Seeing Ourselves in Sport
Strategic Planning for Padideh Shahr-e Khodrou Club Brand Development : Using Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, Results Strategic Framework View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Jacqueline Stavros, Bahador Azizi
The purpose of the study is strategic planning for Padideh Shahr-e Khodrou Club Brand Development using strengths, opportunities, aspirations, results (SOAR) framework. SOAR is a profoundly positive organizational intervention (POI) of strategic thinking, planning, and leading. The applied research method is descriptive-analytical with interviews that were conducted individually and in focus groups. The SOAR dialogical and analytical approach was developed to formulate a strategy for developing and describing the strengths, opportunities, aspirations, and measurable and meaningful results. The purposeful sample of this study included all sports management and marketing experts in Khorasan Razavi province. The findings present the strengths, opportunities, and aspirations of the club's brand development. The expected results are to: win the title of Iranian Premier League in the next three years, win the Asian Championship in the next five years, identify and introduce five top football talents annually, have 50% annual increase in club supporters, acquiring national and international standards, have 30% annual increase in private sector investment, and have 30% annual increase in club revenue. By implementing innovative economic programs, the brand supports its stakeholders’ aspirations. With increase club's revenue generation, it will lead to better facilities and resources to achieve the goal that supports club's brand success and development.
Australia’s Ultimate Tall Poppy - Shane Warne View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Julie-Ann C Tullberg, Tom F Heenan
Australian sports celebrities are supposedly tall poppies. Placed on pedestals, their on-field and off-field behaviours are heavily scrutinised by the general and sporting media and wider community. This scrutiny has intensified with social media. Celebrities’ indiscretions are captured on smartphones and damaging material is posted in online community sports forums and various social media channels, sometimes resulting in sanctions by governing sport bodies. The dissemination of this material can be partially attributed to tall poppy syndrome, a deeply ingrained cultural attitude whereby people cut-down sport stars’ reputations in response to less-than-perfect performances and/or off-field personal indiscretions. This paper analyses this syndrome through a comparative examination of the career of the Australian cricketer and arguably the nation’s only global sporting celebrity, Shane Warne. Despite his frequent off-field indiscretions, which led to suspension, the stripping of the Australian vice-captaincy and the breakdown of his marriage, he retained public support and bucked the tall poppy trend. As this paper shows, Warne was able to control his public persona through the media and social media, in particular. This persona fed into national myths of Australian suburb, masculinity and whiteness, and the unworldly Australian ‘bogan’ abroad. Warne was forgiven his faults and mourned on his death because he constructed a persona that reflected an Australian stereotype based on how many White Australian males saw themselves.
Featured Young Ethnic Women's Dropout of Organized Sport in Denmark: The Influence of Parents, Culture and Religion View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Allai Abou Chaker
Young Danish women with ethnic minority background have a significantly higher dropout rate from sports participation than their Danish peers. Across racial and ethnic groups, young women from non-western countries have the highest dropout rates in youth sports, while studies also show that this group is less physically active when compared to their Danish counterparts and ethnic minority males. They also show an inverse relationship between the women’s age and their sport participation – when they enter puberty dropout rates increase dramatically. Therefore it is important to investigate whether honor-based social control in ethnic groups in Denmark influence young ethnic women’s decisions regarding membership and participation in Danish sports clubs and identify the cultural and religious values, which may influence the dropout rate. The study is based on interviews with parents of two groups of young ethnic women with a Muslim background. One group consists of 5-7 sets of parents to girls and young women who stopped playing sports around the onset of puberty. The other consists of 5-7 sets of parents to girls and young women who continued playing sports after the onset of puberty. Some of implications are: language barrieres (Danish, English and Arabic), Insider vs. Outsider, different limitations in the project.
