Following intensive consultation across the sport over the past 12 months, we are today announcing proposals for a significant restructure of England Athletics.

Our proposals mark a fundamental shift from an organisation of nine semi-autonomous regional business units to a single national team with centralised administration and a greater proportion of staff and resources deployed directly in clubs and coaching at a local level.  We will reduce core headcount by around 15 to 20 staff and redeploy approximately half a million pounds into clubs and coaching.  We believe that the future of the sport lies in the hands of volunteers and this restructure will enable us to support them with a more consistent, higher level of service.
 
We have three core objectives:

• To increase participation across a wider cross-section of the community
• To improve the quality of experience of every participant            
• To support the development of the next generation of champions.
  
  

In the run up to London 2012, the sport of athletics has an opportunity to capture the public’s attention like never before, and it is our responsibility to ensure a sustainable legacy in clubs, schools, coaching and competition that leaves the sport in a strong shape for years to come.
 
Our responsibility is to support and empower clubs, coaches and competition providers to raise their standards and embrace a wider audience.  Our challenge is to lay the foundations for future success on the world stage by helping our clubs and coaches find talented athletes and guide them to the level of the UK Athletics world-class performance programme.

We recognise that continuous improvement in clubs, coaching and competition requires direct financial investment.  Our role at England Athletics is to secure funding on behalf of the sport from sponsors, government and key partners such as UK Athletics and Sport England, and to distribute those funds as directly as possible into clubs, coaching and competition.  

Over the coming weeks we will be announcing exciting new plans to invest money in athletics in schools, clubs and coach development programmes.  A key proposal is the development of Athletics Networks, clusters of clubs working together with schools, universities and colleges to raise standards in their designated areas.

We believe that the needs of athletics will be best served through a consistent national strategy, implemented at a local level by well-trained staff working directly with our clubs and coaches.  

We believe that athletics competition, other than at national championship level, can be best delivered by established competition providers and we will support them wherever possible to deliver a revitalised competition structure that benefits all of our athletes.

We believe that our customer services functions, and the administration of coach, officials and teacher education courses and development events, could be provided most efficiently and cost effectively by a single centralised administrative team, rather than by the current system of nine autonomous regional business units.

Our proposed new organisation will be as follows:

• Spearheaded by a team of up to 19 field-based Club and Coach Support Officers, deployed across the country.  Their role will be to directly support clubs and coaches in their designated areas, working in partnership with the elected Regional Councils that represent the volunteers in their areas.
• The Club and Coach Support Officers will be grouped into three teams under the direction of three Team Leaders who will be responsible for their performance and professional development and for working with local authorities to influence planning agendas and attract further local investment into the sport.
• We will deploy additional development officers and development coaches, where appropriate, within Athletics Networks.  These may be employed directly by the Athletics Networks or sit within the England Athletics organisation on fixed term contracts, depending on local circumstances.

 
These changes will impact on the following posts:

• The existing 10 Regional Manager posts, and the 28 regional development posts (a combination of Regional Performance Development Co-ordinators, Coach Mentors, Athletics Development Officers, Event Co-ordinators and Community Sport Coaches) will become redundant.
• The 15 regional and head office administration posts will be replaced by six central posts, under the direction of a new Education and Athletics Services Manager.

It is envisaged that many of the existing incumbents of the redundant roles will successfully transition into the new Club and Coach Support Officer, Team Leader or central administration roles.

The positions of Chief Executive, Head of Marketing and Strategy, Head of Coaching, Events and Logistics Manager plus the current finance team of one Financial Controller and two Financial Administrators will be unaffected.
 
There will be a net headcount reduction of around 15 to 20 posts.  We will look to achieve this reduction through voluntary redundancies wherever possible, but compulsory redundancies may be required.  We will commence a 30-day collective consultancy process immediately in line with statutory employment obligations.  An intensive interview process will commence as soon as possible following consultation and we would like to have as many new posts as possible filled by the start of December.

As a result of these staff changes we will close 10 regional office facilities.  The new Club and Coach Support Officers and Team Leaders will be field based or based at hot-desk facilities provided by clubs or high performance centres.  

The proposed changes will create savings of around £500,000 that we will redistribute directly to Athletics Networks and coach development.
 
The vital role of our volunteer Regional Councils will continue.  The Councils play an essential leadership role in co-ordinating and supervising interaction between volunteers and employed staff to further the development of the sport.  The Board has asked Cy Knibb, the Chairman of the England Council, to initiate a consultation process with the Regional Chairs and Council members to recommend new structures and terms of reference for the Regional Councils to best support the sport going forward.

John Graves – Chairman         
Mike Summers - Chief Executive

A document containing answers to frequently asked questions can be downloaded below.

• England Athletics Restructure - Frequently Asked Questions