Documenting What an Athletic Administrator Does

Even though an athletic administrator may be visible at some contests, the master of ceremonies at athletic awards programs, and the host of pre-season parent meetings, many in the school community do not fully understand or appreciate the nature and extent of what this person does on a daily basis. This limited awareness would possibly include some teachers, administrators and school board members.

To help educate and counter any misconceptions, athletic directors should consider the following suggestions:

• Create a detailed job description if one does not exist, and extensively revise and update any existing document. This effort is essential in order to cover the full scope of the tasks and responsibilities that are involved in this position.

• Also put together a list of every detail and task that you do. For example, don’t simply write down that you schedule, but include everything that you schedule such as games, officials, transportation, security, ticket sellers, practice facilities, meetings, and anything and everything that falls under your purview for which you make the arrangements. If you put in sufficient time and effort into this undertaking, it will be a long extensive list. You may also want to consider organizing this list of tasks by categories such as summer, fall, winter, spring or ongoing. Use whatever system or approach you think is logical and will be easier for someone to follow.

• Construct a daily log that will show the total hours that you worked, and list the three major responsibilities that you had for each day. An Excel document can be a good format to use for this purpose, and with this log you can also show how many hours per week that you actually spend in the execution of your responsibilities. The document would look like this:

When listing your three major responsibilities for the day, don’t restrict yourself to games and contests. Definitely also list events such as pre-season parent, booster club and league meetings; awards evenings; and special meetings with parents about concussions or college athletic recruiting. Include anything and everything that takes a large segment of your time and effort.

• Prepare a special document in which you explain the steps, the details, and all of the individuals that you have to contact in the event of postponed contests due to inclement weather – snow in the winter and rain in the spring. Quite often, administrators and school board members have absolutely no idea what is involved, and the great amount of time that is spent to complete every step or detail of this process.

• Share with your principal, district-wide administrators and school board the game management checklists that you use for football and soccer contests held in the stadium, and for basketball games in the gymnasium. As with the details that you have to deal with during winter and spring postponements of games, very few individuals will understand the complexity of your tasks when hosting large events without seeing them in print. These documents are also invaluable when you have to ask an assistant principal or department chair to cover for you when necessary.

• Always send copies of programs and meeting agendas to your principal, superintendent and school board president. And this would include items for your pre-season parent meetings, pre-season coaches meetings, booster club meetings, league meetings, presentations at professional conferences, a copy of a published article, an award that you received, league or state sportsmanship awards, tournament programs, and anything else that is positive and noteworthy.

While educating individuals as to what is involved with your position is vitally important, there are also a few other advantages of documenting what you do. Supportive and illustrative documents may be extremely helpful in negotiations to add an assistant, a secretary (yes, not all athletic administrators around the country are so lucky), or for the ability to use flex time to improve your working conditions. Don’t take a chance; document everything that you do and share it.