Sport Facility Operations Management

A Global Perspective

Eric C. Schwarz, Stacey A. Hall, Simon Shibli

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780367345556
• eBook ISBN: 9780429649363
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Operations
• Index: Business

Now in a fully revised and updated third edition, Sport Facility Operations Management goes beyond the basic theories of sport facility management to include relevant practical professional experiences connecting facilities, people, and technology.

This is a comprehensive and engaging textbook introducing cutting-edge concepts and best practice in sport facility operations management. Each chapter contains real-world case studies and discussion questions, innovative 'Technology Now' and new 'Facility Focus' features, and 'In the Field' segments about what is going on in the industry. This new edition also provides new content in the areas of project management, social and digital media, revenue generation and diversification, performance analytics, and impacts and legacies.

This is a vital resource for sport management educators and students, especially those studying facility management. It is also an interesting read for industry professionals working in sport facility management, from grassroots and community complexes to global mega stadiums and arenas.

Dedicated online materials include PowerPoint presentations for each chapter; multiple-choice and essay questions; online appendices with diagrams, schematics, manuals, and forms; a glossary; and a sample master syllabus.

Chapter 1
Introduction to Sport Facility Operations Management

Chapter Outline

■ What is sport facility operations management?

■ Why sport facility operations management is important

■ The discipline of sport facility operations management

■ Chapter review

Chapter Objectives

The purpose of this prologue is to provide the reader with some initial background on the concept of sport facility operations management. First is an explanation of the concepts of facility management and operations management in general terms, followed by how these concepts interact with one another in terms of sport facilities. This is followed by a presentation of global scenarios where poor management and/or operations of a sport facility have led to significant problems. This prologue concludes an explanation of how this book will help the reader learn to deal with the scenarios presented – and much more. This is accomplished through a description of the discipline of sport facility operations management in terms of the various concepts covered in this textbook.

What is Sport Facility Operations Management?

In order to effectively understand sport facility operations management, it is important to consider each of the two main concepts – facility management and operations management. Facility management is an all-encompassing term referring to the maintenance and care of commercial and nonprofit buildings, including but not limited to sport facilities, including heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC); electrical; plumbing; sound and lighting systems; cleaning, grounds keeping, and housekeeping; security; and general operations. The goal of facility management is to organize and supervise the safe and secure maintenance and operation of the facility in a financially and environmentally sound manner.

Numerous associations oversee the profession of facility management worldwide. These associations have further clarified the definition of facility management and also provide guidance and education for those who are employed in the field. The world’s largest and most widely recognized international association for professional facility managers is the International Facility Management Association (IFMA). According to their website (www.ifma.org), they support more than 24,000 members in over 100 countries across 136 regions, 16 councils, and six community areas of interest, comprised of 78 billion square feet of property that purchase more than $526 billion in products and services. They define facility management as ‘a profession that encompasses multiple disciplines to ensure the functionality of the built environment by integrating people, place, process, and technology,’ and they further clarify this definition as ‘the practice of coordinating the physical workplace with the people and work of the organization; integrat[ing] the principles of business administration, architecture, and the behavioral and engineering sciences.’ Other organizations include the British Institute of Facilities Management (BIFM – www.bifm.org.uk), the Facility Management Association of Australia (FMA Australia – www.fma.com.au), the Venue Managers Association Asia and Pacific (www.vma.org.au), the International Association for Sports and Leisure Facilities (www.iaks.org), and the International Association of Venue Managers (IAAM – www.iavm.org).

While facility management focuses on the overall maintenance and care of a building, operations management focuses on administrating the processes to produce and distribute the products and services offered through a facility. This would include the processes of production (tangible and intangible), inventory control, supply chain management, purchasing, logistics, scheduling, staffing, and general services – with the goal of maintaining, controlling, and improving organizational activities. The operations management field also has numerous associations that support the profession. The largest is the Association for Operations Management (APICS – www.apics.org). While on the surface they are the association for supply chain management, their mission is to build knowledge and skills among operations management professionals in order to enhance and validate abilities and accelerate careers. Their body and knowledge framework and principles for operations management are industry leading and globally recognized. Beyond APICS, other global organizations that support the profession of operations management include the European Operations Management Association (EurOMA – www.euroma-online.org), the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS – www.poms.org), and the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (www.ciltuk.org.uk).

