ASSESSMENT 4 BLOGS WEEK 6-10-BLAKE LAWRIE

SLTS100 Assessment 4:  Sport Management Blog                                               Blake Lawrie 9828613

Week 6

Week 6 looked at sport governance. Sport governance as the structures and processes used by an organization to develop its strategic goals and direction, monitor its performance against these goals. Good governance is essential for an organisations success. A local cricket club in Perth nearly had to disband due too poor administrators with lack of goals towards delivering success and little to none monitoring processes.

Week 7

Week 7 was all about the money. And there is a lot of it in professional sport these days. Sport managers have to deal with pressures placed on sporting organisations, players etc. due to the massive amount of money in professional sport. Financial planning is crucial to success in all sectors of sport. As discussed a balance sheet is a basic tool used by sport accountants. At my local cricket club our accountant is the most important person as he runs the book.

Week 8

Sport and marketing for week 8 .As sports have become professional in the last 30 years, players, stadiums and events have become billboards.

Photo of Australian open court, not the best pic but even still can make out about 10 sponsors with their logos everywhere. This event goes global and companies like KIA would be feeling they are getting their monies worth.

http://au.sports.yahoo.com/tennis/galleries/g/15831776/australian-open-day-one/15831779/  

Week 9

Sporting culture came under the microscope in week 9. Culture or organisational culture is a set of beliefs/values/attitudes that are agreed on by its members and set the behaviours of members within it. Culture can be hard to pinpoint and very hard to change depending on the history.  One club in Australia famous for its “bloods” culture is the Sydney Swans. The link below looks at this culture based around team play and respect amongst each other, and how effective this will be on a new recruit.  Ultimately culture of a club is bigger than any individual or collective individuals and will live on if the members are willing.

http://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-premiership/will-bloods-culture-work-on-kurt-tippett-and-turn-controversial-forward-into-an-afl-success-story/story-e6frf3e3-1226534423497#.UQkVur8slX0

Week 10

Week 10 delved into the sport performance model and how each organisation that adopts a model is based on the set of goals laid down by stakeholders within the club. Stakeholders range from sponsors to players to club administrators. Balancing the needs and passions of stakeholders is a challenging test for modern sport managers in professional sport.  Sport is unique in that its stakeholders are passionate about success and that can cloud financial decisions. Look at Chelsea FC in England. The president (Roman Abramovich)  is so passionate about success and style of play that he fires coaches in frequent succession, often having to cut contracts short and pay out millions just so he can be satisfied

week 10-blake lawrie

this week we looked at how sport performance models are different from traditional from business models and the stakeholders involved within an organisation.

performance models for sport organisations have become very professional as the money involved with sport has sky rocketed. clubs use business models to strategically plan for sucess. what the text makes clear is that sporting organisations unlike regular business are emotionally charged with individuals. sporting organisations have history, traditions, idols, hero's, rituals etc. that are very important to alot of people who run these clubs. this emotional attachment can cloud commercial logic and economic rationale.
the stakeholders involved within organisations generally determine what performance model is adopted and what is deemed a success. in terms of professional organisations that may be many diiffernt stakeholders concerned. take australian rugby for instance. the sponsor(qantas) who are concerned with publicity of their brand, the players who are concerned with their paychecks as well as success, the player managers who are concerned with their players planing and attracting lucrative contracts, the coaches who are concerned with success and ultimately keeping their job, they keep their job by making the higher up administrators happy.

all stakeholders can have conflicting ideas that need to be balanced by sport managers but they can also have similar views that can be beneficial.

