portfolios.

However, it should be noted that under certain circumstances, over-reliance on strategic resources may cause rather risk, and it is necessary to take into account the potential of ordinary resources. Ordinary resources are resources that are often available in the marketplace, a neutral resource based on performance (Frery, et al., 2015). Until now ordinary resources have been considered at best to help them gain equal status in the competition. Of course, ordinary resources themselves can not be a source of competitive advantage and outstanding performance, but ordinary resources are essential for a company's activities to run smoothly. In other words, there is a need for a strategic balance between a high-risk, high-return approach that uses strategic resources and a low-risk, low-profit approach that utilizes common resources. This is important because organizational leaders know that companies face problems and need to respond somehow, but there is little information to guide them in making the right decisions (Bughin & Van Zeebroeck, 2017 ). Therefore, it is important to have balanced thinking about resource utilization. While valuable strategic resources may be helpful for companies, strategic resources may have disadvantages and the advantages of common resources can offset these shortcomings.

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FC Seoul followed suit with a spending of 9.3 billion to 6.697,000 won, Jeju United with a spending of 819,000 to 133,000 won, and Suwon Samsung with 789.9 billion won. They are each based on a conglomerate Hyundai, GS, SK and Samsung. On the other hand, Daegu FC ranked ninth among the 11 K-League teams with 3.395 billion won (excluding Sangju Military FC). Still, Daegu FC has the financial status next to Kangwon FC among K1 league citizens' football teams. This is due to the city's decision considering the pride and support of Daegu citizens. With such support from local governments, Daegu FC will finish the 2017 season in eighth place. Although it failed to advance into the upper division, its initial goal of staying in the league could be achieved early. It is also the result of the sacrifices and enthusiasm of its members. Daegu FC players are among the most common resources in terms of professional players. The national player has not yet been selected except for one goalkeeper Jo Hyun-woo, and in 2015 and 2016, the team was in the second league, the K2 league. These mediocre resources are the foundation for leveraging unique assets and are an essential way to maintain low costs. This means that ordinary resources can also produce strategic effects. It means that not only unique resources but also ordinary resources can create strategic effects and ordinary resources can be the basis of competitive advantage (Frery, 2015).

Daegu FC mainly used the tactics of deploying a mercenary player with strong attack power against vulnerable positions, especially striker positions. Rather than endure the salaries of highly-qualified players due to the imbalance in supply and demand among domestic players who have good offensive abilities, they have put in a low-cost and high-efficiency mercenary player to balance attack and defense. In the last room, Cho Hyun-woo, who has recently been featured in the national team, has added a sense of stability. In the 2017 season, after failing to get out of the relegation zone due to poor performance at the beginning of the season, the team stimulated the athletes by putting the super-hardening of the resignation of the manager. And the effect started to appear immediately and gave the whole members a sense of security. The team finally ranked 8th in the season.

IV. FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS

The financial limit of a civilian team and the restriction on recruitment of outstanding national players will continue to be the limit of Daegu FC. This is why new strategies and rules must be reorganized based on lessons learned from the various success and failure cases so far.

That is, it is necessary to know how the new model is created, how it may evolve over time, and what changes the organization's internal data could have on each developmental stage, and also how these activities could mean the rebirth and growth of the organization. (Christensen, et al., 2016). If basic competitive strategies built through internal data from the organization are not appropriate for the organizational environment, they will develop a wrong strategy and eventually lead to a risk of losing direction (Silvestro, 2016). Especially in the sports industry where human resources are most important, the club operation should be focused on the management of the members.

Amid many restrictions and disadvantages, how does Daegu FC manage the AFC (Asian Champions) league, which is given not only the remains of the K-1 league but also the top four teams? The following four suggestions can be suggested. First, there must be a harmonization of strategic resources and ordinary resources. In particular, the key positions should be taken by the optimized foreign players. The key positions here are two in the striker's position (forwards and strikers), a position (defensive midfilters) for coordinating attack and defense, or a forward defender position (sweeper or stopper). The foreign players outsource the domestic players in many ways because they are superior in speed and physical capabilities compared to the domestic players. Because of that, they are used for core position or vulnerable position of the club. Daegu FC is pointed out as weakness of attack power and ability to take control of the center. There is a high risk of placing Korean players in this position. Accordingly, it is necessary to reconcile strategic resources (foreign players) with ordinary resources (national players). The ability to score is essential to winning matches, and the ability to prevent losing runs must be assisted. As mentioned earlier, it is not easy to recruit strikers from other than the big league due to the imbalance in demand and supply of players with superior offensive capabilities. For this reason, foreign players need to play in this position, and so do the assistance of domestic players. If a team pursues strategy based on strategic resources (foreign players), it may lose the importance of ordinary resources (national players). That is, it must not lose sight of the fact that ordinary resources could be the foundation of a competitive advantage (Warnier et al., 2013).

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Players with diverse experience, such as national team experience and experience in overseas leagues, became the core of the team, led the team, retired, and naturally became regional team leaders. Meanwhile, the fan's loyalty has been increased and it has become a representative local association. In this respect, Daegu FC lacks players with national team experience and experience in overseas leagues. However, considering the fact that Cho Hyun-woo, who is currently in the goalkeeper position, is playing in the recent national team matches, it is likely that he will be a Daegu FC legend player in the future.

Third, Daegu FC must go the other way. In order to become a regular sports club, it is necessary to satisfy at least various conditions such as a long history and traditions, enthusiastic support of the fans, continuous good grades, an immortal milestone, and contributions to professional football development. Already among the Korean professional soccer clubs, many clubs have been operating so far since the beginning. Therefore, Daegu FC has to meet the above conditions and develop new ways. In other words, it should be 'a team with a story'. If Daegu FC creates a history that is a storytelling platform from the birth of the team to the present to the future, it will be able to join the ranks of renowned teams.

Fourth, mutual cooperation with Daegu is a prerequisite. Most professional sports and amateur league sports have a regional background. In particular, professional sports leagues value local connections, and the citizens, residents and members of the army support teams that are based in their neighborhoods. Up until 2010, professional sports teams based in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province had been well equipped with the names of Korea's four largest professional sports teams. There were the Daegu Samsung Lions, Daegu Eastern Orions in basketball, Daegu FC in soccer, Pohang Steelers in resident league, and Gumi KB Insurance in volleyball. Daegu Dongyang Orions, however, have moved its location to Goyang City in Gyeonggi Province from the 2011-2012 season, and Gumi's KB Damage Insurance has moved to Uijeongbu City in Gyeonggi Province from the 2017-2015 season. Therefore, citizens in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province felt a sense of relative deprivation and frustration.

Now, the only professional sports that is based in the region are baseball and soccer, Daegu Gyeongbuk has a lot of attachment to baseball and soccer. In particular, since Daegu FC is a team run by the city government, it should maintain a win-win relationship with the city government, and the coaching staff and players under its supervision should also be maintained in Daegu city.

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