Why Sport Facility Operations Management is Important

Every day, thousands of facilities around the globe host sport, recreation, and leisure activities with minimal or no problems. But when a problem occurs or when there is a lack of planning ahead for activities, the results can be harmful and damaging. This can range from damage to the facility or equipment to injuries to personnel, participants, and visitors – with the injuries ranging in severity from minor (cuts, bruises, sprains) to major (broken bones, torn ligaments, back and eye injuries) to catastrophic (loss of limb, paralysis, death). Sport facility operations management seeks to maintain and care for public, private, and nonprofit facilities used for sport, recreation, and leisure in order to ensure the safe and secure production and distribution of products and services to users.

The discipline of sport facilities operations management has many different components that need to be understood. However, before an explanation of these various subdisciplines is provided, let us take a look at a number of historical scenarios where poor facility operations and management have led to significant problems.

• In 1972, 11 Israeli athletes (along with one German police officer and five terrorists) were killed by the Palestinian terrorist group Black September due to inadequate security at the Munich Olympic Games. Eight Palestinians, with bags of weapons, were able to scale the fence that surrounded the Olympic village and then proceeded to enter the Israeli accommodation to take the athletes hostage.
• In 1985 at Valley Parade football stadium, the home of Bradford City in the United Kingdom, a flash fire broke out during a match with Lincoln City. The fire consumed one side of the stadium, killing 56 people and injuring over 250. The fire was believed to have been caused by either a match or cigarette that fell through a hole in the stands and into rubbish below. Even though the fire brigade was called, there was no way to keep the fire at bay as fire extinguishers had been removed from passageways to prevent vandalism.
• Also in 1985, Liverpool and Juventus were facing each other in the European Cup final at Heysel Stadium in Belgium. Before the match started, Liverpool supporters reacted to taunts from the Italian fans by charging through the lines of the Belgian police. The Juventus fans could do nothing but retreat as far as a wall, which collapsed under the pressure onto their own fans below. In the ensuing panic, 39 supporters died and over 600 were injured. Based on further inquiries, as well as an evaluation of concerns voiced prior to the event, it was determined that 58,000 people being allowed into a stadium to watch the game at a stadium that was crumbling from disrepair and that could hold only 50,000 contributed significantly to the disaster.
• In 1988 in Katmandu, Nepal, 80 soccer fans seeking cover during a violent hailstorm at the national stadium were trampled to death in a stampede. The reason: The stadium doors were locked.
• In 1989 at Hillsborough Stadium in the United Kingdom (the home of the Sheffield Wednesday Football Club), a human crush occurred during an FA semifinal match with Liverpool that resulted in the deaths of 96 people. This deadliest stadium-related disaster in British history (and one of the worst in international football history) could have been prevented, as the inquiry into the disaster (the Taylor Report) named the cause as a failure of police and security control.
• On 1992, 18 were killed and 2,300 were injured as one of the terraces of the Armand Cesari Stadium in Bastia on the island of Corsica in France collapsed prior to a semifinal French Cup match between SC Bastia and Olympique de Marseille. Structural problems and instability were noticeable before the match, and improper construction of the temporary terrace was the main issue responsible for the disaster. Further investigation also disclosed violations in the management of ticketing and the attitudes of the management executives as also contributing to the disaster.
• In 1993, during a quarterfinal tennis match in Hamburg, Germany, a fan ran from the middle of the crowd to the edge of the court between games and stabbed Monica Seles between the shoulder blades. The individual (who was deemed to be ‘psychologically abnormal’ by the courts) was a fan of Seles’s rival, Steffi Graf (who was not Seles’s opponent in this match). While her injuries were not life-threatening, she did not return to professional tennis for over two years.
• In 1996 at the Mateo Flores National Stadium in Guatemala City (seating capacity 45,800), Costa Rica and Guatemala were playing a World Cup qualifier. According to FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association, the world soccer association), forgers apparently had sold fake tickets to the match, bringing far more people to the stadium than it could fit (estimated at over 60,000). This crowd, combined with gate-crashers (people without tickets), pushed into the bleachers through a concrete causeway, overwhelmed other fans below, and caused a mass of people to tumble down on top of one another. Ticket takers were seen to also continue admitting fans even after bleachers were clearly filled to capacity.
• In the so-called Accra Sports Stadium disaster in 2001, a match between two teams from the West African nation of Ghana was expected to create unrest, and extra security was provided. The losing team’s fans started throwing plastic seats and bottles onto the soccer pitch expressing their displeasure with the result. Police responded by shooting tear gas and plastic bullets into the crowd, creating a stampede of people that resulted in the deaths of 127 spectators. This was the worst stadium disaster in Africa to date.
• In 2007 at the Australian Open tennis tournament, a brawl between Serbian and Croatian spectators erupted outside a merchandise tent when the two groups began trading insults. Punches, bottles, and beer cups were thrown as about 150 members of the two groups rivals clashed. No injuries were reported, but 150 people were ejected from the event, and Tennis Australia announced the need to revise plans for handling these types of situations in the future.
• Multiple reports published between 2006 and 2009 have examined significant risks to players and spectators due to air poisoning from exhaust systems from ice resurfacing machines because of a lack of ventilation in ice rinks. Medical studies have shown the results can cause a significant increase in asthma and chronic coughs in hockey players who play in poorly ventilated rinks due to carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide poisoning. In a related concept, ventilation problems have also been related to so-called sick pool syndrome in aquatic centers/natatoriums due to the high humidity and the contaminants caused by chemicals and biologics.
• In 2009 at the Dallas Cowboys practice facility, a thunderstorm ripped the roof off the inflatable bubble and collapsed the infrastructure, injuring 12 people, including the paralysis of one coach. Questions of negligence on behalf of the Cowboys have arisen due to a number of factors: (1) Was this an adequate and safe facility to be holding practice in during tornadic weather conditions? (2) Was the maintenance on the facility to withstand the winds from the storm substandard and a cause? (3) Should the Cowboys have used Summit Structures LLC to build the facility when they had prior knowledge that a similar type of facility built for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority collapsed under similar weather conditions (which are more regular in Texas)?
• In the lead-up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, a 64-year-old person was crushed to death while in line to buy tickets in central Cape Town, There were riots across the country at other selling points – to the point that police in Pretoria needed to use pepper spray on the people fighting to get into a FIFA ticket outlet. The cause of so many irate fans: The computer system serving many of those outlets crashed minutes after opening, and people were not able to buy the discounted tickets for matches.
• Also in 2010 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the roof to the Metrodome, home to the Minnesota Vikings, collapsed under the weight of the snow that had collected on it over the weekend. Fortunately, nobody was in the stadium at the time, and it forced the game versus the New York Giants to be moved to Detroit.
• In 2012 in Port Said, Egypt, at least 74 people were killed and many dozens injured in a fight between the fans of two rival soccer clubs. Security measures at the stadium come into question as many fans used knives and other weapons in the fight. Fans were also easily able to storm the field after the match and attack players and fans alike, in addition to setting part of the stadium on fire.
• In 2013, two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon in the United States as runners were finishing the race. Three people were killed and more than 175 injured. Three other devices were found at other locations nearby.
• According to a report published by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), 1,200 deaths have been attributed to stadium constructions since Qatar was awarded the 2022 FIFA World Cup in 2010.

