Knowledge Acquisition in Football

Information and knowledge are among the core production factors for modern organisations across industries and disciplines. Constantly acquiring and maintaining existing knowledge is crucial for organisational growth - not only in terms of revenues but as well as in operational excellence.

“Why is knowledge critical to growing your club?”

It is essential for the success of a football club to constantly strive to do things better. The organisation itself has to support their employees to improve their knowledge and skills through further education. Those who don't recognize it will be hung up. Especially in football, it is crucial to gain an edge through knowledge instead of money. Not only the current COVID-19 pandemic revealed that. Indeed, there are clubs, following a vision to create this specific culture and become a learning organisation. To foster such initiatives, knowledge acquisition needs to be embedded in the strategy of the club and a specific amount of money should be aligned every year to provide ongoing education for the club’s employees. The following two hypotheses can be starting a point to become a learning organisation: 

1. Learning is initially always an individual process that is called “Knowledge Acquisition”
2. In a second step, you have to externalise the individual knowledge of the employees to make it accessible throughout the whole club

This process is described as systematic knowledge management. As mentioned above, it is clear that knowledge and data are one of the most important resources a club can possess. Based on the knowledge gained through the process of systematic knowledge management a club can make smarter and more data-driven decisions. Thus, preparing for a successful future.

A systematic knowledge management tool does not only include internal but also external knowledge. There are several channels that may drive organisational learning. A selection is further outlined in a little more detail within the following paragraphs.

The role of sponsoring

Although the shares differ between leagues, financial sponsoring is still one of the major revenue streams for most of the professional football clubs around the globe. For the European Top 5 leagues, sponsoring accounts for approximately 27% of their clubs’ revenues. Looking at other European top flights, the share tends to be even higher. Certainly, matchday revenues and especially broadcasting rights are as important as classical sponsoring, and in some cases obviously the stronger revenue pillars.

Nevertheless, the vast majority of managing directors will agree that sponsoring is an important building block for the overall financing of their club. At the moment, the largest partition of the funds will go directly into the first team, meaning transfer fees, agent remunerations, star player salaries, etc. Strategic projects often fall by the wayside or are financed with lower priority.

"You give me some money and I will decorate my stadium/kit/media-walls/website with your logo" is usually the way it has always been done. Every weekend you can spot colourful logos of companies from all imaginable industries. Judging from the fact that these companies can afford to place their colours in front of an audience of millions of faces, they are probably not doing too bad in their field either. Such businesses usually carry some expert knowledge which can be very valuable for other organisations as well. So, why take their money in exchange for advertisements when they have something better to offer?! Why not use some of the club’s advertisement capacities for knowledge acquisition? Partnering with professional enterprises does not necessarily need to involve monetary support but leveraging their expertise for the own club can be even more fruitful. Of course, this does not work in all areas but if all parameters are clearly defined, this can lead to a win-win situation. The companies from the business side can save some liquidity and are able to deploy their knowledge in a completely different but at the same time exciting environment, which may lead to new insights for their own business as well. The club, on the other side, is forced to “invest” into infrastructure and strategic projects apart from transfer fees and player salaries - you can see it as kind of an earmarked funding - and thus improves its organisation as such. The tendency to invest too much of the financial resources into high-risk short-term opportunities can thus be mitigated. 

Utilising the academic landscape

Universities and research institutions have always been among the most important knowledge producers in our societies. Nowadays, research is applied in any possible field and apart from the classical disciplines, many novel directions emerged. Especially in sports science a lot of exciting findings appeared in the recent past. This ranges from aspects related to physiology, sports medicine and nutrition to computer and data science. Modern football clubs can profit from this constant knowledge production if they consider partnering with their nearby institutions. Match and performance analysis, for example, is one of the hot topics, which gained a lot of traction and professionalisation in the most recent years but is still far from being fully explored. Universities are full of well-educated data scientists and statisticians - why not exploiting this potential?

Clubs could provide the real-life environment to test theoretical hypotheses from science in exchange for first-hand access to the most promising findings. Even a joint monetisation is possible, if one of the projects leads, for instance, to an innovative analytics tool (to stay within the example). Besides this obvious example, there are many other conceivable ways to integrate knowledge from the academic world into football. Clubs and stadium operators often own large scale facilities, why not use them to take advantage of the latest findings from research into renewable energies and, for example, produce electricity themselves using solar or wind power? It would also be conceivable to use findings from indoor farming, for example, to produce a particularly resistant and even lawn at low costs. Intelligent architecture can be used to regulate the flow of visitors or to create particularly effective places to work (fitness rooms, offices, etc.). One should not forget that, especially in our current times, talent is not only attracted by financial remuneration but also by purpose and the chance of making an impact. The football world is exciting for many young talents and most of them are likely to be willing to give up some money to be able to work in this environment. Contributing to science and research projects may also have a positive effect on the image and brand reputation of the club.

