Competencies of sport managers in German sport clubs and sport federations

Abstract

Growing and diversifying public interest in sport demands greater professional competencies in sport managers in clubs and National Federations. In 1995- 6 this study sought to identify activities undertaken and competencies needed by such paid managers, through mailed questionnaires (response n=199, 30% from clubs, 70% from Federations). Factor analysis identified five groups of activities and seven groups of competencies. The activities of sport managers comprised strong communicative and social aspects. This must be considered more strongly than hitherto by including corresponding interdisciplinary management aspects in training and education courses. The interviewees particularly emphasized the importance of interpersonal communication--as indicated by several of Mintzberg's managerial roles--as well as competencies like public relations, advertising and techniques of personal management. Nevertheless the core of training should comprise aspects of business administration. The interviewees particularly emphasized the management functions and areas of financing, budgeting, sponsorship and event management. Sport management is becoming differentiated from coaching and teaching. Sport managers had to know their respective sports and be part of the culture, but physical education and sport science skills were generally not needed. On the one hand, the evaluation of many competencies showed clear differences from job to job, but on the other hand the significant regression coefficients between different types of activity sets and different competency sets indicated that a broad qualification is needed, regardless of the type of job.