So – how would you deal with each of these scenarios? Could they have been prevented? What would you have done differently? You probably cannot answer those questions right now, but the goal of this book is to provide you with a body of knowledge in sport facility operations management that can be transferred to any type of facility around the globe. As with any textbook, the theoretical foundations presented here offer the reader the opportunity to conceptualize the practices within a subject, then take that knowledge and apply it in practical settings. This book does not and cannot cover every individual, unique aspect of sport facility operations management with respect to every type of facility – this would be impossible. It does, however, provide the framework for an understanding that will allow individuals to enter a sport facility operations management situation, have a base understanding of what is happening, and conceptually understand how to start the process of managing the situation.

The Discipline of Sport Facility Operations Management

The first section of the book seeks to provide the reader with an understanding of behind-the-scenes concepts that must be understood before even entering into the management and operations of sport facilities. First is an explanation of the various business, ownership, and governance structures for sport facilities across the globe. It is equally important to understand the legal authority under which the sport facility can operate as a business, as well as the business, governance, and organizational effectiveness structures. Second is an analysis of the intricacies of financing sport facilities, including the costs of conducting business, life cycle costing, cost-effectiveness/efficiency, and the importance of economic impact analyses. By understanding these financing concepts, sport facility operations managers can connect financing options to ownership and governance structures and understand how the facility came into being. Furthermore, this information serves as a foundation for looking at the current and future trends that will affect the management and operation of sport facilities. The third concept involves capital investment appraisal, which focuses on how the decisions to build new facilities, upgrade existing facilities, or invest in new equipment have a significant effect on the future financial well-being of a sport organization. To help make these decisions on an informed basis, a variety of techniques known as capital investment appraisal are available. Such decisions will be examined through an analysis of traditional methods, such as the payback method and the accounting return on investment, as well as contemporary approaches based on the time value of money, such as ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Case studies
• List of facility focus
• List of technology now!
• List of in the field
• Preface
• 1 Introduction to sport facility operations management
• SECTION I Pre-management and pre-operational issues
• SECTION II Application of management and operations principles for sport facilities
• SECTION III Implementing sport facility operations management
• SECTION IV Effectiveness of management and operations
• Index