Beyond the Glass Ceiling: Sport Management Students’ Perceptions of the Leadership Labyrinth

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 100-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Meg G. Hancock ◽  
Lindsey Darvin ◽  
Nefertiti A. Walker

Sport management undergraduate and graduate programs have gained popularity throughout the United States and around the world. Despite this, women are still underrepresented in sport leadership positions. Although women have made it to the highest levels of sport leadership roles, studies suggest that advancement to such roles is more challenging for women than for men. Extant literature examines perceptions of women employed in the sport industry but fails to consider perceptions of prospective employees, specifically women, with career aspirations in sport business. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate sport management students’ perceptions of barriers to women’s success and upward mobility in the sport industry using the Career Pathways Survey. Results suggest that female sport management students perceive barriers to advancement in the sport industry, whereas male students do not perceive that barriers exist for women. Practical implications for the sport management classroom include developing male advocates, gender diversity and inclusion in guest presentations, and intentional internship placement.

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Sarah B. Williams ◽  
Elizabeth A. Taylor ◽  
T. Christopher Greenwell ◽  
Brigitte M. Burpo

Not unlike the sport industry, the majority of sport management students in the United States are White, middle-class males. As women in male-dominated academic departments experience gender harassment more frequently than women in balanced or female-dominated departments, the purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of sport management doctoral students with gender microaggressions and stereotype threat by gender to examine if such experiences occur at this stage in academia. The results indicate that female students experience gender microaggressions of being excluded, being treated like a second-class citizen, and being placed in restrictive roles by program faculty due to their gender more frequently than male students. This study provides clarity into issues affecting female doctoral student progression postgraduation in sport management. In addition, this study provides context around the student experience in doctoral programs across male-dominated academic disciplines.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 2275
Author(s):  
Samuel López-Carril ◽  
Miguel Villamón ◽  
María Huertas González-Serrano

Social media are one of the most valuable management tools used by sport managers in the fulfilment of their daily tasks. However, the studies that share and analyse the impact of educational experiences that incorporate social media into sport management education for professional purposes are scarce to date. Thus, this study presents an educational innovation piloted in a sport management course where LinkedIn—the social media most associated with the professional sphere—is introduced through an experiential learning methodology, as a driver of students’ career development and as a tool to keep up to date and interact with the sport industry. To assess the learning outcomes, a new scale was developed and tested. A total of 90 Spanish undergraduate sport management students (M = 22.71; SD = 3.84) participated in the study, partaking in a pre-test and a post-test. Regarding the results linked to the testing of the scale, the statistical analysis reflects the scale’s two-dimensional nature, explaining 68.78% of the variance, presenting good psychometric properties (α = 0.95). On the other hand, significant increases in all the scale items between the two measures were obtained, with large effects size in the two dimensions (Cohen’s d ≥ 0.80). Therefore, it is concluded that LinkedIn can help to develop the professional profile of sport management students, Linked(In)g what is taught in the classroom with what the sport industry demands.


2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (5) ◽  
pp. 570-587 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Welty Peachey ◽  
Yilun Zhou ◽  
Zack J. Damon ◽  
Laura J. Burton

Scholars have recognized the importance of leadership in the sport industry; early sport leadership studies emerged in the 1970s. To date, however, there has been no comprehensive review of the scholarly leadership studies in sport management. Thus, the purpose of this review is to provide a comprehensive synthesis of the sport management leadership literature from the 1970s to the present day, to outline what has been learned, and then, drawing from this synthesis, to articulate a preliminary conceptual model capturing how leadership operates in sport management. A number of clear themes in sport management leadership research and conceptual thinking have emerged, with the proposed conceptual model advancing several leadership antecedents and processes unique to sport. Intriguing directions for sport management leadership scholarship are also illuminated. Although progress has been made, many questions and gaps remain that require focused attention from sport management leadership scholars.


