Athletics West

Sport Governance Principles - The Rule Book

This is a Sport Australia podcast production.

Kate Corkery Hello and welcome to the Sport Governance Podcast series. My name is Kate Corkery and I am the Director of Sport Governance and Strategy at Sport Australia. Over this series we will take a deep dive into the sport governance principles and how they come to life in practice. Each podcast will focus on an individual principle with a special guest joining me to share their experiences and practical advice with respect to that principle.

Kate Corkery In today's episode, we are focusing on Principle five, the Rule Book. Documents that outline duties, powers, roles and responsibilities. Principle five highlights that an organisation should clearly define and document its structures and the duties, responsibilities and powers of its members, Directors, committees and management. To discuss the Rule Book, we're joined by Vince del Prete, the CEO of Athletics W.A. Vince was appointed as CEO of Little Athletics W.A. in July 2016 and held this role until August 2019, where he was then appointed to the CEO as the One Management team to lead the historical unification of the sport of athletics in Western Australia. This was undertaken through the merger of Little Athletics W.A. and Athletics W.A. The new state sporting body Athletics West, launched on 1 July 2020 with Vince at the helm. Vince has had over 30 years experience in human resources management, corporate governance, strategic planning and policy analysis. He has undertaken many roles in sport including coach, team manager, club president and board director to name just a few.

Kate Corkery Vince, thank you for joining me to discuss this really important principle.

Vince Del Prete Thank you, Kate, and I hope you're well.

Kate Corkery I do have a number of people who say to me, this is the boring side of good governance and others that say it's the sexy side of good governance. I'm not going to ask you which side of the statement you sit on but from your broad experience in many governance roles, Why is this principle so important?

Vince Del Prete I think it sets the foundation of how accountable we've become as an organisation and as a sport and ultimately it really leads to the decision making as an organisation. So pretty critical, I would have thought, and also sets the framework for the rest of the people within the organisation.

Kate Corkery So you're the inaugural CEO of Athletics West, which is a new sporting organisation formed 1 July 2020 with the merger of Athletics W.A. and Little Athletics W.A.. What were the key drivers for that merger?

Vince Del Prete One liner would be the consolidation of the governance of the sport providing a complete sport to potential members and investors. The development of clear pathways for all our coaches, our athletes, our volunteers and officials. It would be fair to say that the sport has been somewhat fragmented by having two different organisations, potentially two sets of values, two sets of ideas on how the sport should be run. So the members were pretty strong about wanting to be heard about having a very clearly defined body that manages the sport and has the governance of the sport in W.A. It also means that we've been able to streamline our processes and even the financial position of the sport in W.A. in terms of the streamlining of the two businesses into one.

Kate Corkery Yeah, look, it was an historical unification and one that no doubt will become an exemplar for other organisations in sports. When we talk about the Rule Book so that the documents that outline duties, powers, rules and responsibilities, the most important document for sporting organisations is the Constitution. So what process did you undertake to build the Athletics West constitution?

Vince Del Prete I think it's important for us to perhaps go right back to when this whole process of becoming one sport actually took place that led to the Constitution being developed. We go way back to 2017 when the sport as a whole decided that we needed to embrace a whole sport strategic plan with buyin from across the membership. And that set the scene about letting the members understand they own the sport and where they in many ways the gatekeeper of it. This led to the joint organisation review that was undertaken in 2018, which identified 16 key recommendations with two of those major ones being, one to merge the sport and two, the establishment of a new constitution under the Corporations Act. It was deemed to be important that we would go under the Corporations Act because we believe it provides more scope for the sport, but also it provides probably a lot stronger reporting requirements to give a sense of comfort to the members that the sport is in really good hands, when it comes to the board and the management at Athletics West. The other key thing for us throughout the journey, the buyin and involvement of the members has been critical to the establishment of the new constitution. And we had a lot of consultation forums, regular meetings, regular updates to keep them across how the Constitution was being developed. So really critical. And I think really the Rule Book played a critical role in that.

Kate Corkery And you note that the absolutely critical responsibility that members have with respect of Constitutions, so in your case, it was the establishment of the Constitution but ongoing, they will have an obligation for amendments and improvements to the Constitution. When you went through initial negotiations, were there any areas within the Constitution that were more difficult than others to negotiate and determine?

