Leading a small business? No, it's a rugby club!

Abstract

Purpose

Community rugby clubs are now becoming small businesses, which are mostly led by volunteers. This paper aims to document a case study on the Leadership Academy developed by the Rugby Football Union to improve the effectiveness of community rugby club leaders.

Design/methodology/approach

The programme content is explained, and written evaluations and observations analysed to assess the effectiveness of the Leadership Academy as a tool in helping to develop the community rugby club leaders.

Findings

The results showed that the Leadership Academy helped the leaders to build stronger local relationships with other rugby clubs and to improve confidence levels. These outcomes are also factors that help small business owners become more effective as leaders.

Originality/value

The findings from this paper provide useful input for any other organisations or governing bodies that want to improve the effectiveness of their current or future leaders.

Citation

Stockdale, S. and Williams, S. (2007), "Leading a small business? No, it's a rugby club!", Industrial and Commercial Training, Vol. 39 No. 6, pp. 339-342. https://doi.org/10.1108/00197850710816827