The Roles and Responsibilities of the Chief Operating Officer (COO) in Sports Organizations

The role of a chief operating officer (COO) is one with which many sports fans may be potentially unfamiliar; indeed, many fans may be unable to name who their club COO was or currently is. Typically, the individual occupying the position is not exposed to external scrutiny from the media, club supporters or indeed organizational scholars (Bennett & Miles, 2006; Hambrick & Cannella, 2004), and as a result the COO typically goes mostly unnoticed by many sports fans and journalists. Oversight by the media is somewhat surprising, given that COO job descriptions typically identify him/her as the senior executive held responsible for overseeing the execution and ‘day-to-day’ performance of the club.