Key information and statistics

Transcription

1 Key information and statistics VISION The Golfing Union of Ireland (GUI) envisions the game of golf in Ireland being governed by the leading national governing body on the island, one which is recognised domestically and internationally for its leadership, governance and capacity to oversee the game s continuing development. MISSION The GUI s mission is to support and grow the game of golf in Ireland. It will enable this through the provision of the widest possible array of attractive and well-managed competitions, a world-class high performance programme, and a dedicated plan to support clubs in providing a wide range of facilities in a sustainable way. To accomplish this mission, the GUI will drive the necessary innovation and organisational change while maintaining the century-old traditions that distinguish the game of golf in Ireland. HIGH LEVEL GOALS - To increase participation in golf - To optimise the governance and leadership capacity of the Union - To be a resource and catalyst to the constituent parts of the Union in developing their capacity to respond to changing needs and circumstances. - To have a High Performance system that is world-class, underpinning the continued success of our elite players at all levels. - To support volunteers and volunteerism in golf - To initiate a process, in collaboration with the Irish Ladies Golf Union, which will result in the development of one governing body for golf in Ireland

2 STRONGER CLUBS The Union will commit more resources to help strengthen golf clubs in acknowledgement of their fundamental role in promoting and developing the game of golf. Additionally, the Union will provide advisory and support services to clubs, through the Confederation of Golf in Ireland (CGI), which will assist clubs in adopting good governance, as well as enhancing the quality, value and sustainability of their products. - There are 418 affiliated golf clubs in Ireland (as of 31 st October 2015). The number of clubs peaked in 2012 when there were There are 150,138 golf club members in Ireland, of which 19,567 are Juniors. - Club membership peaked in 2008 when there were 199,129 members, including 24,307 Juniors. - The CGI employs two Club Support Officers and three Participation Officers to provide face to face support on the ground. - GUI provides through CGI a range of different services across areas such as Governance, Club Services, Junior Golf, Safeguarding and Participation. In the six-month period from January 2016 June clubs used the Strategic and Business Planning service, eight have had full club reviews/audits, four have had full club governance reviews and two have had a full financial review. These were delivered for the GUI through CGI clubs attended seminars held by CGI on Income Generation and Advanced Club Financials. - CGI completed two mystery shopper reports for GUI affiliated clubs - Three significant publications were launched The Governance Guide, Junior Handbook and a Get into Golf Guide for clubs. - CGI engaged with R&A in relation to an Economic Impact Study for Golf in Ireland and engaged with the ESRI in relation to a Participation Study for Golf.

3 DEDICATED VOLUNTEERS The Union will continue to encourage a volunteer culture at all levels in golf on the island of Ireland. It will offer training and support resources at club level for Committee members. It will remove boundaries and limitations on involving a greater number of volunteers in the organisation, on the basis of competency as well as commitment. - There are over 200 Volunteers working for the GUI at present. They sit on Committees, referee at events, organise and travel with representative teams at interprovincial and international level and perform a vast number of different tasks on a regular basis for the organisation. - The Volunteers are from all walks of life and from the four corners of the island of Ireland. Some are retired while the day jobs of others include everything from farming to banking. - All are members of affiliated golf clubs across the island. - 75% of Volunteers help with the running of Inter Club events (Senior Cup, Barton Shield etc) and Championships - 40% of Volunteers work on committees such as SSS & Handicapping, Venues and Fixtures, Greenkeeping & Ecology and Rules of Golf. - GUI has a high retention rate amongst Volunteers with 93% remaining with the Union for three years or more - 19% of Volunteers spend one day or more per week doing voluntary work for the GUI while 55% give a few days every month of their time % of Volunteers reported that they would recommend to other people being a Volunteer with the GUI Over the past year, the Union has taken a more proactive approach to supporting and developing its Volunteer Force: - A Volunteer Policy has been devised - Volunteer Role Descriptions have been produced - A Volunteer Impact Assessment has been undertaken - Annual Volunteer Induction / Training programme is being developed - Volunteer Management and Volunteer Services programmes are being put in place

4 WORLD CLASS HIGH PERFORMANCE SYSTEM The Union will adopt a unified and co-ordinated High Performance Plan and Programme. It will draw together the considerable expertise and experience available at provincial and national level. It will provide the conditions to ensure the maintenance and improvement of the consistently high standard of performance. In 2016 an independent expert was commissioned to review the High Performance programme of the GUI and the provincial branches. The aims of that report are - To support the establishment of an agreed concept around an athlete pathway which extends from first beginnings in the sport through to high performance level - To identify the coaching systems and structures required to support this pathway, with a clear focus on player development - To identify and confirm the roles to be played by each of the stakeholders within this pathway (i.e., Confederation of Golf in Ireland, individual golf clubs, the four branches, and the GUI), and the professional and volunteer structures most appropriate to deliver it - To build a framework for the measurement of success within the pathway, including through the identification of appropriate performance indicators It is hoped that the report will be completed and recommendations made by the end of 2016.

