Your people are the heart of sport and active recreation organisations, and are central to the identity, values, and impact within sporting communities. Leaders, members, and volunteers all play a crucial role in driving behaviours, culture and community presence.
Investing in your people's development helps to build skills and confidence, and strengthens your organisation’s capacity to grow and adapt to changes that affect your sport, the sector and the community in which it operates. Importantly, investing in your people helps to foster an inclusive and vibrant culture where everyone feels supported and inspired to contribute.
Recruiting your Leaders
Great leaders are critical to running a successful organisation. Leaders set the organisation’s vision, make key decisions, and are central to creating a welcoming and inclusive culture. Organisations should ensure they actively seek out leaders with a variety of skills and from a range of backgrounds to ensure the leaders reflect the community they serve.
Prior to commencing recruitment, organisations should:
- Review your constitution to ensure appointments align with any constitutional requirements.
- Consider the skills and diversity your board already has and where the gaps are.
- Outline the expectations and commitment required for the position to ensure that candidates understand the responsibilities and are ready to contribute.
- Consider establishing a nominations committee to assess recruitment of key positions.
Organisations should also provide a thorough onboarding process so new board members feel welcomed, informed, and able to contribute. This should be linked to your succession planning so that your leadership stays strong over time.
If your organisation wants to advertise vacant board positions, you can now do so on the Australian Sports Commission's new Jobs Board (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site).
For information and guidance on how to recruit and retain strong and diverse leaders see:
Learning Opportunity: ASC Governance Education Module:
The Players - Board Diversity (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site)
Supporting your Leaders
It is important that your leaders are well-supported and able to assess their performance in line with clear strategic aims and objectives. Along with a well-written strategic plan which outlines clear and measurable targets, your organisation may benefit from:
- Developing a schedule for assessing the performance of the organisation against specific measures.
- Regularly assessing the performance of leaders and provide feedback, development opportunities and support where needed.
- Engaging in open, constructive discussions about how leaders interact and work together.
For information and guidance on how to support your leaders see:
Upskilling your Leaders
Continual training and upskilling ensures your leaders have the skills to lead confidently and adapt to an evolving sector.
ORSR encourages all leaders in the sporting and active recreation sector to undertake sport governance education and training provided by ASC:
The Board Manual - Governance in Action | Australian Sports Commission (external site)
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These short learning modules take between 1 and 2 hours each to complete, and provide useful foundational knowledge to be an effective leader.
Future Leaders
As well as setting your organisation up for current success, it is important to identify future leaders to help your organisation achieve sustained success. The above learning modules are useful to provide new leaders as part of their induction.
More information on how to achieve this can be found in Succession Planning.
If you are an invidivual looking to volunteer, please see our Become a Volunteer page.
Recruiting your Volunteers
As well as identifying the key people within your organisation to volunteer, looking outside your close network can be a good way to grow the capacity, diversity and skillset of your volunteers. Organisations should ensure that volunteering opportunities are appealing to the people you are trying to attract, and flexible to their needs. Sport and active recreation organisations should avoid relying on a small number of volunteers to do the wide range of jobs that are required for their day-to-day operations and find new ways to engage volunteers.
For information and guidance on how to recruit volunteers see:
Supporting your Volunteers
Ensuring that your volunteers feel supported will maximise the chances of retaining them. This includes sufficient induction processes for new volunteers, ensuring they have ongoing access to the tools and support they need, ongoing training and education, and effectively managing any disputes or conflicts. Sport and active recreation organisations also have a responsibility to keep volunteers updated of any changes that may affect them and provide avenues for volunteers to provide feedback.
For information and guidance on how to support volunteers see:
Recognising your Volunteers
It is important that the contributions made by volunteers are appropriately celebrated and recognised as this will contribute to your organisations retaining high-quality volunteers. To do this, it is important to understand what motivates them to volunteer and try to match that with how they are recognised. This could be in the form of letters of recommendation, covering costs for coach accreditation, public recognition, or free club apparel.
Recognising your volunteers should be central to how your organisation attracts and retains its volunteer workforce. Although volunteers offer excellent return on a small investment, they should not be considered as a free workforce and need to be recognised appropriately.
For information and guidance on how to recognise volunteers see:
Volunteering SA&NT
Volunteering SA&NT is a not-for-profit organisation that acts as the peak body for volunteering in South Australia and the Northern Territory. In partnership with Sport SA, Volunteering SA&NT have developed the WeDo Sport platform, which provides a platform to match potential volunteers with opportunities.
To post a volunteering opportunity, you can sign up to the WeDo Sport platform (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site).
To find a volunteering opportunity, you can access the WeDo Sport platform (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) or the Volunteer Assist platform (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site).
Working with Children Checks for Volunteers
For more information, head to Keeping Children Safe.
Engaging with your Members
Your members are the experts in the experience that your organisation provides and are well-placed to help you improve. It is important to put your members at the centre of your decision-making and ensure that their opinions are heard and acted upon. This may include member surveys or forums outside of annual AGMs to check-in with how your members think the organisation is being run. Consider the following points when engaging with your members:
- Have a clear purpose on what you want feedback on and why you are seeking this.
- Ensure that the easy and appropriate (e.g. confidential or open forum) feedback channels are available to members.
- Advertise opportunities to provide feedback to all members.
- Acknowledge your members’ feedback and thank them for their involvement in the organisation's operations.
- Act on the feedback and share with your members the changes you have made.
For information and guidance on how to engage with your members see:
Protecting your Members
Sport and active recreation organisations have a responsibility to create environments that prevent and address discrimination and harassment and are safe and inclusive for everyone.
If you are affiliated with a national sporting organisation that is signed up to the National Integrity Framework (NIF) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site), your organisation and its members will be covered under a comprehensive member protection policy. You can check if your organisation is signed up to the NIF here (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site).
If your national sporting organisation is not signed up to the NIF, Sporting Integrity Australia provide resources for how to develop a Member Protection Policy (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) that is aligned with the NIF.
In addition, organisations should nominate a Member Protection Information Officer (MPIO). An MPIO is responsible for providing information about a member’s rights and responsibilities when making a complaint or raising a concern and supporting them during this process. Sport SA offer comprehensive MPIO Training (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) for South Australian sport and active recreation organisations.
For information and guidance on how to protect your members see:
Member Protection Information Officers | Play by the Rules
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Information and Resources for Members of Sport | Sport Integrity Australia (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site)
Further information and resources:
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Drivers and Barriers to Participation | Australian Sports Commission (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site) (external si (external site) (external site) (external site) (external site)(external site) (external site) (external site) (external site)
