BU Research Blog

Management academic Dr Tim Breitbarth (Department of Sport & Physical Activity) was invited by the German Football Association (DFB) to provide input and add to the discussions at DFB’s 1^st Annual Congress on Social Responsibility. With over six million members, DFB is the largest single sports federation in the world.

Held in Hennef on November 26^th-27^th, the event brought together 70 of the DFB’s executives and leadership team from across the country, including vice-presidents, directors and representatives from all regions and states. Tim contributed as an external expert panelist for the moderated ‘fireside discussion’ that kicked-off the ambitious program and provided guidance at the start of the workshop on communication and marketing value of corporate social responsibility in the context of the sports association.

The DFB seeks to take a proactive stance on reflecting upon and invigorating its socio-political role and policies, especially by encouraging its regional and local entities and more than 25,000 individual clubs to embrace the process.

Recently, Tim provided Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) communication expertise to DFB’s Social Responsibility Commission (see this blog post) and moderated a similar event for Sport Federation Lower-Saxony, which is the umbrella organization for almost 10,000 sports clubs and 3 individual million members.

His engagement and expertise is underpinned by his research, e.g. manifested in a recent special issue of Corporate Governance on “Governance and CSR management in sport” and an upcoming special issue of Journal of Public Affairs on “The marketing and public affairs of sustainability”.