Organizational Analysis of Princeton University Athletic

Aquatics

Submitted by: Aaron OstroffSubmitted to: Dr. Bocarro

In partial fulfillment of the course requirementPRT 506 Organizational Behavior and Leadership in Parks, Recreation, Tourism, and

Sport10/13/2014

Aaron OstroffPRT 506

Princeton University Athletics – Aquatics

Organizational Context:

The Princeton University athletic department is composed of 36 varsity

sports. Along with coaches and assistant coaches for these sports, there are also

administrators, coordinators, directors, and business and finance staff. The

complexity of the organization lies in not only the number of employees, but also the

fact that we all report to the Athletic Director and still have to work with each other

and make decisions amongst ourselves even though neither the administrative staff

or the coaches actually report to each other so it is about making decisions without

stepping on toes. I am focusing on the aquatics part of the athletic department,

which consists of a director, two coordinators, a pool manager, and seven coaches

for five different sports. The sports are Men’s Swimming, Women’s Swimming,

Diving, Men’s Water Polo, and Women’s Water Polo. In appendix A, you can see our

organizational structure and how complex it is. The leadership among the aquatic

staff would be our Aquatics Director, whom I report to, and he reports to our AD.

Our coaches also report to our AD, which means that we have to communicate

effectively amongst one and other to keep everyone on the same page and things

moving smoothly for everyone. My job is to schedule all of the events and practices.

Each month, we go through and set practice schedules for all of our varsity teams.

When doing this, we make sure everyone is in the meeting together so each coach

knows what the other coaches are doing to prevent accidental overlaps with

practices. Having so many sports that use the same facility means that there is no

way for them all to be in the water at the same time, this is why we schedule

everyone in advance and make sure they all know when other teams have the pool.

We also are responsible for bring in $465,00.00 in revenue each year by renting lane

space to age group teams and hosting events throughout the year. This makes the

scheduling process even more complex because it adds another set of teams and

needed pool time to the mix. There are definitely some politics involved in this

process because when making the schedule we have to make sure that each coach is

given equal time and that it does not appear that one team is getting better practice

time than others. Our women’s swimming coach often makes the case that she is

less respected due to the fact that she is a woman when she does not get exactly

what she wants. Being aware of this and the fact that it is a sensitive issue, we make

sure to document every teams practice schedule so we have it clearly stated the this

is not the case and that her team gets just as much adequate pool time as all the

other teams. Here in Princeton Athletics, we have a very strong organizational

mission, which simply states why we are all here and what our purpose is. That

phrase is ‘Education Through Athletics’. It is a simple but powerful statement that

reminds us what we are here for, and that is the student athletes and setting them

up for success both in and out of athletics. Having this mission is so important

because it really is such a strong rallying point for our organization that it really

makes everyone work together to produce not only success on the athletic side, but

to produce great people and will leave here and make a positive impact on our

society.

Four Frames:

Structural – Both the administrative staff and the coaching staff have very

detailed and straightforward goals given to us by the Athletic Director. The

goal of the coaches is to win games and achieve success on and off the field of

play. The administrative staff is to do everything we can to set the teams up

for success and other various tasks, such as revenue generation for our

facility.

Human Resource – The relationships between all our athletic staff is very

positive. People are very proud to work here and are very motivated about

what they do.

Political – The overall person in charge is our Athletic Director. Overall, there

is a very open line of communication between coaches are her. It is a bit

different for administrative staff because most people do not report directly

to her.

Symbolic – This is a very strong frame for our organization. The vast majority

of our staff are behind the phrase ‘Education Through Athletics’ which has

become a great motivator for everyone to achieve success in our profession,

but to also teach and help make great people after they leave.

Perceived Problems:

Having such a complex organization often can lead to inefficiencies as well.

By having so many teams using our facility, scheduling and sticking to that schedule

are very important. In the state of New Jersey, we are required to provide lifeguards

for all of our practices. This includes our varsity sports, our rental groups, and any

events we have. Basically any time someone is in the water, we have to have a

lifeguard on duty. This is another reason that sticking to schedules is so important.

Often times, coaches will change or cancel a practice without notifying us so that we

can make sure that we do not have lifeguards show up and have to pay them to

watch an empty pool. We staff our lifeguards through an outside company and pay a

flat per hour rate for lifeguards. The other issue that stems from not informing us of

a changed practice is that the pool may not be available at the time a coach would

like to switch to. Like I said before, we are not physically able to have all of our

teams practice at the same time, so if a coach switches to a time that is unavailable

and does not inform us of this, we are unable to do anything about it until the time

comes and we have to tell them that they cannot practice because other teams are

scheduled and there is no space. This is not an answer that coaches like to hear.