Vince Del Prete Kate, when you look at that, there was similar constitutions in a way previously, but with some slight differences. One of them was the definition of membership, believe it or not in terms of slight definitions and what they meant. So we had to work through that process. The voting process was another critical one. In the past, Athletics WA had a vote weighted system where based on the size of your club, determined whether you got three votes, two votes, one vote. Little Athletics, it was very much one centre, one vote regardless of the size of the organisation. So we had to work through coming to a position how we would deal with the voting process and what we agreed to in the end, because we're trying to get clubs and centres, juniors and seniors, to become one we've pretty much said if you provide the whole service as a club or a  centre, you would get two votes to recognise both sides of the sport. If you're only providing a Little Athletics program or a Seniors program, you would only get one vote. And I think the members could see the value in that sort of voting system. The other one was the initial transitional clause in terms of how many directors should we have on the new board and what is the right number. And thankfully, we had some good guidance in terms of documentation Sport Australia had in what constitutes a good corporation template. And we settled on a number that both boards were happy with. And then was how do we split, if you like the transitioning of directors from both boards onto one. Who would chair, normally under good governance, as you would know, the chair would be elected by the directors. In this case, because the merger was decided that one year the current chair of Little Athletics would chair the board and the next year it would be the current chair of the Seniors.  And so that way was just a way to get a little bit of -how do you put it - that members felt a little bit more at ease. That from both sides they were being heard, that they had an equal buy-in to the process, an equal buy-in to the governance of the Athletics West Board. That was a pretty critical piece for them believe it or not.

Kate Corkery No, look the selection of the board chair and the importance of that within modern or contemporary good governance is significant, as is having confidence to then in any transition of an organisation, that corporate knowledge is retained and leadership is consistent. So I think it sounds like they were well worked through. In terms of whether it's a state sporting organisation or a national sporting organisation or large or small why is it important to have clear and transparent documents to explain how the organisations are governed.  In looking at those documents for Athletics West, what key documents have been given priority?

Vince Del Prete So first of all, if I can say, we were very fortunate to be able to leverage off Sport Australia's previous governance and best practises, documents and frameworks that were available and also the ability to leverage off what the two national bodies of Little Athletics Australia and Athletics Australia also had in place in terms of its governance structures and how it had structured its constitution. For us it is really important, because this really sets the framework of, I use the word accountability before in decision making, and it sets for us a really clear framework on the delegation of powers between board and management, which certainly leads to very good governance in terms of values, behaviours and practices, which for us are very, very important in terms of the transparency in the documents and how we govern. Also, I think the good documentation also provides a good check point for assessing where the organisation the sport is at, in essence, a health check of sorts. But also, I think it's important that it allows us to have in place well functioning teams that can operate in a safe environment within the organisation and on the board. So for us, in terms of having clear, concise documents, really assist in - like us said at the beginning - accountability and decision making and really sets a framework that people can work around and with.

Kate Corkery You have spoken about delegated authority, so we know that the board has ultimate responsibility for and control over the way the organisation is run, except in some matters which may require the involvement of members and we've spoken about changing the organisation's constitution. However, boards can choose to delegate part of their authority to others, such as the organisation's staff and even if they don't have staff to volunteers. What has been the process to establish clear delegations between the board and yourself as CEO, for example?

Vince Del Prete So I think the first thing we've done besides the Constitution is that it was important for us to establish some really guiding documents in terms of understanding the delegation between the board, the CEO and even the management team. The first thing we've really put in place is what we call the Board Charter that really sets out directors, CEO and management responsibilities, captures the code of conduct in there, clearly outlines the delegation, along with the finance, risk and audit documents that we've developed. The financial management policy delegation, member protection, safeguarding policies. So for us, it was really important to establish those documents that clearly provides a framework around that delegation because otherwise it becomes really challenging in ensuring that people know how to work within, I guess the process and the procedures of the organisation.

Kate Corkery You've also picked up there board subcommittees. So board subcommittees are a really effective mechanism to assist boards to govern well and to augment the capability of the board in terms of additional diversity and expertise and I was talking to someone today about also the importance of subcommittees as a pathway or a training ground for future directors. What has been the process used by Athletics West to identify subcommittees that are going to be able to assist the board?

