As your sports club grows and develops its range of activities, you will probably find it necessary to establish some club policies that set out in more detail how the club and its members should operate. Typically, these policies might cover such things as:
- The requirements for a person to become a member of your club (e.g. their standard of play, or the nature of their contribution)
- The standards of conduct expected of members or officials
- Arrangements for protecting children, young people or vulnerable adults from any form of abuse
- Arrangements for protecting members and the general public from any potential danger arising through the use of your premises, facilities or equipment.
The range of policies and procedures that you might require will very much depend on the nature of your sport and the type of activities that you choose to undertake. Listed in the righthand column, you'll find links to articles covering some of the more typical policy areas. In most cases, these articles will also provide you with a template policy to download and adapt for your circumstances.
A quick guide to policies and procedures
This section contains advice and guidance on the following common areas of club policy and procedure as listed in the Articles side panel:
- Membership Policy - membership criteria and membership forms, including addional provisions for junior members
- Equal Opportunities Policy - establishing an equity statement and its implementation through an equal opportunities policy
- Code of Conduct for Fair Play - ensuring that your members are familiar with minimum expected standards of participation and play
- Child protection - procedures to ensure that children, young people and vulnerable adults participate in your club's activities without risk of abuse
- Health & Safety - covering a range of issues including duty of care, risk assessment, insurance, first aid, emergency procedures, etc.
- Club Development Policies are covered in the section on club development planning
- Ethics in sport - 'ethics' is the now generic terms for all aspects of fair and equitable conduct in both the management and running of sport . See also the excellent Running Sport: Getting it Right booklet (listed in Resources panel) which provides a guide to sports ethics, disciplinary procedures and appeals.
Sports club governance
'Governance' refers to the process of running your sports club, making decisions and ensuring that it is properly accountable; this differs from 'management' which is concerned with organising the day-to-day activities of the club. To be an effective and accountable organisation, you need to ensure that you have good governance arrangements in place.
The Home Office also runs a very useful website called The Governance Hub which provides codes of conduct and useful guidance on all aspects of voluntary and community sector governance matters. It's linked from the Resources panel. The site refers specifically to England and Wales though many of the principles will apply elsewhere.
The national Sports Councils run several Modern Sports programmes designed to support the committees and boards of sports organisations to deliver efffective governance. Contact your national Sports Council for more information.
