Three functional areas in sport management
Sports management is described as managing a sports organisation through the application
of management techniques and strategies that are commonly used in other modern
businesses (Hoye et al, 2015). Baker and Esherisk (2013) defines it as the process of getting
things done with the support of people and other resources. The other resources including
the three functions mentioned in this essay. The purpose of this essay is to explore three
functional areas in sport management and how they are used within the sport industry.
This essay will discuss human resource management, sports marketing and sports law.
Each function will be looked at in further detail, highlighting the importance of them, what
they are and how are they used in a sports business using modern day examples. These
three are used within all sports organisations and are fundamental elements.
The first function to be discussed is Human resource management (HRM). Storey (2007)
defines HRM as an approach to the management of recruitment and employment which
strives to reach a competitive advantage over other employers by attaining capable
employees with a high level of commitment using varying methods such as cultural,
structural and personnel techniques. Human resource management within an organisation
fundamentally centres upon acquiring the right person to fulfil the right position at an
optimum time (Hoye ,2015). It therefore could be considered that human resource
management is a key aspect to managing people effectively , however, it is not the
foundation of all business activity, but rather just a key element (Torrington et al, 2014).
The foundation of a business is essentially the product or service, however, without human
resource management it would be difficult for a business to sell the product or service
(Torrington et al, 2014). HRM puts in place and guides a business towards the ‘best
practices’- carrying out the correct and the most effective procedures, in terms of
recruitment, development, reward and the management of people all aiming to do the
same thing, creating a high- performing work system (Bratton, 2012). Human resource
management is an essential factor to sustaining a long-term effective work performance
within a sport organisation (Taylor et al, 2015).
Some roles within certain jobs require staff to have specific skills, so managing those people
correctly is key, ensuring they remain happy in that role, reducing the risk of them leaving as
it would be more difficult to find candidates to fulfil that role (Hoye et al, 2015). Hoye et al
(2015) has presented a traditional HRM process, showing the general process an
organisation will follow when acquiring and maintaining human resources with in all
businesses- including sport. The author also believes this involves eight key stages ensuring
that an organisations HRM is effective.
Selection and screening is the fourth stage that is shown in figure one. This is the stage of
the process where the candidates who applied for the job in the recruitment stage are
selected and therefore the number of candidates are short-listed (Hoye et al, 2018). The
most common way this process happens is through interviews, giving the employer or the
recruitment team an opportunity to analyse the candidates further allowing the candidates
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, to further show their skills and experience, assisting the recruiter’s decision on if they meet
the criteria for the job applied for (Hoye et al, 2018). Interviews can be done is various
different ways: face to face (in person), video call and via the internet (Hoye et al, 2018). An
example within the professional sport sector where this process is executed would be the
UEFA, the UEFA use skype interviews enabling them to gain a further insight into the
candidates’ skills- this is the first interview stage they use (UEFA, n.d.). The second
interview stage, UEFA conduct a face-to-face interview followed by a technical assessment,
both allowing the candidate to showcase their abilities and, again, demonstrate their skills
(UEFA, n.d.)
An example of the selection and screening within the professional sport sector at a higher
more elite level would be when Everton FC appointed Marco Silva as manager. An article
has said that Everton liked Silva’s vision of football and the way he thinks about football is
what attracted them to him, also because he is a manger who wants to play attacking
football and has already proved already that he is eager to work with young players and
develop them- making he an attractive candidate for the role (Hunter, 2018).
It is fundamental that staff have the right training and qualifications to do the role
effectively (Wolsey et al, 2012) in order to provide continual improvements to the quality of
staff- which will therefore have a direct effect on the performances in the business (Hoye et
al, 2018). The fifth stage, training and development, stated by Hoye et al (2018) in figure 1,
is the stage where the employee is given the appropriate training and the opportunity to
develop the skills they may already possess. This stage of the HRM process is undertaken
for one primary focus of making the business work effectively (Wolsey et al, 2012), but this
primary focus is complete through other collective purposes for training and development,
such as increasing one’s job satisfaction and overall morale, reduce the staff turnover,
increase the motivation levels of the staff and therefore improve efficiencies (Taylor et al,
2015).
Fit for Sport is an organisation that aims to educate children through exercise, Fit for Sport
do this by training all their staff to guarantee that they are aware of the up to date
safeguarding policies, what is the best practice and so they gain knowledge on different
ways to engage the children in the project (Fit for Sport, n.d). This is an example within the
private sector.
As sport has become more popular and the commercialisation of sport has increased,
therefore marketing within sport has developed, this is because sport has grown from being
something people primarily ‘did’ with no real governance to it, to now, where National
Governing Bodies have taken over- and marketing is used to increase participation levels
and profits (Smith and Stewart, 2015). This is another important function of sport
management.
According to Beech and Chadwick (2007) marketing is described as a set of processes that
are done by an organisation to meet the desires and requirements of the customers. Sports
marketing includes all the same aspects of marketing, but with the added element of sport,
it differs in some areas-sports marketing is heavily dependant on the relationships with the
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