Evaluating good practice in coaching delivery between governing bodies of sport and county sports partnerships in the United Kingdom

ABSTRACT

Forty-nine county sports partnerships (CSPs) work together with national governing bodies of sport (NGBs) to support and develop sports coaching in the United Kingdom. Partnership has been promoted as a key means by which agencies are able to address complex issues, but to date there has been little, if any, research into the effectiveness of partnership working between NGBs and CSPs in their support of coaching delivery. NGB officers (n = 13) and CSP Coaching Development Managers (or equivalent) (n = 23) were asked (via online questionnaire and telephone interviews) about their experiences of partnership working. Findings demonstrate that successful partnership working relies heavily upon ‘buy-in’ from both parties and an adequate amount of funding to support coach development. The paper concludes by suggesting that it is likely that partner agencies may need to be persuaded about the value of partnership working due to the required investment and the perceived burdens of collaboration.

RÉSUMÉ

Quarante-neuf partenariats sportifs communautaires (PSC) collaborent avec les autorités sportives nationales (ASN) pour soutenir et développer l’encadrement sportif au Royaume-Uni. Le partenariat a été promu comme une manière essentielle pour les agences de faire face à des problèmes complexes, mais à ce jour, peu ou pas de recherches ont étudié l’efficacité de partenariats passés entre les ASN et les PSC à propos de l’encadrement sportif. Les représentants de l’ASN (n = 13) et les responsables du développement de l’encadrement (RDE ou équivalent) des PSC (n = 23) ont été invités (par l’entremise de questionnaires en ligne et d’entretiens téléphoniques) à partager leurs expériences de partenariat. Les résultats montrent qu’un travail en partenariat réussi repose fortement sur la bonne volonté des deux parties ainsi que sur un financement adéquat en soutien au développement de l’encadrement. Le document conclut en suggérant qu’il est probablement nécessaire de convaincre les agences partenaires de la valeur du travail en partenariat, en raison de l’investissement requis et des complications anticipées en lien avec l’établissement d’une collaboration.

KEYWORDS:

• Sports coaching
• partnership
• national governing bodies
• county sports partnerships

MOTS-CLÉS:

• encadrement sportif
• partenariat
• autorités nationales
• partenariats sportifs communautaires

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Sports Coach UK for funding this study and for the particular support of John McIlroy and Simon Thomas. We would also like to thank the participants who gave their time to support this study in addition to Simon Padley, Mark Jeffreys and Alison Croad for their contribution to the data-collection process. Valuable and constructive comments and suggestions to improve the quality of the paper were made by two anonymous reviewers for which we are grateful.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Sports Coach UK [Consultancy Agreement Number 359].