5 SUPPORTED PARTICIPATION The Union will adopt an accessible, unified and co-ordinated Participation Programme which will build on the current excellent work of respective Provincial and Club-level Junior Coaching programmes. It will seek to improve its overall output by adopting an all-island approach to encouraging sustained participation, not only through a volunteer training plan but also through the provision of early-stage coaching. In 2016 a report on Supported Participation was commissioned as part of the overall High Performance Review. This will help GUI identify the best practice for supporting clubs grow the numbers playing the game. In the interim, ongoing work continues, delivered for GUI by the CGI in the areas of Schools Golf, Get Into Golf Programmes, Taster Days and general awareness of the pathways into golf through seminars, conferences and attendance at professional tour events. In the period January 2016 June ,900 attended the CGI Coaching Zone at The Irish Open - 4,500 children participated in 28 School Awareness days - 89 Get Into Golf Programmes delivered in partnership with golf clubs, resulting in 4400 people signing up for an eight-week programme - 27 clubs offer a follow-on scheme - 82% of people say their perception of golf has changed for the better having taken a Get Into Golf Programme - 97% would recommend a Get Into Golf Programme to family and friends - 88% say that the membership packages offered after the programme offered value for money

6 BETTER COMMUNICATIONS The Union will strengthen its connection with Irish golfers by creating more awareness of the GUI s role and value. It will develop a plan to tell the story of the GUI, speaking with one voice across all provinces. It will embrace social media and incorporate the necessary innovation to assist with this. It will market the game of golf as a healthy, active, social and lifelong pursuit, and will inform and influence decision makers in political office. In 2015 the GUI embraced social media platforms Facebook and Twitter for the first time. In the first year the Facebook page had almost 17,000 fans and the Twitter account had 4,350 followers. Facebook - 93% of our fans are male - 48% of our fans are aged between 25 and 44 Twitter - Over the first year, our tweets received an average of 957,000 impressions per month - We send on average 253 tweets per month, or 8.3 every day. - 53% of Twitter users are aged between 15 and 24 Website The GUI website, is Ireland s single biggest golf website or publication. In the twelve months to the end of July 2016 Video - Golfnet had 2,323,585 total visits from 607,727 unique users - The average user views 4.5 pages on each visit % of users are male - 60% of users are aged % of users access via a mobile device, 38% on desktop and 17% on tablet - Skerries Golf Club s website refers more people to the site than any other golf club in Ireland - The most accessed areas of the site (homepage excluded) are View Handicap, Open Fixtures and Tournaments The introduction of video came about in 2015 and the first tournament covered was the Home Internationals at Royal Portrush. This was followed by the AIG Irish Close, Walker Cup, Cups and Shields National Finals and in 2016 to date, the Flogas Irish Amateur Open. Information videos have also proved useful in explaining changes to Championship entry conditions. Videos are distributed across multiple channels with Facebook and Vimeo being the main outlets.

7 On Vimeo our videos were viewed 45,000 times in the twelve months to July Facebook accounted for over 280,000 views in the same period. From August 2016 the GUI will drive more awareness of what it does and the role it plays for golf in Ireland. In the pipeline are - A focus on how GUI generates and spends money - The role of the Volunteer within the Union - Our elite players and how they progressed through the coaching structures of the Union - Handicapping Awareness Campaign - The services provided to golf clubs by GUI and delivered by CGI on our behalf

