Sport Australia is committed to helping sports deliver clear aligned strategy and direction across all levels of the sport. We encourage national sporting organisations to develop unified and inclusive strategies in partnership with their key stakeholders that set the direction at all levels of the system.
Participation planning is the operational tool for bringing the aligned strategy to life. Start by building a strong planning foundation and carry it through the duration of the planning process to create a quality plan. It's also important to engage stakeholders in the planning process to shift the sport to the desired state.
Features of effective participation planning
'Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.'
Warren Buffett
A national participation plan is a road map to help you deliver on your sport's strategic plan, by agreeing on your participation objectives and an agreed set of actions. It also ensures you consider resourcing and how to measure success. Effective participation planning for sustainable success requires:
clear leadership
a well-articulated purpose and vision for your sport
engagement of relevant people throughout the process
early and frequent consultation with partners and stakeholders to facilitate buy-in
the ability to respond to new evidence and insights including the need for change
the ability to prioritise resources to achieve critical objectives
clear performance measures related to participation objectives
ongoing, planned, formal and informal monitoring and review
periodic independent monitoring and evaluation of progress and performance
Using the drivers of participation in planning
Sport Australia has co-designed a set of nine drivers of participation, which are the factors identified by stakeholders as having the most significant influence on driving positive participation outcomes. More detailed information can be found at drivers of participation.
Market insights
Ensure all decisions are based on data and evidence about the market – your consumers and competitors. This is the most important driver to overcome barriers to participation.
Product design
Developing products with benefits and features to meet consumer needs and wants.
Workforce
How products are delivered to the market.
Marketing and communications
Messaging and methods used to communicate internally and to consumers.
Infrastructure and equipment
Providing appropriate, accessible and affordable infrastructure and equipment.
Commercial
Developing sustainable participation products and commercialising related assets.
Governance
A strong governance structure, committed to achieving participation outcomes.
Unified behaviours
A whole-of-sport approach to participation.
Management
The experience, expertise and performance of the management team.
How to use the planning process and resources
As a step-by-step planning process
Use the planning process and resources to step through the development of a participation plan. Start by establishing a national planning team. Use the stakeholder map and engagement plan tools to identify and detail ways to engage key partners, the SWOT and gap analysis to reflect and consider how you can achieve your participation objectives, and the participation plan template to bring your outputs and plan together.
To inspire a new way of thinking
When updating your organisation’s participation plan, use the information and resources to change the way planning has been conducted in the past. The SWOT analysis by drivers of participation will help identify new opportunities and the gap analysis by drivers of participation is a great tool to facilitate a group discussion about priorities for your sport and challenge the status quo.
To assist in reviewing your participation plan
Often sports have 4-year rolling participation plans and undertake annual or regular reviews. Use the planning process and the drivers of participation as a framework for review and to identify if adding new areas to the plan would enhance participation outcomes.
The planning process
This planning process reflects the unique considerations of sporting organisations and the environment they operate in. The principles set the tone for the behaviours and actions and the steps are based on key questions to consider when creating a participation plan. Organisations have different planning needs and can use the step by step planning process to develop a comprehensive participation plan or focus in on specific steps or resources to enhance their plan.
Participation planning should strongly align with your whole-of-sport national strategic plan. Make sure you have a good understanding of your sport’s participation related strategic priorities before you start the participation planning process. Regularly revisit your strategic priorities to ensure plans continue to align.
A participation plan should:
cascade from a national strategic plan
be consistent in its ambition, focus, look and feel
be co-designed by key stakeholders then tailored for local adoption
be fully supported and resourced by boards, management, participation teams and the community
anchor key decision making for the duration of the plan.
Unify
Unified behaviours are an enabling driver of participation and should be implemented to create a whole-of-sport approach to participation. Collaboration around a planning process and consensus on where a sport is heading and what it is trying to achieve has many benefits and builds mutual trust.
Tips
Establish a nationally agreed team of individuals from different levels of your organisation and stakeholder representatives that have a complementary skill set who will be responsible for driving the planning process. An identified lead, timelines and governance should also be established.
This team, or similar, should continue past the development of a plan and assist to implement, monitor and evaluate your sports progress on an ongoing basis.
Engage
Successful participation planning and implementation is impacted by a wide range of stakeholders. Don't underestimate the importance of meaningful, early and ongoing engagement to ensure your participation plan has the best chance of sustainable success.
Tips
Consider the impact of both internal and external stakeholders.
