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To AD or not to AD...

Should programs have an associate athletic director in charge of technology?
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Can you see this happening? A new coach is hired. He wants new computers and video equipment for his staff. So, off to the AD's office he goes. The athletic director, anxious to do everything to make the new coach happy, tells the coach to get him a proposal. Thereafter, the coach instructs his video coordinator to "... write something up." The coach and his video guy then return to the AD's office to make their pitch. The AD will most oftentimes try to approve the expenditure, and then find the money. While this scenario no doubt happens time-after-time in the world of high school and college athletics, it would most assuredly never happen in the business world.

Virtually any business organization of any size whatsoever would have a position of Vice President for Technology, Chief Information Officer, and/or Chief Technology Officer. These positions are well established in the business world. The executives, who hold these titles, or their equivalents, are at the upper echelon of management in most of the world's leading corporations. The big business of college athletics shouldn't be any different, but this position is still a rarity. Because University Presidents and athletic directors have been slow to invest in executive level professional expertise, many programs have paid a large price in wasted dollars and, even more importantly, in failure to maximize the productivity of their investments.

For years, the business world has borrowed from sports ideas for motivation and concepts such as teamwork. Yet, the sports world seemingly never uses sound, proven, tried and true methods of management from the business world. This incongruous fact represents a trend that must be reversed in today's world of athletic department management if programs across the nation are to survive.

In order to keep up in what appears to be a mutually assured mass destruction mode of never-ending escalation in spending, schools must seek to run their athletic departments in a more "business-like" manner, with clear mission statements and attainable and identifiable goals for everything. One of the best ways to accomplish this is to have a dedicated individual within the athletic department serve as the coordinator of all technological needs, resources, training and purchases for the department: an associate athletic director for technology. With today's investment in technology such an important and expensive part of successful programs, professional management of this key to success, is a requirement for programs, which strive to be the best.

A program should have one person whose sole responsibility is the oversight of all technology needs of the athletic department staff and teams. This person would be responsible for approving all purchases, product enhancements, updates, and training for all coaches and athletic department staff personnel. This individual would have as his/her mission to look at each and every technological need and requirement and maximize cost efficiency and product effectiveness for the department.

In the scenario described above with the new football coach, the coach would never have made it to the AD with a request without first having the proposal thoroughly analyzed and approved by the associate AD for technology. What could make more sense than a person with full and complete knowledge of the subject giving approval to proposed expenditures and, thereafter, giving advice on such to the ultimate decision maker: the AD?

The associate AD for technology should not only handle the purchasing and training aspects of technological needs for the department, but would also make certain that every line item purchase is: 1) cost effective; 2) would be used efficiently by all areas within the athletic department and the various coaching staffs and/or athletes; 3) and would insure there is no redundancy in equipment or software already on hand, and that no minor modifications to existing equipment would accomplish the same goal as the requested new technology. The bottom-line is that he/she would maximize efficiency in all technology on hand or to be acquired.

The following outline reflects what we feel are the key qualifications demanded by this position. We have also included a brief description of the proposed staffing requirements to support the technology needs of a college athletic department. This staffing analysis represents the "best case situation" for universities who are at the "top end" of the feeding chain. While recognizing that the level of expenditures may be beyond the means of smaller programs, this structure is still a good one for those programs, which aspire to success at the top of the profession.

Proposed Staff for a fully functional department of technology within an athletic department

Associate Athletic Director of Technology (1): Full-time employee. Responsible for coordinating all activities within the Technical Services area. Reports directly to the Director of Athletics, but liaisons with all members of the administrative staff. Oversee the activities of both the Video Services and Computer Services Areas. Supervision of LAN operations. Coordinates all technical maintenance and repairs of departmental technology. Oversee all technical hardware purchases, including all paperwork and administrative tasks in cooperation with purchasing. Oversee all budgeting and acts as administrative budget liaison for all Technical Services areas. Coordinates and oversees all activities of the Internet web site team.

Administrative Assistant to the Associate Athletic Director for Technology (1): Student employee, College Work Study Program-eligible preferred. Performs all routine filing and paperwork-related activities for the Associate Athletic Director for Technology. Updates and maintains the Technical Services inventories and equipment lists provided. Reconciles monthly budget expenditure reports. Processes all student and limited term employee wage reports each pay-period.

Video Coordinator (1):Full-time employee. Responsible for coordinating all activities within the Video Services area. Reports directly to Associate Athletic Director for Technology, but liaisons with a member of each sport's coaching staff Coordinates football scouting between graduate assistant coaches and the assistant video coordinators. Covers football needs during winter sport seasons. Coordinates service and maintenance of all-sports video equipment year-round. Provides consulting and user support to non-revenue sports coaches. Directly performs football scouting work as needed in support of assistant video coordinators efforts. Oversees all recruitment and training of Video Services staff. Arranges all football video exchanges in cooperation with assigned video coach, including arranging flights, pick-ups, etc.

