Athletics in Europe
It’s Not About Women, It’s About Athletics
Radha Balani – 10 October 2014
www.wsff.org.uk
@wsff_uk
“It has been argued by many that sports mirror the society in
which they operate. In this way sport is a microcosm of society.
Sport is more than a mirror reflection. A mirror provides a
passive reflection, but sport is not a passive reflection.
Sport is active and affects what it is a reflection of. Further
sport not only reflects society, it also dramatises the social order.
These unique aspects are what make clear the moral
significance of sport both for the individual and society at
large.”
(Eitzen 2001)
Who am I?
Formed in 1984
Put issue of gender inequality in sport on the agenda
Successfully influenced publicly funded sport to take issues seriously and
invest
Rebranded in 2007
Increasing participation main policy goal
Funded by Sport England to support national and local delivery
Refreshed (and rebranding!) in 2014
New Chief Executive, Chair and office
A new vision, mission, value-set and strategy
OUR VISION
To transform sport for the
benefit of every woman
and girl in the UK
OUR MISSION
By drawing on our unique insight we
will champion the right of every
woman and girl in the UK to take part
in, and benefit from, sport: from the
field of play to the boardroom, from
early years and throughout her life
This will
enable us
to achieve
our vision
This creates
the culture
we need
These are the
practical things
we work
towards with
partners
Fairness – Challenging – Insight-led – Collaborative
Why am I here?
European Athletics leading the way – on the field of play
50:50 average participation profile
Range 31%-63%
Recognising the discrepancy
37 out of 50 endorse The Brighton Declaration
IWG 1 – 1994 in Brighton; IWG 6 – 2014 in Helsinki
The Brighton Declaration outlined:
“Women are significantly under-represented in management, coaching and
officiating, particularly at the higher levels. Without women leaders, decision
makers and role models within sport, equal opportunities for women and girls
will not be achieved.”
Sydney Scoreboard (IWG 5 – 2010 in Sydney) – Legacy
“Within the context of the achievement of the UN Millennium Goals – to increase
the number of women on the boards/management committees of all sport
organisations at international, regional, national and local level.”
Why am I here?
What now?
Insight – from business from sport
Considerations – individually and collectively
Activate the endorsement
Why?
European Athletics leading the way from the boardroom as well
A closer look at the world…and sport
Women represent 49.7% of the world’s
population
Gender equality worldwide
By virtually every global measure, women are more
economically excluded than men (World Bank)
In many countries, restrictive laws can hinder women’s ability to access
institutions, own or use property, build credit, or get a job
In 15 countries, women still require their husbands’ consent to work
Women on average earn between 10 and 30 percent less than working men
A total of 128 countries have at least one sex-based legal differentiation,
meaning women and men cannot function in the world of work in the same
way; in 54 countries, women face five or more legal differences
Gender equality in sport
Women are under-represented at all levels of sport:
•
ƒin participation;
•
ƒin positions of leadership and coaching;
•
ƒin public recognition and media coverage; and
•
ƒin employment
This is not because of a lack of interest by women, but reflects a
long history of direct and indirect forms of discrimination
It is important for men and women to work together to enhance sport
for all
IT’S NOT ABOUT WOMEN – IT’S ABOUT ATHLETICS
Worldwide Board Directors in Sport
The Sydney Scoreboard – Legacy of IWG 5
Europe-wide Board Directors in
Sport
European Athletics’ Average Participant
Profile 2013
European Athletics – 2103 Average
% of Women
That’s a
Because
Change
is – you
Whycare
does
it
YOU
Says
who?
diversity
So
what?
collect
and
report
matter?
happening
BIG
matters
on this
statement
Why does diversity matter in: business?
On average, companies with
more women on their boards
outperform those with fewer
A higher number of women in the
workforce correlates with higher GDP
growth
Why does diversity matter in: business?
Diversity is in focus today, not just for equality and
governance priorities, but for the benefits for
companies and shareholders
• Since 2005, companies with at least 1 female director have
returned a compound 3.7% above their male-only
counterparts
• Since 2005, ROEs of companies with a female board
member have averaged 14.1% vs 11.2% for all male boards
• Where >15% of senior management is female, ROEs in 2013
were 14.7% vs 9.7% at companies with <10%
(Credit Suisse, 2014)
The research happened for a reason…
Zeitgeist!
