To be able to appropriately govern a sport facility, a manager must have a clear understanding of the concept of organizational effectiveness. Organizational effectiveness is the concept of how efficient a business is in achieving the outcomes set forth in the planning processes. Measuring organizational effec-tiveness is central to the evaluation of what a sport facility delivers from programmatic, operational, and managerial perspectives. It is an integral process to prove the investors and donors that the money being provided is being used to accomplish the goals of the organization, to evaluate the communication processes and ethical actions of the business, and to serve as a foundational process for determining strategic growth.
For a sport facility to be effective and achieve its goals and objectives, the ownership and the governance structures must be able to successfully respond to changes in its environment. Changes in the environment may be internal to the sport facility organization/management/operation, or external (examples include customer’s needs, the economy, politics, legal issues, and the media). At the same time, there is a need for an organization to understand the attributes of flexibility in correlation to control. Flexibility allows faster change, whereas control allows a firmer grasp on current operations. How these two concerns work in congruency in both the internal and external environments is a signifi-cant measure of organizational effectiveness.
Numerous models have been developed to help sport facilities measure organization effectiveness based on the varying levels of environmental and organizational attributes. The following chart articulates the major models of organizational effectiveness that are utilized in sport facilities globally.
Model Description
Goal (or rational goal) Where the achievement of specific organizational goals determine effectiveness.
Establish the general goal.
Discover objectives for accomplishment.
Define activities for each objectives.
Measure level of success.
Designed to enhance strategic planning by link-ing program goals and resource allocation levels.
Is output based and in measureable terms – not always good because all effectiveness is not output based.
Process (or internal process) Focuses on the effectiveness of the internal trans-formation process.
Emphasis on control and the internal focus, and stresses the role of information management, communication, stability, and control.
Systems resources Where effectiveness is determined in terms of the ability to attract and secure valuable resources, such as operating capital, physical resources, and quality human resources
Multiple constituency Where effectiveness is not internally judged, but is based on the judgment of its constituents.
In the case of a sport facility, it may include spectators, promoters, resident teams, and vendors.
Often used as a viable alternative to the goal and systems approaches.
Strategic constituencies Effectiveness is determined by the extent to which the organization satisfies all of its strategic
constituencies.
For a sport facility, it would include spectators, vendors, home teams, the media, sponsors, etc.) Open system Effectiveness is measured as a result of the degree
that an organization acquires inputs from its environment and has outputs accepted by its environment.
Continued
Model Description
Competing values Effectiveness that is measured based on the inter-action between four sets of competing values:
Internal Focus and Integration;
External Focus and Differentiation;
Flexibility and Discretion;
Control and Stability.
High-performing system Effectiveness as a measurement that compare itself to other similar organizations.
Human relations Effectiveness measured based on the development of the organization’s personnel.
Places emphasis on flexibility and internal focus.
Stresses cohesion, morale, and human resources as a development criteria for effectiveness.
Legitimacy Effectiveness measured by acting lawfully and ethically in the eyes of the internal and external environment.
Fault-driven Effectiveness seeks to eliminate traces of ineffec-tiveness in its internal functioning through the design of backup plans to be reliable even if some components fail.
On a final note, sport facility managers and owners need to acknowledge a contingency approach to organizational effectiveness, as there is no best model. There are numerous variables that influence organizational effectiveness, including changes in the organizational structure, the implementation of new technologies, opportunities and threats in the environment that affect the sport facility, and the people using the sport facility (both customers and human resources) – to name a few. As a result, sport facilities owners and managers must take a situational approach to organizational effectiveness to attain an optimum solution for a specific set of circumstances that arise.
Chapter review
A sport facility must operate under a specific legal business structure to be a viable business. Understanding these various business structures and the operational framework each allows is crucial to the operations and management of a sport facility from a legal and functional standpoint. The three main cate-gories of business structures are sole proprietorships, partnerships, and corpo-rations. The most basic form of business ownership is a sole proprietorship,
where only one individual owns the facility and is responsible for the overall administration and liabilities of the sport facility. A partnership is where more than one individual who shares the overall administration and business opera-tions of the sport facility. There are a number of partnership structures utilized for sport facilities including general partnerships and limited partnerships.
General partners are directly involved with the day-to-day operations of the facility and have full liability, whereas limited partners have financial liability but not operational liability or responsibility. Corporations are business struc-ture created under the laws and regulations of governmental authority made up of a group of individuals who obtain a charter authorizing them as a legal body where the powers, rights, authority, and liabilities of the entity are distinct from the individuals making up the group. There are various corporate structures for sport facilities including C-Corporation, a close corporation, an S-corporation, a limited liability corporation, a publicly traded corporation, or a non-profit corporation.
Sport facility ownership usually fall under one of three governance structures.
Public sport facilities are usually operated under governmental or quasi-governmental ownership either through federal, regional, or local jurisdictions.
Non-profit sport facilities are those managed by volunteer executives and hire paid staff to carry out day-to-day operations, with the ultimate goal not based on profit but on public benefit. The main goal of commercial sport facilities is to make a profit. A unique governance structure is governance by trust, where a benefactor places an asset (such as a sport facility) into a trust, that is managers by an assigned party (trust manager) to ensure the customers (beneficiaries) benefit from the services of the sport facility. These trusts can be either as a charitable organization, a non-profit without charity status, or a public interest company.
To appropriately govern a sport facility, a manager must have a clear under-standing of the concept of organizational effectiveness, which is the concept of how efficient a business is in achieving the outcomes set forth in the planning processes. While there are multiple models of organizational effectiveness, it is important to recognize and acknowledge the need for a contingency approach to govern a sport facility, as there is no other best model – which is only an optimum solution for a specific set of circumstances.