NASSM Executive Council Member Diary (Part 1)

by Michael L. Naraine, Brock University

It’s November 5, 2021 and the Fall term has hit its midpoint across most of North America. There’s a lot going on for us sport management academics: NASSM abstracts are due, mid-terms need marking, and all of that discount Halloween candy isn’t going to eat itself! At the same time, some NASSM members might feel left out; our society has not met in-person since June 1, 2019 in New Orleans, LA. While the amazing behind-the-scenes team on the executive council (EC) and our various committees do their best to spread the word, for some of our membership, what NASSM does can still feel indescribable and too far removed from the average daily account of a sport management instructor and researcher. So, in the spirit of transparency, let’s open up the books! Whether you’re a student or professional member, affiliated with an R1, R2, or teaching-focused institution, a glimpse NASSM’s inner workings brings our community closer together and shines a light on the amazing work being done to maintain our status as the preeminent sport management association. So, what better way to utilize the NASSMblog than by using it for a diary! Over the months ahead on the #RoadtoNASSM, I’m going to document my perspective, my voice, providing one small, but (hopefully) helpful look into the behind-the-scenes. With this first diary post, I want to bring everyone up to speed.

For starters, for those of you who don’t know me, I’m Mike Naraine, and I’m an Assistant Professor at Brock University in Canada. For background (and if we’re splitting hairs), Brock is probably closer to an R2, but our sport management department is the largest in the country with 1,000 students and over 15 dedicated full-time faculty. More importantly, this is my second (and final year of my term) on the NASSM EC as a Member-at-Large (MAL). Before I was voted in by the membership, I was a member of the NASSM Marketing and Communications committee, helping advance our social media strategy (and culminating with that elusive “Twitter verified” status!), and had been on the organizing committee of the 2015 NASSM conference in Ottawa, Canada.

One of the most common questions I get from members is: what does the EC actually do?

Well, like many things in our society today, there’s a pre-pandemic and present-day answer. Pre-pandemic, I’m told there were two major meeting sessions: Fall EC meetings and the NASSM conference EC meetings. What I understand about these two critical sessions is that EC members met for marathon sessions to cover all NASSM topics and issues in two days. I was not a part of this, so I’ll focus on present practices instead. My election to the EC happened during COVID-19 when the NASSM 2020 conference was moved to a virtual offering. Since then, the NASSM EC has embarked on a very effective strategy of having monthly meetings, spreading the workload of our society across the yearly cycle. This obviously has demanded an extended commitment from EC members across the year, but it has also allowed the now 2-hour meetings to be more focused and thorough on important issues - especially those that arose during the beginning of the pandemic. In late 2020, early 2021, a lot of those conversations were about the conference and providing new opportunities to recognize excellence in our society, such as the Distinguished Research Award which was approved by the membership at the 2021 conference. Today, those conversations continue to involve ways to recognize our members, create new opportunities and touchpoints for member connections, and safeguard our society for the future.

But, what does that really mean? Well, after the 2021 conference had concluded, the EC held its usual “changeover” meeting, where the old guard and the new guard come together – akin to the transition period in US Presidential Politics. In that meeting, our current President, Bri Newland, helped shape the direction and call-to-action for the EC for the upcoming year. One of the things I had personally pledged to accomplish during my term on the EC was the assist in the modernization of NASSM and that is certainly a sentiment shared by many in the group. In addition to identifying a new web administrator and beginning the arduous process of developing a new NASSM web site, Bri has been working tirelessly to update operating codes and centralize our digital approach. This has not been the easiest of tasks – many of our touchpoints have been fragmented: NASSM had different systems for e-mails and CRM, abstract submissions/reviewing, membership registrations, and even social media. Heck, I was the social media person and we didn’t even have centralized communiqué through Hootsuite or Tweetdeck! But, we are starting to see change and the shift to a centralized, modernized approach. This definitely is cause for some quick shoutouts to Bri, Khalid Ballouli (the new web admin), and Natalie Smith (the chair of the NASSM marketing and communications committee). We’re not all the way there on some of these pieces just yet, but the progress is encouraging. At the moment, myself, Patti Millar (MAL), Kerri Bodin (Student President), and Khalid are reviewing various online submission systems for NASSM abstracts and the review process, so if you’re a fan of a particular system, don’t hesitate to reach out to any one of us and voice your experience!

For the MALs on the EC, our service activities in the lead up to monthly EC discussions have, on the whole, increased this year. One change Bri made to ensure better communication between the committees and EC was to assign an MAL as an ex-officio non-voting member to a committee. All six MALs now liaise with standing committees like diversity and inclusion, sustainability, and the marketing & communication committee (just to name a few), and communicate those activities back to the EC to recognize, digest, and respond. MALs have also been working hard to initiate and oversee the process of our major award winners for the 2022 NASSM conference (i.e., Earle F. Zeigler Lecture Award, Garth Paton Distinguished Service Award, Distinguished Sport Management Educator Award, Joy DeSensi Diversity Award for Inclusive Excellence, and NASSM Research Fellow Awards). That has been an interesting process, working with past winners to examine nominations, additional evidence materials, and then provide a holistic report of the finalists back to the EC to vote at the November monthly meeting in a few weeks time.

And so, that brings us to the here and now. Before I became a NASSM EC member, to be honest, I did not know about the inner circle. If you go to the NASSM conference every year you might feel like your involved, but if you skip out on key touchpoints like the Annual General Meeting (AGM), and don’t get involved with the many standing committees or initiatives that are happening, it’s really easy to default into thinking not much else happens. But, now having been on the other side, there is so much happening from dedicated members across R1, R2, and teaching focused institutions, and there’s certainly room for more! NASSM is also about to vote on a new governance structure that will open the doors for new opportunities for shorter-term service. For example, the process I just described above for the awards will change under the new structure. Members could choose to get involved, for example, as part of the doctoral research grant award committee, which will only require a few weeks of service across two years. Whether you want to get your “feet wet” with some standing committee involvement and/or eventually run for a position on the EC, there is room in the NASSM tent for more to get involved. As you can probably decipher from this first diary post, there’s a lot going on, but there’s also much more to go. Having members willing to serve and affect the direction of our society with improvement is the bedrock of our scholarly community. So, if you want to be a part of the movement, get involved; reach out to a MAL, a standing committee chair, or even our President.

In the interim, our next NASSM EC meeting is on November 19, 2021, where we’ll determine, among other things, those major award winners for the 2022 NASSM conference in Atlanta. Having chaired two major award committees, I can honestly say our membership continues to inspire and impact their community, and it’s been a privilege to oversee the examination of these outstanding members and their contributions to the field. With that, my next post won’t be too far away, so hang tight; if you have any questions or comments, or things you’d like to know more about in future posts, send me a message on Twitter (@mikenaraine) or via e-mail (mnaraine@brocku.ca).

Until next time, NASSM Members…