How old's too old? 40 is the new 60; WFH WTF; Booze culture; Noisy v Quiet offices; Ed Warner on UKA; If Tesco Ran Sport; How to get ahead in the sports business; Ryan Reynolds on marketing
Overthinking the sports business, for money
Have you checked out Substack Notes yet? It’s like Twitter, only good.
The People Thread
We talk a lot about things: deals, trends, companies, stuff.
Not enough about people.
So we’ve launched a pod to rectify that.
It’s called How To Get Ahead In The Sports Business.
The title is an homage to Bruce Robinson’s third best film.
Due almost entirely to the intelligence and honesty of our two brilliant guests - Ishveen Jolly and Mark Thompson - the initial conversation is just the start, prompting new questions and new threads.
Here’s a few to get us going.
1. 40 is the new 60
We need to talk about ageism, the least fashionable ism.
The sports business is a microcosm of society.
So it’s obsessed with youth and the next thing.
There’s a large cohort of people who don’t get jobs because they're deemed to be past it.
Or they’re just too expensive. Or they want to work fewer days and that’s a bad signal to the rest of the crew.
What’s the answer to this?
Is it on the employer to be more flexible, or on the older candidates to accept that pay isn’t always going to go up, and that their asset wealth is part of their compensation…tricky.
See also: The Wall Street Journal did a thing about hiring older people. Click the image.
2. Work as life, office as church
Work was something we did.
Now it’s who we are.
My generation has lived and worked through the self help era, which has packaged work and the office as the central part of our lives.
As Ishveen Jolly notes, today we look to our workplace to fulfil so many of our needs, that were previously met by church, family and other areas of life.
That too much pressure.
As Arthur Miller put it, in Death of a Salesman:
“Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!”
3. WFH WTF
Covid and it’s aftermath may have been a useful corrective.
Working from home has blown up the idea of corporate culture.
What is a business now, what’s left?
4. Networking as euphemism for drinking
Does sport have a booze culture?
So much of the work is hospitality based, with drink at the centre of the event.
Does it turn people in to drinkers, or attract them?
After work drinks are great if you like drinking. Not if you don’t.
5. Noisy v quiet offices
What was your first office like?
Mine was a jungle.
People on phones, shouting across the room, the informal curriculum of this is how things are done here.
I probably romanticise it.
It certainly over-rewarded extroverts and performative working.
Now offices are like libraries (remember them?).
But how do young people learn the realities of the job when nobody makes a call in the open office?
Btw, Susan Cain’s book Quiet changed my mind about how offices work and how they don’t.
6. Are recruitment consultants a waste of money?
In the social media age, you probably know your next hire.
Recruitment consultants perpetuate narrowness, discuss: The same types of people get put forward, and so it goes on.
If you want diversity, why not just put your ad in the job centre? The medium is the message, etc. (See also…Job of the Week, below)
“If you sense I’m pissed off, you’d be right”
Former UK Athletics chair Ed Warner on the state of UK Athletics, must-read status.
See also: Michael Johnson did a great thread on how to re-energise track and field…
Ryan Reynolds on marketing
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See also: Ben Foster saving a penalty.
If Tesco Ran Sport
Still talking about ‘The Gen Z Sports Fan’?
That’s just lazy.
Job of the Week
The Role: Strategy Director, Cake - London
The Blurb: We are looking for a highly experienced senior strategist, with at least 6 years’ experience in the sports industry.
The ideal candidate will have a breadth of experience across a variety of strategic projects spanning sport and entertainment – from research and insight to brand, creative, comms, partnerships, and commercial strategy. This must include a deep understanding of partnerships - from helping brands select the right partner, to working with rightsholders on their commercial ‘sell’.
They will also be intrinsic to driving growth through new business, know and understand the worlds of the brands and rights holders you work with and enrich the role and the reputation of the agency and beyond.
The Link: Tell them UP sent ya
