Buried Accomplishments: Institutional Isomorphism in College Athletics Mission Statements

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Russell E. Ward
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equity ◽  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Mission Statement ◽  
Mission Statements ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Academic Advancement ◽  
External Pressures

Despite suggestions that mission statements represent a strategic component of organizational communication, there has been little research of these documents in athletic departments at U.S. colleges and universities. The purpose of this research was to explore the relationship between mission statement content and athletic department accomplishments in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I schools (N = 343). The content analysis of mission statements revealed that athletics missions do not differentiate accomplished from less accomplished athletic programs. Athletic departments with strong traditions of promoting the academic advancement of student-athletes, achieving gender equity, and complying with NCAA rules tend to reference these distinctions in the same way as departments with less favorable histories. Grounded in institutional theory, this article describes the external pressures toward sameness rather than differentiation in mission statement content. Implications for intercollegiate athletics and higher education are discussed.

scholarly journals Markets: Cartel Behavior and Amateurism in College Sports

2007 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 209-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence M Kahn
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Product Quality ◽  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Arms Race ◽  
Head Coaches ◽  
State Appropriations ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Men's Basketball

This paper studies intercollegiate athletics in the context of the theory of cartels. Some point to the explicit attempts by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to restrict output and payments for factors of production as evidence of cartel behavior. Others argue that such limits enhance product quality by preserving amateurism. I find that the NCAA's compensation limits on athletes lead to high levels of rents from the entertainment revenues produced by the athletes, a finding consistent with the cartel interpretation. The athletes producing these rents are disproportionately African-American, while the beneficiaries are primarily white. The rents are typically spent on facilities, nonrevenue sports, and, possibly, head coaches' salaries. Big-time football and men's basketball programs earn accounting profits, although the athletic departments in which they reside make accounting losses on average. However, there is some evidence, albeit not unanimous, that sports generate alumni contributions, state appropriations, and additional student applications. But, arms race considerations suggest that there may be some societal gains to the aggregate limitation of spending on college athletics.

Greening Our Front Porch: Environmental Sustainability in Collegiate Athletics

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-17
Author(s):  
Jamee A. Pelcher ◽  
Brian P. McCullough
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Sustainability ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Collegiate Athletics ◽  
Sport Organizations ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Environmentally Sustainable ◽  
Sustainability Initiatives ◽  
Sports Organization

Sport organizations have begun to widely implement environmental sustainability into their daily operations, but more needs to be done to properly plan and implement these initiatives to ensure their long-term success. Specifically, college athletic departments struggle to be proactive in their approach to environmental sustainability despite the vast resources available to leverage in order to deeply commit to being an environmentally sustainable department on campus. This case study examines the strategic planning of sustainability initiatives in the Smallville University Athletic Department. This case provides students with an opportunity to (a) explore the importance of sustainability in sport, (b) analyze the role of stakeholders in a sports organization, (c) investigate common barriers to implementing sustainability in college athletics, and (d) consider creative options for implementing sustainable initiatives.

scholarly journals The Case for Paying College Athletes

2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allen R. Sanderson ◽  
John J. Siegfried
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Labor Markets ◽  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
College Athlete ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Men's Basketball ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Legal Challenges ◽  
Or Team

Big-time commercialized intercollegiate athletics has attracted considerable attention in recent years. Popularity of this uniquely American activity, measured by attendance, television ratings, or team revenues, has never been higher. At the same time, however, several high-profile scandals exposing unseemly behavior on the part of players, coaches, and even respected higher education institutions—as well as questions about the distribution of the enormous revenues pouring into university athletic departments—have marred the image of these college football and men's basketball programs. Currently there are several legal challenges to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and its member institutions that may change dramatically and permanently the arrangements between the NCAA cartel, its member colleges and universities, and the “student-athletes” who play on the teams. These challenges all focus on the NCAA's collective fixing of players' wages. We describe this peculiar “industry,” detailing the numerous market imperfections in both output and labor markets, the demand for and supply of college athlete labor, and possible alternative arrangements in the college athlete labor market, including the ramifications of compensating players beyond the tuition, room, board, books, and fees that some current players already receive as grants-in-aid.

Multi Criteria Decision-Making: Ticket Sales Outsourcing in an NCAA Division I Athletic Department

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seungbum Lee ◽  
Matthew Juravich
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
Multi Criteria Decision Making ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Ticket Sales ◽  
Intercollegiate Sport ◽  
Division 1 ◽  
The Status ◽  
Outsourcing Decision

Outsourcing in sport is not a new phenomenon. Specifically, outsourcing in intercollegiate sport has become common among athletic departments across the NCAA. While outsourcing can be employed to generate increased revenues via enhanced sales, marketing, or fundraising functions, many midmajor institutions are utilizing outsourcing partners exclusively to manage ticket sales. As such, this case presents a scenario in which an athletic director and her management team are faced with assessing three options related to ticket sales outsourcing at a midmajor NCAA Division 1 institution. Utilizing the lens of multi criteria decision-making, financial, nonfinancial, and circumstantial data are provided for readers to address an outsourcing decision in the context of intercollegiate athletics. By examining three options including maintaining the status quo, considering another outsourcing partner, or bringing ticket sales operations in-house, this case provides an opportunity for students to investigate the role of ticket sales outsourcing as it relates to revenue generation, a pertinent issue for athletic departments across the NCAA.