There is also the fact that we have rental groups that pay for pool time. Our varsity

groups always get priority, which is why we always schedule them first, but when

we have varsity practices cutting into rental group time, that needs to be adjusted

for the rental groups and will cut into our revenue generation which is required

through our endowment when the pool was built.

This leads into the next issue at hand, which is coaches understanding our

endowment and why it is so important that we schedule outside groups to come use

our facility. Running an indoor pool is a lot different that running other athletic

facilities because it costs a lot more money. The average cost to build an 8 lane, 50

meter indoor pool is $4 million, with an average annual operating cost of close to

$250,000(usaswimming). When this pool was built, it was done so with the

expectation that we would generate $465,000 a year to cover costs as well as have

the money to make necessary upgrades and repairs as needed. Currently, it does not

always seem that our coaches understand that all of these upgrades and repairs to

the facility cost money and that the money for them needs to come from

somewhere. So when we have to constantly cancel and adjust our rental groups’

schedules, losing a little bit here and there really adds up and will impact us in the

long run. This is impacted more on a day-to-day basis than it is with our events. We

schedule and plan events far enough in advance that we are able to schedule groups

around the event without cutting into any pool time. This issue stems from coaches

changing something on short notice when the schedule is already set and there is

not much time or wiggle room to adjust the rest of the schedule. One small change

can end up impacting several other groups.

Problem Analysis:

The current issues at hand are a combination of leadership and organization.

A lot of planning does go into our schedule for all of our events, but since we only

have 20 lanes at our facility, and if we wanted all five teams in at the same time we

would need to have 44 lanes of space. This is why the planning is so important and

seems to be the root of some of our current issues. The schedules are set for all of

our teams a month at a time. Over the course of a month though, a lot of things

change in regard to practice schedules. This lack of communication and planning

when making those schedule changes is what creates the issues of inadequate lane

space for our teams. The issue can also be due to the current work environment in

which this may still seem acceptable to coaches. According to the Strategic Planning

process of the Four Interpretations of Organizational Process (Bolman & Deal p.

314) this issue takes part amongst all four frames.

Structural - there needs to be cleared objectives set for why this

communication is so important.

Human Resource - I need to do a better job of encouraging and promoting the

participation from our coaching staff.

Political - I need to make it known more why this is an issue and not

necessarily realign power, but get them to understand why some changes

cannot be made.

Symbolic - this will require more responsibility from both our coaching staff

and myself. To have all of us working together to stay on top of this lack of

communication and planning to make it less of an issue going forward.

The challenges we are facing with our endowment and revenue generation has

to do with a lack of leadership on my part. I feel that this issue stems more from the

coaches lack of knowledge on how important this endowment is to our program

than it is a disregard for it. The coaching staff not completely understanding all

aspects of our endowment is most likely the reason that they do not fully grasp why

we need to make sure we schedule outside groups to come use of facility as much as

possible. If they understood more why it is so important that we hit our revenue

goals every fiscal year, they would be more likely to stick to their schedules and try

not to alter our rental groups times as much. This lack of knowledge, and therefore

more common overlapping into outside users time puts unnecessary strain on our

efforts to achieve our revenue goals. I believe that if I do a better job leading and

educating our coaches on why this is so important, they will be more likely to

appreciate this and do their best to keep from altering our schedules.

Prognosis & Solution:

In the textbook, Bolman and Deal refer to human resource leaders

communicate through having a strong belief in people (p. 362). I believe that this

relates directly to the current situation. The current issue at hand is that there is not

enough emphasis put in communication amongst our coaches between each other

and to us, the administrative staff. By showing a strong belief in our coaching staff

and helping them to understand how much better it will be for them as well if they

communicate with us more often, they will see through the results and our actions

that there is a much greater chance that we can make adjustments for them. By

doing so, they will be more likely to do this in the long run because there is a much

better chance of them getting the results that they want.

In the text, Bolman and Deal also refer to Structural Leaders as people who

focus on implementation (p. 360). To me, this means that I need to lead by example.

I need to do more than just tell our coaches that they need to communicate better, I

need to communicate better as well. I will implement this by making to point to

check in with all of our coaches on a much more frequent basis. At the beginning of

each week, I am going to stop in at each coach’s office to see how his or her week is

looking. I am going to ask them if they have any changes as well as if they anticipate

that something may change later in the week. If that is the case, that I am going to

follow up with them, either in person or via email mid week to keep up to date with

them. My hope is that this will lead to more open communication amongst all of us.

My goal with this is not for them to expect me to always come to them, but while

doing this to continue to encourage them to come to me or send me a quick email

any time they have a question or are looking into a change. I am hoping that by

showing my willingness to open up our communication, they will follow suit and do

so as well. Having this will also help with our endowment issue because it will

ensure that the outside groups that we do rely on will also not be impacted by these

changes either.

