On Tuesday 28 February 2017, London Sport hosted a consultation for a Bigger and Better Workforce for physical activity and sport in London at the KIA Oval. The consultation is a vital step for partners throughout the whole sport sector to begin to address how we can be better together and support the growth and development of London’s future workforce, as part of a major project launched earlier this year.
Angus Robertson, Director of Operations at London Sport set the scene reiterating the importance of the workforce – “the people behind the people” – in order to meet London’s ambition to get 1,000,000 Londoners more active by 2020.
Stuart Armstrong – Sport England’s Head of Coaching brought to life their recent “people strategies” Coaching in an Active Nation and Volunteering in an Active Nation. The principles that underpin these strategies will be integral to creating a bigger and better workforce. There are dual benefits for the coach, volunteer, and participant: contributing to wider society; an improvement in peoples experiences of physical activity and sport through alignment to their individual needs and aspirations; a focus on less active people driven by insight.
Stuart’s passion is inspirational and he left a palpable energy in the room as we switched our focus from why this is so important to what are we going to do about it. The aim of the day was to provide clarity and outlay the commitment of everyone to shape and develop a framework that will enable us all to work better together. Whilst acknowledging that this will be both complex and challenging, the commitment of the people at KIA Oval was clearly evident.
This consultation was one of first steps in this research project, there are many more we need to take. If you were unable to be at the consultation (or even if you were), we still want you involved shaping the project. You can engage with our research partner for this project, HPI Proactive on twitter using @hpi_proactive and @hpibiggerbetter.
If you have thoughts about the research project you would like to share, click here.
For more information on this research programme and London Sport’s wider commitments to coaching and volunteering, please contact Dean Nevill, Specialist Advisor for Workforce at London Sport via [email protected] or 020 7868 5055.