Vince Del Prete The Athletics West board has got a really strong position, if you like, on its financial and risk management responsibilities and the responsibilities that directors have in that area. For us, it was really pivotal in the early days to establish a finance risk audit committee and to really ensure that all the documents I've already mentioned or the delegation, that we have a process in place that we know we're on the right track in terms of how the organisation has been managed, how decision making is arrived at and also, I think the real key thing is about providing an opportunity for growth of the organisation because like that committee should also be in a position to say, hey, we're doing some really good stuff, how can we continue to have continuous improvement, which to me is really critical in terms of of the organisation being able to go forward in the sport being able to going forward. And as you've mentioned, Kate also a good breeding ground for the next level of directors that may wish to join the board down the track or current directors that may be new to the board and perhaps as a way of professional development for them and to really get a better understanding of what governance really does mean. It isn't just attending board meetings and reading your board papers, but that you have that responsibility that when you're making decisions, that there is a process around it and then you're making decisions for the right reasons. But to me, I think it also just continues to build on board values and board culture having subcommittees in place, because I think people buyin a lot better.

Kate Corkery They are really valuable observations. So if people listening to our discussion and they want support or somewhere to start and certainly calling out to some of our state sporting organisation directors who might be listening to this podcast series, what advice would you give them?

Vince Del Prete I would certainly refer them to the Sport Australia Sport Governance Principles document. It is a fantastic resource in terms of what it provides in really understanding the principles of governance. But I like the questions it actually asks under each of the principles, really easy to follow and it gives a really good heads up in terms of things you need to be thinking about. The other thing I like on your website is there's a fantastic array of templates that certainly will assist any sporting teams of understanding the documentation it needsand the support it can get by leveraging off those templates that are available on the Sport Australia website. The other thing as well is that people shouldn't be scared as well to get on the blower, ring Sport Australia and ask for help or support or even their Department of Sport & Rec they may have within their state who are a valuable resource as well and I think the other valuable resource we have is that we have so many people that are knowledgeable within the sport industry that they could actually get in touch with, like Athletics, that can explain the journey we've been on, what's meant in terms of governance and what they need to do. So I think there's just so many wonderful resources available that I think really people can tap into.

Kate Corkery I mean, what you've highlighted there is there's really no excuse. I mean, the state and territory Departments of Sport and Recreation and ourselves that Sport Australia and like you say, your colleagues in the sector are almost always too willing to help and provide support. You mentioned the questions to ask in the Sports Governance Principles. Are they a source of discussion or debate in the Athletics West boardroom at the moment?

Vince Del Prete Absolutely. As of last week's board meeting, there was a commitment made by the directors at each board meeting, we will go through two principles, which becomes a very good health check for us as I've mentioned previously.  But we've also used it as part of our development of our culture, our culture sessions in terms of the values we want to have, the expected behaviours around those values and also as a way of board professional development for our directors. There would be some that have already been through upskilling previously, that perhaps it's great for them to go back and have a read of those questions and then be in a position to provide their expertise to the new directors, but also for the new directors to get an understanding of, ok that's what those things mean and that's what I need to be doing so and then to complement them, I think the podcasts that are being done, which I think will always provide some additional information in terms of what the questions may mean or what does that particular principle mean. So it's been fantastic, certainly for Athletics West to get now the board really engaging around the sports governance principles.

Kate Corkery Vince, thank you for joining me on our sport podcast series exploring Principle five, The Rule Book. And best of luck to you and the Board of Athletics West as they continue to embed and activate good governance in athletics in Western Australia.

Vince Del Prete Thank you, Kate. And again, thank you to Sport Australia for certainly your support of the sport of athletics coming together in WA.

Kate Corkery Thank you for joining me today. If you'd like to access a copy of the Sport Governance Principles, you'll find them on the SportAUS website sportaus.gov.au/governance. If you have any feedback or questions, please email us at sportsgovernance@sportaus.gov.au My name is Kate Corkery and I look forward to you joining me for the next podcast in the Sport Governance Series.