Financial crisis raised questions over status quo.
Gender diversity perceived as a starting place for diversity of thought at
senior management levels
“If you keep doing what you’ve done, you’ll
get what you’ve always got”
(or Einstein’s definition of insanity!)
In the UK, the Lord Davies Report in 2011 set out ten clear
recommendations for gender diversity on Boards
Pressure for a legislative quota from the EU has helped highlight
voluntary action as the better way – listed companies objective of 40%
…and it stacks up
6 studies based on different geographies corroborate the
intuition that more diversity at board and management
levels helps improve financial performance
1. McKinsey ‘Women Matter’ 2011
2. Catalyst ‘The Bottom Line and Women’s Representation on Boards’
3. Citigroup ASX100 Women on Board Analysis August 2011
4. SocGen Getting the Right Women on Board October 2011
5. Credit Suisse Gender Diversity and Corporate Performance August 2012
6. Credit Suisse The CS Gender 3000: Women in Senior Management September 2014
How diverse is diverse?
A powerful – evidence based – argument for having a varied
board and executive team, with complementary skills and
less danger of ‘groupthink’
30% is the figure widely agreed to be when contributions of the
minority group cease being representative of that particular group and
start to be judged on their own merit (McKinsey 2011)
REMEMBER, IT’S NOT ABOUT WOMEN, IT’S ABOUT ATHLETICS
Why does diversity matter in: sport?
The global sports industry is worth
between €350 billion and €450 billion
(A.T. Kearney)
Why does diversity matter for:
European Athletics?
• Sport is becoming more competitive – on and off
the field of play
• Greater competition for peoples’ leisure time…for
an increasing proportion of the world’s population
• How can we keep Athletics on top of the podium?
• We need to ‘do better business’ in EVERY sense
What does ‘better business’ mean in practice?
Look at the prevailing cultural and infrastructure conditions that
have brought us to this point
Complexities – collective and individual
Club structure – unique to each MF – seeps into overarching EA structure
Thread of voting runs though both and ties them together
Dual approach – both MFs and EA need to tackle this together in order to
create genuine, sustainable, profitable change
Not about blame – it’s about updating governance at a local, national and
international level to best allow success
This means finding the solution that is right for you – again, individually and
collectively
Governance as a means of safeguarding – and
enhancing – ‘profitability’
“Sport leaders face a critical yet long overdue strategic
decision in properly equipping their sports for future
development.
How they decide to respond to the challenge will determine
whether their teams will win or lose the future game.
The most progressive secretary-generals, chief executives
and chairs of boards have already started modernising
internal, athletic and event governance standards to bring a
beautiful game into the future.”
(Pederson)
Governance as a means of safeguarding – and
enhancing – ‘profitability’
Three key reasons why governance is so important to sport:
1. Good governance builds trust by enabling strong
relationships with key stakeholders of the game –
INTEGRITY
1. Good governance builds growth by facilitating increased
participation and increased revenues – SUCCESS
1. Good governance builds performance by attracting and
retaining people fit for the game, motivated and supported to
perform to their full ability – QUALITY
Internal Governance and External Influence
Internal
Current reliance on member elections
Long standing MF members and elite male performers tend to be
rewarded with the top jobs
This is one of the reasons men predominate boards and adds
credence to the push for improved governance across the sector
Internal Governance and External Influence
External
Guidelines? Quotas with funding consequences?
Guidelines – United Kingdom
25% board diversity in all publicly funded sports bodies by 2017
Supported by the Sport and Recreation Alliance’s Voluntary Code of
Conduct
It has 7 principles, one of which calls for board diversity:
“Ensure board composition adequately
reflects society and the communities they serve”
Internal Governance and External Influence
Guidelines – United Kingdom
Change is happening – slowly but surely
WSFF produces Trophy Women? annually to independently report
on progress
Currently less than half of these bodies meet the quarter gender
diversity guideline
We are calling for 30%
Internal Governance and External Influence
Quotas with funding consequences – Australia
The UK voluntary approach has achieved a very similar result to the more
targeted approach taken by the Australian Sports Commission (ASC) –
rate of change is similar
ASC has seen female representation across the boards of the 55
Australian National Sporting Organisations reach 28% in 2014
The idea that there may be a causal link between governance and
integrity is being promoted by the ASC through the development of the
2013 Mandatory Sports Governance Principles
These Principles for larger partner sports receiving more than $5 million
per annum in ASC funding have financial implications for non-compliance
This is the first time that the ASC has tied funding to gender
So what could EA do & what could MFs do?
