Sport NI have gathered many of the leading sports coaches, administrators and thinkers together in Belfast for a two day GameChanger conference looking at the changing nature of sport.
We were there yesterday to see Damien Hughes open up proceedings with a strong session on the power of organisational culture drawn from the year he spent with Barcelona FC.
Looking at how leaders emerge from within a team environamnt to become ‘cultural architechts’ was a fascinating way to kick off the week and gave plenty of food for thought.
Sport NI has drawn together around 250 to attend the conference in the magnificant surroundings of the Titanic Museum.
There was irony given the location that Dave Conway, who led the development of the Sport Ireland Campus through its early phases, used the metapgor of an iceberg to illustrate the amount of work that needs to go in below the surface to provide sporting facilities from informal playgrounds all the way through to international sporting venues.
Other breakout sessions included looking at wellbeing, talent development and more.
Sport Ireland’s Dr Una May was a key contributor to a session looking at how agencies and academics are meeting the challenge of creating a physical activity plan to counter the threat of sedentary behaviour.
The figures from last week’s publication of a Sport Ireland and Sport NI report into Children’s physical activity left a serious amount of questions on how current thinking is failing to halt the slide in terms of the amount of time children are spending active.
This is one of the biggest and most difficult challenges that sport and the world of physical activity promotion faces and will be central to the strategic plan that Sport NI are now beginning to prepare to bring them through to 2025.
Northern Ireland football manager Michael O’Neill was another keynote speaker yeaterday and the conference continues today with a panel discussion on Women in Sport and another from Tony Adams on ‘Dealing with Addiction and Pressure in Sport.’
A big part of the value of an event like this is the opportunity for those involved in the delivery of sport to come togtether and learn together across such a wide range of issues.