Create a Stakeholder map to understand relationships and the impact stakeholders can have on the success of your plan.
Involve your stakeholders through the decision-making process to create buy-in. Use the Stakeholder engagement plan template to plan and track engagement.
Value the unique insights into issues, challenges and opportunities that your stakeholders bring. Understand that at times stakeholder consultation can be challenging but is extremely beneficial for effective planning.
Get creative with your engagement. Use online surveys, file-sharing platforms, workshopping activities etc. You can find cost-effective methods for collecting stakeholder views and engaging them in the process.
Commit to genuine engagement and co-design. Don't circulate draft plans before commencing the engagement process as it undermines the process and trust.
What is your whole of sport purpose and vision and what are your values?
Considerations
Who does your sport primarily exist to benefit and what benefit do they expect?
What attitudes and behaviours do you require to make the vision a reality?
How can you align your participation planning with your sports strategic plan, purpose, vision and values?
Resources
Desktop review: Gather and analyse information on your sports purpose, vision, values and strategic priorities. This is an important step in understanding the context for your participation planning.
Purpose, vision and value board: List each of these statements and brainstorm the ways to bring each to life through your sport's participation approach. Use different colours to identify current and future ideas and use the future ideas in step 2 of the planning process.
Fishbowl Activity, opens in a new tab: This activity will help ensure different opinions and viewpoints are heard and considered during group planning discussions.
Use data, evidence and insights to understand your current state and desired state. What market insights do you have and who are your target markets?
Considerations
What are your sports achievements and challenges in the past year?
What is the current state of your sport internally and externally? Consider in the context of your sports agreed purpose:
Who are your customers?
What are their wants and needs?
What are the market trends?
Who are your competitors and how do you compare?
How does your sports current state compare to the desired state? This will help form your participation objectives.
Review thinking against Sport Australia's drivers of participation to ensure all factors have been considered.
Resources
SWOT analysis by drivers of participation template: SWOT analysis is a situational analysis technique you can use to identify your sport’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as its external opportunities and threats.
Identify and prioritise actions that will help your sport achieve its participation objectives. This will be your roadmap to future success.
Considerations
What is business as usual and what are the key shifts your sport needs to make to achieve its participation objectives?
Now your sport has highlighted the key participation objectives to focus on and has articulated the needs of participants, what actions is your sport going to take to achieve them?
What actions have the greatest impact on successful outcomes?
Consult with your stakeholders to identify any potential risks or issues that may impact your ability to take action and achieve your objectives.
Review your plan against Sport Australia's drivers of participation to ensure you have considered all factors.
Anchors and engines: Identify the factors that make actions move faster and those holding them back. Discuss how can you take advantage of or overcome these factors.
Impact vs effort: On a matrix, plot tasks based on their impact and the effort needed to complete them. This will help identify major projects, quick wins and thankless tasks. This may help prioritise appropriately or eliminate low-impact activities.
Agreed prioritisation: Identify your sport's priorities through group decision making. Prioritisation increases project success rate, increases alignment and assists decision making processes throughout the duration of the plan.
Identify resources needed to take actions that will help your sport achieve the participation objectives.
Considerations
What human, financial, physical and intellectual resources does your sport require to achieve its objectives?
How will your sport prioritise its participation objectives? What objectives are critical, important or desirable and how can the variables (e.g. actions, resources or timing) be adjusted to achieve your participation objectives?
Does your sport have enough of the right people, in the right environment with enough financial and other resources and systems to get the job done?
Who must do what by when to accomplish and drive the participation objectives? What are their roles and responsibilities?
Do you have support from your CEOs/Boards? Don't create an unattainable wish list.
Estimating activity duration: To help understand the time required to complete individual activities, start by considering your resources eg people/budget and then use work breakdowns, past examples or expert judgement to best estimate activity duration and timelines.
Track progress of objectives through development of SMART performance measures.
Considerations
What does success look like?
Are your measures SMART?
Specific: Keep it simple and describe exactly what will be accomplished when each objective is achieved
Measurable: The KPI needs to be measurable so it can be determined when it has been achieved
Attainable: Expect to achieve the KPI, it should be realistic but provide some ‘stretch’ (challenge)
Relevant: The KPI must relate to specific objectives
Time bound: Each KPI must have an ‘achieve by’ date (deadline)
What measure is appropriate to achieve your objectives?
If you are interested in working with Sport Australia on participation planning, email the Participation Planning team at participation@sportaus.gov.au