Assistant Video Coordinators (2): Part-time employees without benefits. Limited Term Employee status. Report directly to Video Coordinator. Responsible for all data entry, printed report generation, desktop publishing of football playbooks, video duplication, and production of weekly football highlight films for each side of the football, etc.. Each assistant video coordinator is responsible for video support to one of the basketball programs during the winter, and return to football focus in the spring. work eleven months with June off, given the opportunity to work football summer camp during June.

Student Videographers (4): Shoot all practices, run practice dubs, produce highlight films, work varied tasks on game day. Provide support services for both soccer programs during home contests and all non-revenue sports during winter. Each student works 15-40 hours per week throughout the entire school year. College Work Study Eligibility preferred.

Computer Services Coordinator(1): Full-time employee. Responsible for coordinating all activities within the Computer Services area. Reports directly to Associate Athletic Director for Technology. Perform and oversee performance of user support for Local Area Network (LAN) "Help Desk". Perform installations and notifications of user accounts. Evaluate and install software on LAN and within user accounts. Design and implement curriculum for education of departmental users on software applications in use within the departmental LAN environment. Design, implement, and maintain user-specific databases for all areas within the athletic department, including databases for each sport's recruiting, special events operations, etc.. Recruit, train, and supervise Computer Services Staff. Troubleshoot hardware and software problems in the LAN environment.

Assistant Computer Services Coordinator (1): Part-time employees without benefits. Limited term employee status. Report directly to Computer Coordinator. Perform user support for clients in LAN environment as necessary ("Help Desk"). Assist with installation and account modification, as well as periodic account maintenance for individual user accounts. Design, implement, and maintain databases for various departmental areas as necessary.

Student Computer Services Assistants (3): College Work Study Program-eligible students preferred. Generally Computer Science or Electrical Engineering majors. Provide user support services ("Help Desk") far all departmental users. Assist with routine user account maintenance. Troubleshoot user systems as necessary. Design, implement, and maintain user-specific databases for all areas within the athletic department.

Internet Web Site Assistant Coordinator (1): Part-time employee without benefits. Limited term employee status. Reports to Associate Athletic Director for Technology. Delegates and oversees maintenance of the athletic department's Internet web site.

Student Internet Web Site Assistant (2): College work-study program-eligible students preferred. perform routine maintenance tasks, including updating statistical information and multi-media pages within the athletic department's Internet web site.

The five "must-haves" for an associate AD of technology

An executive ideally suited to supervise the needs of a major college program should have expertise and experience in the application of technology to five areas: college coaching, teaching, administration, business, and academic credentials. Here are some brief thoughts and what to look for in each area:

Coaching:In the end, the primary purpose of technology is to maximize the ability of coaches to recruit the finest student-athletes possible, teach them to perform to the best of their abilities, place them in strategic positions where they have the greatest chance for success, and to maximize their academic potential. Nothing can help an executive understand the challenges faced by coaches as well as the experience of coaching itself. This experience is vital not only in helping the executive in decision making, but also in relating to coaches as a colleague, whose judgment and decisions are respected.

Teaching:Just as the coaching of student athletes is teaching in its purest form. So to is "coaching the coaches". One of the most important factors in maximizing the productivity of technology is a well-educated work force. The coaches and administrative staff who use technology must be continually trained, refreshed and supported. Ultimately it is the responsibility of the executive in charge to design, oversee and evaluate the instructional and support efforts within the department. To fulfill this role he needs to be a proven teacher himself.

Administration:Overseeing and coordinating technology resources and support personnel, in the highly demanding environment of intercollegiate athletics, requires unique administrative skill. Proven experience in roles of administrative leadership, staff supervision and crisis management are essential. From time to time "problems" will occur. Many times they seem to occur at the time of greatest pressure. Maturity, experience and demonstrated success in dealing with problems and adversity are invaluable skills. Crisis management is one of the most important functions of all administrators, particularly in an area like technology, where few of those people in the athletic department have the technical knowledge or skill to diagnose and solve problems.

Business:Another major role of the Associate Athletic Director for Technology is to be the university's representative in the evaluation, recommendation and purchasing of technology. Computer software and hardware, multi-million dollar scoreboard technology, non-linear (digital) editing technology and an Internet presence are all technologies, which impact today's athletic departments. Proven experience in evaluating, budgeting for, and purchasing such systems is invaluable.

Academic credentials:In today's university environment, professional credibility at the senior administrative level requires at a graduate level degree. In an environment where decision making is made by leaders with law degrees and Ph.D.'s, and critique often comes from a faculty comprised primarily of Ph.D.'s, the higher the level of the academic credentials of athletic administrators, the more readily they are accepted as colleagues, whose judgment is respected.






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