Hana Schlangerová

Managing Human Resources in the Czech Rugby Union

Czech Rugby Union (CRU) is the governing body of rugby union in the Czech Republic. This case study aims to discuss management of volunteers in the CRU. The CRU has about 3300 members associated in 34 clubs, has 6 full time employees and is using some external paid services. All other positions and tasks are covered by volunteers. In the current situation the CRU is dependent on volunteers. With help of SWOT analysis and problem tree analysis this study tries to address the main problems in volunteers’ management.

The management of volunteers is affected by ineffective leadership and missing strategic thinking/planning in the HR perspective. There is no evidence of volunteers. No one is taking care of motivation of the volunteers. The development opportunities of the volunteers are limited and mostly dependent rather on personal relationship then real potential of the person. This poor management of volunteers causes malfunction of the CRU.

There are several suggestions made in order to solve this problem. First of all effective leadership has to be assured: a written structure of the CRU including job description, responsibilities and operational relationships of all employees and volunteers at management positions needs to be adopted. Database of volunteers is the next suggested part of the solution. It will make the engagement of volunteers as well as the communication with them significantly easier. Training and potential of career development may serve as a motivation factor for volunteers and a way to secure future employee with appropriate education, training and experiences for the CRU in the same time. Reflection on the rewarding of volunteers has to be made as well.

Implementation of all tasks of the solution has to be completed by the end of August 2017. Costs will be covered from the budget of CRU. Suggested steps will help improve current situation and enable future development of the CRU, as volunteers are essential for the function of the CRU.

Managing strategically in women’s section of the Czech Rugby Union

Czech Rugby Union (CRU) is the governing body of rugby union in the Czech Republic. This case study aims to outline the strategic planning process which is currently running (since 12/2016) in the women’s section of the CRU and suggest further steps. Based on a diagnosis of the environment, review of the real performance of CRU using stakeholders’ analysis, and SWOT analysis and with respect to the vision, mission and values of the women’s section of the CRU several strategic objectives have been defined. Taking in consideration the limited extend, this case study is only focuses on one of them: To raise the quality of players in national teams.

The main problem, which this case study proposes to remedy, is the low quality of performance of national team players. With help of problem tree analysis three main root causes of this situation have been identified:

• Low number of players,
• No development pathway to work with talented players,
• Low quality of coaching.

To solve these root causes, several solutions were suggested. One of the most important is to provide education to coaches of all levels and motivate them to take part in the education process. The next is a development pathway for talented players which would ensure a proper recognition of such players and which would enable their development on a regional and/or national level including strength & conditioning, mental preparation and medical observation. Launch of a U17 national competition is vital to ensure that young players get more playing opportunities and with it a real match playing experiences. All this has to be communicated and coordinated with the clubs – which will naturally profit from the development of players – to ensure their cooperation. Clubs also have to be encouraged to run recruitment campaigns to raise the number of female participants of all ages.

All solutions will be implemented in the course of this year. An action plan, as a part of the strategic planning process, has been developed to assign responsibilities and allocate financial resources for this purpose. As the strategic plan is scheduled for the period 2017-2021 we will have to wait several years for the results and evaluation.

The strategic planning process provides a great opportunity to work out main issues hindering the development of women‘s rugby in Czech Republic and outline steps needed to ensure all participants can reach their potential in rugby.

Author:

Hana Schlangerová

Women’s Rugby Representative/Coordinator

Czech Rugby Union

Contact:

Mezírka 12, 602 00 Brno, Czech Republic

hanaschlanger@yahoo.com