8 OUTSTANDING COMPETITION The Union will run a world-class Competitions Programme that will capitalise on the quality and diversity of Ireland s golfing environment. It will determine the necessity of rationalising its current suite of competitions and introducing new events to make its current offering more inclusive. It will adopt a co-ordinated approach in its policies and procedures for conducting competitions in a way that will enhance overall quality. The Union will also offer assistance to golf clubs in enhancing the quality of their competitions. - The Union and its Branches run over 80 Championships and Tournaments each year, catering for age groups from Under-12 to Over-70. These Championships have evolved and expanded over time to the extent that it is now necessary for the Union to review its Competitions Suite to ensure its relevance to the golfing population at large. - In 2015, the Union started this process with a root-and-branch review of its Championships. It has already made several changes, including the incorporation of World Amateur Golf Ranking positions into its eligibility criteria and the reduction of the lower age limit for Mid-Amateur golf to 30, which have had undeniably positive effects on the competitiveness and quality of those events. The success of the full range of changes that were made in 2015 will be reviewed in the autumn of As a result of consultations carried out in 2016, the Union will also embark on an exciting new programme of events for University and third-level College golf from the season onward. The details of this will be communicated to college golfers shortly. - In 2016, the Union has also turned its attention to the Cups and Shields and will shortly be surveying golfers and considering available data on handicaps and participation rates for the current range of competitions it offers for club golfers. - On the practical side, the Union and its four Branches have identified and implemented a policy of standardisation on a range of issues, including the issuing of draws and communications issued to players before and during tournaments. The level of satisfaction of the players who play in our Championships is being measured by a short survey issued to all participants after each Championship. Further work will be carried out in this area in 2017.

9 FAIR AND CONSISTENT HANDICAPPING The Union will establish a reference group to extensively engage with the Union s constituents (the clubs and branches) in order to determine the future direction for handicapping in Ireland, and to make recommendations within six months of its establishment. At the end of 2015 several consultation meetings took place across all provinces where clubs were asked to voice their opinions on various aspects of the handicapping scheme. Further work on this will continue in 2016 and Education, Sanctions and Rules Changes are among the main issues being developed. One of the key issues to emerge from the consultation meetings with clubs, was the desire to further limit the number of shots a player could get back in a calendar year. The SSS & Handicapping Committee brought this to the Council of National Golf Unions (CONGU) and a one-shot limit (1SL) was introduced in Ireland as a result (down from two shot limit). A review of this will be undertaken during the annual handicap review period at the end of A proposal to have a Handicap Awareness Month in early 2017 will be discussed by the SSS & Handicapping Committee in late OPTIMISED GOVERNANCE The Union will update its governance model to ensure strategy and policies are determined at the appropriately high level, and which can be delivered in an efficient, effective and accountable manner. It will deepen the involvement and sense of belonging of its branches and affiliated clubs within the organisation. The appointment of a Chief Executive Officer in September 2015 was the first step in changing the way in which the Union is governed. This was followed by the establishment of a Board which met for the first time in May Included on the Board are three external members, one of which is the Chairperson. The Board replaced the Executive Committee and comprises of fewer members. The Board s composition is now Chairperson (external), President, President Elect, Hon. Secretary, Hon. Treasurer, one representative from each Province and two other external members. The Strategy Implementation Committee continue to examine the overall governance of the Union and will report to the Board on their findings.

10 A STRONG AND OPEN CULTURE The Union is committed to maintaining the traditions and history that distinguish golf on the island of Ireland. However, the organisation recognises the need for more openness, inclusivity and transparency, and will secure the necessary buy-in from within to embrace required changes in thinking and acting in order to deliver this strategy. A plan to tell the story of the Union is being formed which will look to change perceptions about the organisation. The aim is to demonstrate the Union as being forward moving, open and relevant to the member clubs it serves. ONE GOVERNING BODY The Union will engage with the Irish Ladies Golf Union to initiate a process leading to the formation of a single governing body for golf on the island of Ireland. It will seek to build on the current excellent working relationship between the GUI and ILGU, and the specifically positive experiences of both organisations in the key joint venture projects that have been undertaken in recent years. The Irish Ladies Golf Union (ILGU) and the GUI are in the process of holding discussions regarding the creation of a single governing body for golf in Ireland. These discussions have identified the need for both organisations, collectively, to consult with various stakeholders, including affiliated clubs. This consultation process will provide an opportunity for all stakeholders to voice their ideas and visions for a single governing body which will aim to serve the game of golf and its players and clubs into the future. Consultation meetings have taken place in 2016 with clubs and staff with further consultations planned. This is not a merger, rather an attempt to build from scratch the most effective and successful governing body for the sport there can be.