Raising Awareness and Commitment to Gender Equity in Athletics a Developmental Workshop

1998 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 33-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cynthia Lee A. Pemberton ◽  
Robert B. Everhart
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equity ◽  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
Field Test ◽  
Title Ix ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
Resistance To Change ◽  
Field Tests ◽  
Willingness To Participate ◽  
Division Iii ◽  
Gender Specific

The purpose of the project described in this study was to develop and field-test an educational workshop designed to lower individual and organizational resistance to change relative to the issues of gender equity in intercollegiate athletics. The effectiveness of the workshop was assessed by addressing three questions: (a) Did participants believe that their participation in the workshop increased their awareness and understanding of Title IX?; (b) Did participants believe that their participation in the workshop increased their awareness and understanding of the gender specific value of sport?; and, (c) Do/did participants indicate that they intended to initiate actions to facilitate further gender equity on their own campuses?Workshop participants included intercollegiate athletic personnel from two National Athletic Intercollegiate Association and/or National Collegiate Athletic Association Division III member institutions. The institutions and participants were selected based on their willingness to participate in the workshop fiel, d-tests.The workshop content addressed Title IX and the gender specific value of sport using a combination lecture and small group activity format. The effectiveness of the workshop was assessed using a post-workshop survey, workshop facilitator notes and reflections, and in the case of the first workshop field-test, focus group and follow-up interviews.The findings were: (a) Both workshop field-tests were effective in lowering change resistance as defined in this project, with the revised workshop being more effective than the original workshop; and, (b) The workshop was improved through consideration and implementation of selected education change strategies and adult learning theory.

Big money, corruption, and black markets

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 399-415
Author(s):  
Tyler Custis ◽  
Meghan Hoben ◽  
Payton Larsen
Keyword(s):  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Free Market ◽  
Labor Law ◽  
Revenue Sharing ◽  
Black Market ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Financial Reports ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Compensation Gap

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore why the stagnant version of amateurism that is being used by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and its member institutions to limit student–athlete compensation is creating labor law and antitrust violations, and ultimately contributing to a black market in college athletics. Design/methodology/approach The qualitative portion of the examination uses a review of historic and recent cases regarding labor law and antitrust violations and applies them to the college athletic industry. Furthermore, the quantitative portion creates a scaled revenue sharing calculation utilizing financial reports from university athletic departments and corresponding professional revenue-sharing agreements to discern an approximate value of a student–athlete’s participation. Findings The authors find that the current structure of the NCAA and regulatory framework perpetuate injustice for those who lack a voice in the system. Furthermore, the research shows a wage disparity of millions of dollars creating a lack of free market and black-market tensions to reach free market equilibrium. Social implications This research creates reasoning to restructure the NCAA system to adjust for modern commercialization and profits of the industry. Originality/value This paper highlights the legal and regulatory abuses by the NCAA, and demonstrates how the compensation gap created by these legal violations is creating a strain on free market flow ultimately leading to a black-market effect in the industry.

Stakeholder status in the identification, prioritization and management of college athletic donors

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Matt R. Huml ◽  
Alicia M. Cintron
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity Theory ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Stakeholder Management ◽  
Rank Order ◽  
Collegiate Athletics ◽  
Stakeholder Salience ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Economic Capacity

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine how athletic fundraising managers perceive status and seek to use status to identify, prioritize and manage stakeholders within college athletics.Design/methodology/approachTo test this purpose, the researchers use the Gioia methodology to interview 19 college athletic department fundraising officers within National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) institutions. Following interviews, the data were analyzed by the researchers and structured within a first-order and second-order concept designation.FindingsInterviews show that status is an effective concept for explaining how athletic fundraisers identify and prioritize donors. Officers relied on economic (capacity) and social (passion and interest) factors to rank order donors. The results also show that athletic departments use status to manage stakeholders by rewarding their giving and escalating their commitment. Status is used in four strategies to manage the donor hierarchy: benefits, recognition, membership and access. Each strategy highlighted exclusivity and rank order.Originality/valueThere is a need to empirically test the application of status within the stakeholder theory context. These findings also contribute to the evolution of stakeholder management beyond the use of social identity theory or stakeholder salience. It helps our understanding of the evolving relationship between fundraiser and donor by recognizing the importance of capacity, passion and interests when identifying and prioritizing donors. Further, status-markers such as exclusive benefits, recognition, membership and access can be used to manage donors toward the organization's goals.

