The Role and Responsibilities of the Sporting Director (SD) in Elite Sports Organizations

The demand for high-performance ‘on’ and ‘off’ the field in elite sports organizations is not a recent phenomenon. Indeed, the motto of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has long been recognized as ‘Citius, Altius, Fortius’ (or faster, higher, stronger). In 2021, IOCs’ motto has evolved to include ‘communiter’ (or ‘together’). The evolution of the Olympic motto reflects a need for its executives to embrace solidarity, unity, and alignment of its stakeholders’ needs. The imperative to review organizational alignment is not that it is unique to the world of elite sports but shared throughout high-performing organizations (Gammelsaeter, 2013). In professional sports, the emergence of senior executives tasked with providing alignment between the business and sporting domains of their club is arguably a reflection of the evolution and modernization of professional sports. A case study of association football (aka ‘soccer’) in the UK reveals that professional clubs have responded to the commercialization of the game and the imperatives for modernization by reviewing their organizational hierarchies and criteria for staff appointments. The search for ‘marginal gains’ (Clear, 2018) and competitive advantage has led clubs to critically appraise the impact and power of the ‘head coach’ (aka ‘gaffer’ in the UK industry parlance). The role of the head coach in professional club football is historically contentious. According to Kelly (2008), the head coach has traditionally been regarded as a totemic individual and regarded as the main ‘architect’ of club success, without whom the club would ‘fail’. A high-performance organization cannot be maintained by one person with total control, that is, a unicorn leader (Mowbray, 2011). The implication for the sports team that employs individuals who proport to ‘unicorn’ status is that they inevitably lack the intellectual/strategic depth of knowledge to coordinate the complex business/sporting needs of a global business. The need for an executive who can ‘bridge’ both worlds (sporting and business) is therefore imperative. Hence, the need for a senior executive who is commercially astute while understanding the nuances and divergent needs of internal and external stakeholders is of growing importance to club ownership/investors. This individual, who provides the technical and commercial ‘bridge’ to the boardroom, is now commonly titled one of the following: technical director, sporting director (SD), general manager, chief sports officer, etc. What all titles share is the common purpose of supporting high-performance strategy (both on and off the field of play). Any individual appointed to the role of SD for an elite team will therefore need to have a rack record of exceptional level of both technical and business intelligence.