When addressing our endowment with the coaches, I am going to make a

point to sit down with each of them for just a few minutes to explain what our

endowment is and why it is essential to our facility. I am going to do this individually

to ensure a better understanding from our coaches by allowing them to ask anything

they may have and to make sure they pay better attention versus meeting with them

all at once with the chance that one may have a question they are embarrassed to

ask or that some of them will not pay as close attention in a group setting. I will set

these meetings up at times that work well for their schedule so that I am not

inconveniencing them at all. These meetings will be brief and to the point, and I will

also encourage them to come to me with any questions they may think of later. As I

said earlier, this is a leadership issue on my part and by making everyone more

aware of the significance of our endowment, I can expect them to respect it a little

bit more as well. This caters more to the Structural Frame because I am doing this to

set our organization up for positive results towards our revenue generation. By

doing this, I am also going to be able to better market our facility to outside groups.

If I am able to better commit to set times, I am more likely to get those slots filled

and maximize our pool space to the best of my ability. By doing a SWOT analysis for

our facility and lane rentals, I am able to show why it is helpful and beneficial to our

endowment to have a better set of time to offer our groups that pay for their lane

space.

Strengths – We have the best looking and fastest facility in the area.

We are one of only two pools in New Jersey that can offer Long Course

pool time in the winter. We have the ability to host large events

because our facility hold 1,500 spectators.

Weaknesses – A non-consistent schedule due to changing varsity

schedules every season.

Opportunities – Maximizing our facility time by offering set times to

these groups. Hosting additional events to create more revenue and to

get more teams into our facility to increase awareness of what we

have to offer.

Threats – Rutgers, which has the other Long Course indoor pool. Also

other indoor pools in the area that do not have the ability to go Long

Course, but can offer teams a consistent schedule.

By having the ability to offer more consistent schedules to groups that rent our lane

space, it will better increase our revenue and ensure long-term use by teams.

Prospecting the Future:

When looking towards the future and long-term success of these changes, I

believe that they will actually benefit each other. By increasing the communication

between the administrative staff and the coaching staff, teams will ensure their

practice times and the administrative staff can rely on the ability to schedule outside

groups without having to worry so much about last minute changes. When Bolman

& Deal reference Argyrus and Schon’s Theories for action, specifically Model II, it

says to communicate openly (p. 172). Having this open communication between

everyone in the organization will lead to a better overall work atmosphere and

better efficiency for pool space. This model also shows us that by combining

advocacy and inquiry, it will make us integrative which is what the goal is.

Now, when it comes to our endowment and what is expected of us in revenue

generation there are more things to look into. In years past, we generally increase

our lane fees every 3-4 years. I have only been here for a year, but looking at our

history, it the last time we increased our rates was 2010. Based off of our history, I

can expect that this may change during our next fiscal year. By increasing our rates, I

need to make sure that we can produce a product that is worth the rate that people

will pay. I also need to use the available time to rent to groups to the best of my

ability. By having a set time I can offer teams, it will give me the ability to utilize as

much pool space as possible as well as offer these times to groups for the a long

time. If I am able to get a set schedule, I can do work on the front end to make sure

that all 20 lanes are being used, I can then have that be a set schedule for our teams

and know that on most nights, our pool space is being maximized. This will lead to

better revenue generation and keep us on track for the expected increase. There are

currently 65 teams registered with New Jersey Swimming (njswim.org), which

means that there are a large number of teams that use pool space on a daily basis.

By hosting events, Looking at that number and knowing that when we host event for

New Jersey swimming that several of these teams will be there, this is a great

opportunity to market our facility and let them see for themselves what we have to

offer. I feel that a lot of teams are scared off by how much we charge, but when the

get a chance to be inside our facility and swim in it, they can see that it is worth it. If

we are able to get a solid three hours each week night to offer a groups, at $17 per

lane/per hour and having 20 lanes, we have the ability to generate $1,020.00 in

revenue every night of the week, and even more on weekends because we can offer

more than just three hours.

Work Cited

25 yard compared to 50 meter – “to build or not to build”. Retreived October 10th,

2014 from: http://www.usaswimming.org/ViewMiscArticle.aspx?

TabId=1755&mid=7716&ItemId=3570

Bolman, L. & Deal, T. (2008). Reframing Organizations: Artistry, Choice, and

Leadership. San Francisco. Jossey-Bass.

NJ Swim Club Page. (2014). Retreived October 13th, 2014 from:

http://www.njswim.org/TabGeneric.jsp?_tabid_=12291&team=eznjslsc