European Athletics – External Influence
Actions to support the commitment shown by endorsing the Brighton
Declaration
Keep this conversation going – recent changes to infrastructure puts the
focus on appointments
Greater promotion of the role models coming through the EA Women’s
Leadership Awards – highlighting the huge talent pool that exists
Continue to develop the pipeline through the scholarship programme
Continue with the broad recruitment strategy for appointed roles
(commissions and staff) – with merit-based appointments
BE THE LEADERS – SET THE PACE OF CHANGE
So what could EA do & what could MFs do?
Member Federations
Great opportunity to make good business decisions – EA has provided the
infrastructure
Make a decision – quotas or guidelines
Invest time and resource at both grassroots club level and at national level
Utilise the growing body of insight on coaching infrastructures and
strategies that maximise the potential of women moving through the
coaching pathway – particularly at grassroots
Not about women-only courses (unless necessary within the context)
Latest evidence suggests 50:50
Consider the structure of Coach Education - modular
So what could EA do & what could MFs do?
Member Federations
Utilise the growing body of insight on coaching infrastructures and
strategies that maximise the potential of women moving through the
coaching pathway – particularly at grassroots – if we don’t attract and
retain women at grassroots, we’ll never redress the balance
Not about women-only courses (unless necessary within the context)
Latest evidence suggests 50:50
Consider the structure of Coach Education – modular
Recognise the influence of the coach on the participation – yes it’s 50:50
on average, but remember the outliers
BE THE LEADERS – SET THE PACE OF CHANGE
So what could EA do & what could MFs do?
Member Federations
Establish local and national mentoring programmes – develop the pipeline
of women remaining in the sport – both as participants and in the
workforce, including volunteers
A fearless SWOT and skills analysis of the boards, committees and
commissions – then fill the skills gap and reflect the demographics of the
communities you serve (n.b. don’t forget the world population stat!)
Be prepared to come to the table – appointments vs elections
How broad is your recruitment strategy? Who do you nominate for
elections at European level?
Do you know how big the pool of talented women in your sport is?
(p.s. it’s
HUGE!)
Ok – But Quotas or Guidelines?
It’s not a one size fits all approach
You are all unique, with your own local cultural and societal
challenges
So...
…each MF needs to find the right approach for them…
to allow the evolving EA infrastructure to yield the best results –
this infrastructure allows for both approaches…
…be first out of the blocks, make a commitment to keeping
Athletics competitive
World leaders as the most
fair and equitable sport:
reflecting and affecting
society
Decision makers
representative of
participant profile
Better governance;
greater integrity
Greater exposure to
current and potential
participants
A positive association
for investors and
stakeholders
Increased
media profile
Increased
commercial
investment
The Bottom Line
Women in decision making roles aren’t there to merely
comment on women’s participation in the same way that
men aren’t there to merely comment on men’s
participation.
Athletics leading the way in terms of participation – which
makes the decline in representation as seniority, decision
making and influence increases even more prominent.
Athletics has a great opportunity to lead the way in being
an equitable sport from field of play to boardroom, and be
the market leaders in the increasingly competitive
business of global sport.
“It has been argued by many that sports mirror the
society in which they operate. In this way sport is a
microcosm of society.
Sport is more than a mirror reflection. A mirror
provides a passive reflection, but sport is not a passive
reflection.
Sport is active and affects what it is a reflection of.
Further sport not only reflects society, it also dramatises
the social order.
These unique aspects are what make clear the moral
significance of sport both for the individual and
society at large.”
(Eitzen 2001)
THIS IS YOUR OPPORTUNITY TO AFFECT
SOCIETY – THE TIME IS NOW
THANK YOU
I look forward to hearing your thoughts and answering
your questions during the panel
www.wsff.org.uk
@wsff_uk