week 6 -blake lawrie

this week looked at risks in sport management. managing and avoiding risks is done through governance. the ASC describes sport governance as the structures and processes used by an organization to develop its strategic goals and direction, monitor its performance against these goals and ensure that the board and management seek to deliver outcomes for the benefit of the organisations and its members and that the means used to attain these outcomes are effectively monitored. the 2 areas of sport governance is corporate( deals with profit seeking companies and corporations and protecting the shareholders) and non-profit( governance of volunteers and facilitate involvement of individuals). corporate governance  has a number of theories which the text touched on.  through pinboard i read some articles about major issues in professional sport in australia that concerns governance  in particular the salary cap issue. this problem has occured in AFl and NRL in the last 15-20 years as the sport has become more professional. clubs like carlton and recently adelaide in the AFL and bulldogs and storm in NRL have fallen victim to salary cap breaches. both the NRL and AFL organsitions have put in place structures and restrictions to catch and monitor clubs that breach the salary cap. the salary cap is in place to ensure a equal playing field for all clubs and he competition remains fair for all. protecting the value and intergrity  of the game and the competition is vital for all sponsors, broadcasters, shareholders, players, and audience of the game.

week 8 -blake lawrie

really enjoyed this weeks topic. i am studying marketing concepts in another unit so it tied in well. sports marketing is different from conventional marketing in that it has two dimensions. firstly is marketing sport through sport. this include trying to sell sport related products and services through the use of sport. i.e- advertising slazenger cricket bats during the cricket commercials. the other dimension is marketing product through the median of sport. we see alot of this in professional sports were sports "star" promote a brand that really is not related in any way too the sport in which they compete. sportmen and women acrooss the globe earn  a substantial  chunk of their salary through promoting large brands. there are important factors that athletes need to be marketable. first and foremost they need to be successful in their field. once that is achieved they then need to be able to brand themselves. this is where sports management comes in to play. branding is vital for an athlete to be paid top dollar for major companies. companies like nike, adidas, puma etc. pay athletes massive sums to be part of their brand and endorse their products in a way in which the company wants to be seen to the public. sports stars are seen as ambassadors for the company and therefor they must adhere to image of the company. this can lead to major problems when sports stars fall from grace, lie we have seen with tiiger woods and lately even worse with lance Armstrong  Armstrong was sponsored by massive companies like Nike and Oakley but since his doping scandal they can no longer support him as he doesn't fit the brand image in which these companies desire.

back to the coarse work, we looked at the marketing framework and the 4 stages
1.identify marketing opportunities
2. develop a marketing strategy
3.plan the marketing mix
4.implement and control the strategy

week 9 ---blake lawrie

this week we looked at culture in sport. more specifically sport organisational culture and how its formed.  from the text sport organisational culture is described as a collection of beliefs, values and attitudes that arre common to members of a sport organisation and which subsequently set the behavioural standards for all members. agreed assumption of sport culture are
 1. culture tends to be inflexible and hard too change
2. the culture iis shaped by circumstance, history and its members
3. culture is learned and shared by members
4. culture is covert and can be hard to pinpoint.
5. culture is manifested in a variety of ways that affect performance of an organisation and its members

culture is varied across sports, across different countries and of  coarse across different clubs/organisations. professional clubs tend to focus on a culture base around results and winning, where as nonprofit organisations tend to focus more on developing a culture around participation and mateship. in terms of professional clubs, this culture of winning is talked about frequently. developing a history and player/member base which is based solely aroound the desire too win is crucial to many large clubs. Clubs and i find common in sporting clubs in Australia  try to develop culture around not only winning but playing for you team mates. In AFL last year there was many occassions were clubs suspend their own players when they dont adhere to this culture. If an indivudal breaks the rules and does selfish acts that are seen to be not doing their best for the team then they be punished, we see it alot when players have a few too many drinks and make headlines for the wrong reasons. it is important for sport mangers too  identify the cultures surrounding the indivudal or club they are working and  work towards success by integrating into the culture,

week 7- blake lawrie

this week we looked at money in sport and the growing pressures the populaitry in professional sport casues on sport managers and sporting instituations.  4 phases of sport development over the past 50 years from recreational/cultural purposes to modern sport with corporasation and sports clubs run as a business. then looked at  where money for sport comes from. areas of revenue include membership, fundraising, sponsorship, media contracts, assest owned by clubs or organisations such as the stadiums.  the growing pressures placed on sport managers was most intersting to me this week. the articles which were on pinboard weere intersting and relevant. especially liked reading about over price beer at the olympics, as this is something that irrates me when i go to live sport. anenjoyable week of readings.