scholarly journals NCAA Athletic Department Employee Perceptions of Workplace Related Burnout, Commitment, and Emotional Intelligence

2017 ◽  
Vol 76 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-46
Author(s):  
Robert C. Schneider ◽  
Penny D. Hite
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Intelligence ◽  
Emotional Exhaustion ◽  
Electronic Mail ◽  
Affective Commitment ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
College Athletics ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Continuance Commitment ◽  
Strongly Agree

AbstractThe objective of this study was to determine employees’ perceptions across National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisions I, II, and III athletic departments of the following general categories and their respective subcategories: (a) emotional intelligence consisting of appraisal of emotions, optimism, utilization of emotions, social skills, and emotional exhaustion; (b) commitment consisting of affective commitment, continuance commitment, and normative commitment; and (c) burnout outcomes consisting of exhaustion, and cynicism. The literature offers broad perspectives related to burnout, commitment, and emotional intelligence along with the respective subcategories (Cropanzano, Rupp, & Byrne 2003; Grichnik, Smeja, & Welpe 2010; Opengart 2005; Patzelt, & Shepherd 2011; Youssef, & Luthans 2007). An intercollegiate sport centered questionnaire was developed by the researchers, the content of which was grounded in seminal research studies related to emotional intelligence, commitment, and burnout outcomes. Feedback from five experts who held no less than 15 years of working experience in an NCAA athletic department helped support content validity. The questionnaire consisted of a demographic section followed by a 7 point Likert scale ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree, that included 49 total statements. Electronic mail was used to send the questionnaire to a random sample of 333 athletic department employees whose e-mail addresses were obtained from the publicly accessible National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics’ (NACDA) National Directory of College Athletics. Of the 333 surveys mailed, 82 were returned for a 24.6% response rate. Descriptive statistics was applied to the data to arrive at findings related to athletic department employees’ responses to the subcategories of the general categories related to burnout, commitment, and emotional intelligence. Athletic department employees were found to generally agree. Overall, responses by the athletic department employees indicated perceptions related to each of three categories of emotional exhaustion, commitment and burnout outcomes that are favorable to the well-being of the athletic department.

scholarly journals Applying Activity-Based Costing to Intercollegiate Athletics

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 81-105
Author(s):  
Heather J. Lawrence ◽  
Liz Wanless ◽  
E. Ann Gabriel
Keyword(s):  
Intercollegiate Athletics ◽  
Title Ix ◽  
Activity Based Costing ◽  
Athletic Department ◽  
Athletic Departments ◽  
Football Bowl Subdivision ◽  
Sport Sponsorship ◽  
Current Accounting ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
The Cost

Current accounting methods in intercollegiate athletics make it difficult for leaders to assess and understand the true cost of each sport team operations. Institutional and athletics leaders often make decisions concerning sport sponsorship/offerings, budget allocations, overall program operations, and review Title IX compliance based on information that may not truly capture the cost of each sport. Additionally, intercollegiate athletics reform groups and the federal government are calling for athletic departments to report more consistent, accurate, and transparent financial data. The purpose of this paper is to respond to the call for accounting reform in intercollegiate athletics via an innovative application of activity-based costing (ABC) to one NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) athletics department. ABC was applied to the athletic department budget report with results showing how previously established ABC cost drivers for intercollegiate athletics (Lawrence, Gabriel, & Tuttle, 2010) and reallocation of expenses back to specific sports allow for a greater understanding of the cost of each sport.

A Unifying Principle for a Researcher Learning Safety: Reduce Uncertainty!

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camilla Kao ◽  
Russell Furr
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Best Practices ◽  
Mission Statement ◽  
Safety Information ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Mission Statements ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Physical And Chemical

Conveying safety information to researchers is challenging. A list of rules and best practices often is not remembered thoroughly even by individuals who want to remember everything. Researchers in science thinking according to principles: mathematical, physical, and chemical laws; biological paradigms. They use frameworks and logic, rather than memorization, to achieve the bulk of their work. Can safety be taught to researchers in a manner that matches with how they are trained to think? Is there a principle more defined than "Think safety!" that can help researchers make good decisions in situations that are complex, new, and demanding?<div><br></div><div>Effective trainings in other professions can arise from the use of a mission statement that participants internalize as a mental framework or model for future decision-making. We propose that mission statements incorporating the concept of <b>reducing uncertainty</b> could provide such a framework for learning safety. This essay briefly explains the definition of <b>uncertainty</b> in the context of health and safety, discusses the need for an individual to <b>personalize</b> a mission statement in order to internalize it, and connects the idea of <b>greater control</b> over a situation with less uncertainty with respect to safety. The principle of reducing uncertainty might also help <b>non-researchers</b> think about safety. People from all walks of life should be able to understand that more control over their situations provides more protection for them, their colleagues, and the environment.</div>

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