2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 92-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacquelyn Cuneen ◽  
M. Joy Sidwell

Internships permit sport management students to link classroom learning to the professional environment. Since internships provide students with opportunities to learn on-the-job and test their skills in the marketplace, the experiences should be uniformly beneficial to all students regardless of gender. This study was conducted to describe internship work conditions (i.e., opportunities to perform in essential marketplace functions) for male and female sport management interns assigned to ‘Big Four’ professional sport organizations. Participants were 74 sport industry professionals who supervised a total of 103 interns over a one-year period. A X2 Test of Independence found that male and female interns working in professional sport had comparable opportunities to perform and learn on the job. Differences in opportunity, hiring practices, and on-the-job benefits emerged primarily as a function of job specialization (e.g., operations, marketing, venue management), league/association, or gender of the internship supervisor rather than gender of the interns.


2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 184-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew G. Hawzen ◽  
Christopher M. McLeod ◽  
John T. Holden ◽  
Joshua I. Newman

For university students in sport management programs, working in sports is often the end goal, and internships have become the most common curricular component for achieving this end. Sport management students bring to these internships various backgrounds and active fan attachments with sports that structure their work experiences and create certain conditions of exploitation. We thus conducted interviews with current and soon-to-be interns to understand their subjective perceptions and experiences of working in sports as fans. Drawing upon Lauren Berlant’s concept of cruel optimism as well as neo-Marxist theories of affective labor, we reveal the structuring contradictions of interns’ work in the contemporary sports industry.


Author(s):  
Liz Sattler ◽  
Rebecca Achen

The sport management internship has been deemed a critical component of students’ academic preparation, as well as a foot in the door for many students seeking full-time employment after graduation. The number of sport management programs has grown in recent years, and the field itself remains highly competitive. Thus, it is increasingly important for sport management programs to help prepare their students for the internship hiring process. Scholarship in this area has largely focused on student perceptions of their internship experience and employer perceptions of student preparedness. But to prepare students for internship experiences in the sport industry, it is essential for faculty to understand the key skills that are sought by industry practitioners making hiring decisions, as well as the administrative requirements included. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the nature of professional sport industry internship job postings in the United States by examining the content of online announcements during a 6-month period. The results indicated that digital content, sales, and operations internships were the most highly sought positions, while basic computer skills, communication skills (both oral and written), and the ability to withstand long hours were the most commonly desired skills.


2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-82
Author(s):  
Elizabeth A. Taylor ◽  
Gareth J. Jones ◽  
Kristy McCray ◽  
Robin Hardin

The sport industry is ripe for issues of sexual harassment/assault due to the high value placed on masculine characteristics and the power differential between male leaders/coaches and female subordinates/athletes. This culture permeates sport organizations, as issues of sexual harassment/assault committed by athletes and coaches/administrators are commonplace and have recently been mishandled, raising questions about effective education. This study examined the relationship between education on sexual harassment/assault and the endorsement of rape myths by sport management students. Results indicate that training on sexual harassment/assault in sport management classrooms is low and is potentially ineffective at curbing rape myth acceptance, suggesting current curricula are insufficient. These findings have both theoretical and practical contributions related to how sport management departments can prepare future professionals to change the culture of sport.


2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 248-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noni Zaharia ◽  
Anastasios Kaburakis

Collaboration between industry and academia is a subject of great interest to sport management academics and sport industry leaders in the United States. However, there is a lack of research regarding barriers to sport industry–academia collaborations and bridging the gap between sport management research and practitioners. The aim of the study was to explore trends in collaboration barriers among various research involvement levels of U.S. sport firms with sport management academia. Data were gathered from 303 sport managers working for U.S. sport companies. Results indicated several barriers for research collaborations between the U.S. sport industry and academia. Such barriers include transactional barriers, sport industry subsectors, sport organizations’ location, and age and education level of respondents.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Mark A. Beattie ◽  
Leeann M. Lower-Hoppe

How does a professional sport organization with a toxic organizational culture transform its workplace to one built around equity, diversity, and inclusion? This article addresses that question in a case study that explores the aftermath of the Dallas Mavericks’ sexual harassment scandal. The case allows students to analyze the crisis the Mavericks faced after a Sports Illustrated article exposed the organization’s corrosive workplace culture. Students will discuss the strategies Mavericks’ chief executive officer Cynthia Marshall deployed to transform the Mavericks’ workplace culture. Furthermore, students will consider how those strategies have broader utility in improving organizational diversity throughout the sport industry. A theoretical framework, a case narrative, and teaching notes are provided to support implementation of the case study in sport management curricula.


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