Implementing initiatives and deepening fan engagement at one strike

The fans of a football club are more than just normal customers. They have a deep emotional connection with the club, sometimes built up from early childhood. As a fan, you are willing to give everything for your club. In this sentence lives so much potential a club can use. In contrast to the public opinion, the fan base is actually quite diverse. You find people from top management and well educated to skilled labour workers. A club can lend these resources and knowledge from their fans to successfully implement specific projects in return for club experience. Additionally, to provide club experience to your supporters can deepen the emotional bond and thus have positive side effects on the business of the club as well. Examples of club experience can be offering a season ticket, naming a seat in the stadium after a supporter, inviting them to meet the players, get a look behind the scene or have a place where all the helpful supporters are listed and showcased. A common phrase in marketing is - do good and talk about it. Talk on social media channels and matchday magazines about the good things and initiatives that go on within the club and use it as encouragement for others to start their own initiatives.

Football clubs seem to be far away for a supporter to positively influence the club other than the voice during the match. With initiatives as mentioned above, a football club does not seem to be from a remote place that is reserved for a few chosen people but that everyone can help to work towards a more successful club. But fans are not the only human factor connected to a football club. A club is usually deeply rooted within its community and plays an important role in the social responsibility of it. Clubs can ask questions like how can we introduce retired people into the football club and give them a new meaning of life by receiving important resources for the club. There are so many creative ways of including your community into your club. Furthermore, there are many stakeholders with a wide spectrum of experiences involved in the club. How can a win-win situation be created for the club as well as for the different stakeholders? Nowadays, the factor time is one of the most important resources and well the only thing no one has the power to buy more. Football clubs are one of the lucky ones, as their fans, community, and stakeholders are deeply rooted in the club's history. They are willing to share their valuable time with them. So why don’t we create a competitive advantage and use the diverse talent, knowledge and experience of these people to build a better future together and give them the opportunity to be part of the process. 

Networks are the key to success

To survive in today’s competitive and complex business world, a strong network is one of the keys to succeed. That is the reason why all kinds of companies have recognized the value of cooperation. There are numerous benefits a cooperation can bring to an organisation like using synergies, sharing resources, overcoming obstacles together, and inspiring each other. A fruitful cooperation can be a win-win situation for all the partners involved. “If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else” by Booker T. Washington - this famous quote illustrates the power of cooperation. Even in the very competitive football industry valuable key strategic partners can be found. For example, it can be interesting for clubs to partner with the smaller regional clubs. These clubs are scouting their talents from the same talent pool as your club does. Cooperation in scouting and a systematic approach in youth development can support the trend that kids can play longer in their hometown club with less pressure than in the academy. As it is hard to have cooperations with your direct competitors clubs can look beyond the borders of their countries. Sharing knowledge with clubs from different countries will help to gain new insights and standards that can give you a competitive advantage in your home league. A cooperation does not necessarily need to be only within the football industry but can also be created with clubs from different sports or non-sports industries. If you gain insights from best practices of different sports, it can help to look at problems from a different angle and turn it into an opportunity.

Nevertheless, to introduce a successful cooperation system with your key strategic partners two criteria have to be met: 1. similar culture between the partners (openness to share and learn) and 2. effort from all parties involved (one-sided effort kills cooperation). The two criteria make it clear that time for research and an exchange about the expectations have to be done before the cooperation is implemented. It is essential that common goals and action plans are created that the parties involved know what to expect. Finally, with well-chosen key strategic cooperation partners you can open your horizons, learn new things, create best practices together and achieve common goals where otherwise you would stand alone only having the same old views from the same people in your club.

Knowledge acquisition in IT, digitisation and technology 

Today’s football clubs are highly professionalised organisations, facing similar challenges like other commercial enterprises. Although efficiency is an important matter for any organisation, for football clubs it’s even more important as they aim to allocate as much of their capital to their first team. Since the overall goal of a club is usually sporting success and not purely economic and organisational growth, improving IT, pushing digitisation and advancing technological infrastructure are often side projects. By the very nature of things, a football club can hardly own the state-of-the-art expertise in IT and infrastructure. To buy in such expertise is usually an expensive endeavour. With their big audiences and the widespread media presence as well as their emotional dimension football clubs have a precious asset to throw in the ring. To partner with specialised enterprises and incorporate their expertise in exchange for advertisement can be a fruitful synergy. In fact, there are already a couple of technological partnerships existing. There is for example a Swiss-Singaporean company providing data protection to the growing IT infrastructure at Arsenal FC. Since 2015, the City Football Group has worked with SAP and uses its technology for functions such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Human Resources (HR) to improve its efficiency. It also uses SAP analytics applications to drive fan engagement and to improve the sporting performances. These are outstanding large scale examples of elite clubs partnering with global enterprises but similar synergies can be achieved on a smaller level too. There are many innovative start-ups and SMEs with great products and services on the market, especially in the IT sector (If you are interested, this article could also be something for you). Many of them have applicable solutions for football clubs and will be thrilled to deploy them in an exciting environment but at manageable costs. Hence, particularly the channel of professional partnerships may be promising for knowledge acquisition in IT and back-end infrastructures.

