The attraction, retention/transition and nurturing process of sport development : some Australian evidence

The purpose of this study was to explore and map the sport development processes in Australia. A grounded theory approach identified sport development processes by examining 74 annual reports from 35 national sporting organizations (NSOs) over a period of 4 years, before and after the Sydney Olympic Games. The 3 frameworks presented in this article representing the attraction, retention/ transition, and nurturing process illustrate the generic processes and strategies described by NSOs. The results show that each sport development process requires human and financial input from various stakeholders. These stakeholders initiate or implement sport development strategies for each process and each process has different sport development outputs. These results contribute to the extant literature of sport development by demonstrating that sport development is more complex and encompassing than previously described. It is proposed that the generic frameworks derived from this study be subject to more specific testing using other sport systems, as context and case studies could lead to tailoring the frameworks to represent specific sport development processes and systems.

Sport development, systems, policies and pathways : an introduction to the special issue

Fundamentally sport development is about participation and promoting the opportunities and benefits of participation. Participation in sport and physical activity spans a wide range of contexts including the wholesomeness associated with the freedom of children’s play to the modification of sport to allow children to be children a little longer. The cycle of participation continues to junior and youth sport, where the rules, regulations and traditions of a sport become the foundation to protecting the “institution” of sport, to participation in senior competitions and ultimately, to elite and professional sport. Sport development research and practice therefore is concerned with all these manifestations of the sport experience. It logically follows that the purview of sport development is quite large and potentially complex. Moreover, it is possible to identify at least five themes that could be used to categorise sport development research. These themes include; policy, development through sport, development of sport, future patterns of sport delivery and marketing in terms of the relationship between professional sport and participation.

Tennis Australia : a case study of financial management for sport development at the club level

There has been substantial work that examines financial management in professional sport which has assisted scholars and practitioners to better understand processes and policies to ensure teams and leagues are sustainable (Andreff & Staudohar, 2000; Howard & Crompton, 2004; Kraekel, 2007; Lewis, Sexton, & Lock, 2007; Li, Hofacre, & Mahony, 2001). However, there has been a paucity of scholarly research that examines financial management at the grass roots levels of sport, and how this integrates with national sport organisation strategic planning, with the exception of the recent work by Havaris and Danylchuk (2007). This study aims to add to this gap in knowledge by examining financial management at the club level of tennis in Australia.

Challenges for sport development: women's entry level cycling participation

Sport participation is an issue of relevance to sport managers, yet it is an often-neglected area of sport management research. Cycling is a particularly complex form of participation to examine given its many formats, including sport, recreational and commuter cycling, and the multifaceted nature of the cycling landscape involving a broad range of stakeholders. In Australia, women are underrepresented in cycling participation and membership (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2012; Cycling Australia, 2014), yet women show an interest in cycling training courses. The present paper explores motivations, supports and constraints reported by a group of entry-level female cyclists who participated in a training programme accredited by AustCycle, an initiative led by Cycling Australia. We draw on a health and sport development driven framework, informed by social ecological theory (Rowe et al., 2013), and suited to examining the issue of women's cycling participation in Australia. Results show that a range of individual characteristics, and factors within the social and physical environment, were perceived by study participants as barriers to participation. Of these, skill level, confidence, traffic/road conditions, and social support networks held particular relevance. Participants also discussed specific cycling barriers and supports of relevance to certain forms of cycling. Preliminary insights into perceptions held by a group of entry-level female cyclists highlight overlaps between cycling formats and indicate that conceptual advancements in the development of sport, and development through sport could be collectively considered in the context of women's cycling participation. Further research opportunities were also identified.