How the community can help building your departments

Recent studies show the emergence of nutrition science as an important complement to training science. To enhance the effect of the training, help to reduce the recovering time and prevent players from injuries professional football clubs need to provide high-quality and situation-specific nutrition to their players. To build a nutrition department is a costly but important expense for a club. To reduce costs but guarantee the high-quality of the department, it could be done in a different way. A club can hire a recent graduate with a degree in nutrition science as charge of the new department. The graduate can use the connection to build a cooperation between the club and the university and thus helps the club to always implement the latest findings in the development of the department. However, it is crucial that you put an experienced person as a mentor next to the newly appointed head of nutrition. This goes in line with the latest development of how German national teams put together their coaching teams as they combine the perspectives experience and innovation in one team. But where can you find the mentor? It could be an experienced supporter in the field of chef and nutrition science that helps in the initiative of developing the department or a retired chef that is willing to share his experience. More resources could be gained by retired people that would love to have a part-time job and help in the daily cooking. With initiatives and ideas like these, a club can develop a high-quality nutrition department that helps for sporting success while keeping costs low. Similar approaches can be used to build a medical or psychological department in a football club. But how can a club know about the diverse skills, experience and knowledge that exists within their stakeholder groups?

A possibility is to create an app similar to a marketplace where the football club can offer different projects and the stakeholders e.g. a fan can create a profile that displays the different skills he or she is able to offer. If the club initiates a new project, it can find skilled people that are specialised in implementing the specific project. Furthermore, people can organize themselves to create a project and present it to the management board of the club. In such an environment the club not only profits from new insights but also enhances fan engagement that creates a win-win situation for all involved parties. An effective fan engagement is one of the highest opportunities to grow revenue. Lastly, the data gained through this app can have valuable insights for specific direct-to-consumer marketing activities and the possibility to offer content to the fans according to their preferences.

Better decision-making through a broader view of leadership

In this highly complex and competitive world change is the new status quo. The clubs face complex situations where they have to make decisions under pressure to ensure not being left behind. Leaders of football clubs need to adapt to new situations at an exponentially growing pace by evolving a variety of new skills, tools, and mindsets. Do the leaders of football clubs have the required skills to be successful under this circumstance? Shouldn’t they cooperate with leaders beyond their traditional domain of football?

Creating a strategic partnership with a club from a different sport outside the football business or a sponsorship deal with a consulting firm can help a club to receive new ideas, knowledge and skills. With such partnerships, football clubs can take over a broader view of leadership as the decisions and development of the club are based on opinions, knowledge, and experience of a diverse team. Consulting firms are specialised to adjust organisational structure to face complex challenges and implement strategies to grow in this uncertain environment. Taking a look outside the football business will help the club to face the uncertainty with a broader view and thus being able to face the future more confidently.

Low-cost scouting with foresight

The field of scouting, match and team performance analytics has seen a tremendous upswing in the recent past. Sophisticated data handling and processing can massively leverage the efficiency of scouting departments. Again, partnerships with Data/BI consultancies or data integration & management providers may be a good way to acquire additional knowledge in this field. Also, universities and other academic institutions can deliver new methodological insights or simply talented and well-educated staff to execute known practices. Also, the club’s community may be a good source to expand scouting activities. Imagining, the club incentivises its supporters to record lower league youth matches and upload them to an online platform developed together with students from the local university. Especially, the parents within the fanbase, who attend the matches of their kids anyway may be turned into base-level scouts with a brief introductory training easily. After eliminating the material which is not usable due to video quality, incompleteness, or camera perspective, the club could accumulate an immense library of regional video scouting material. By now the mere amount of (visual) data may be of limited use but with the inevitable rise of artificial intelligence and continuously advancing technology, the possibility to analyse such kind of “big data” will emerge sooner than later. Again, cooperation with research institutions might help to accelerate the process. For some particular match recordings there may be even an immediate use and once structured analytics is feasible the value-added can be significant. Moreover, such a comprehensive library may also open ways for monetisation of the gathered material (e.g. to sell access to the database). In any case, costs would remain low with the exploitation of alternative knowledge acquisition channels. 

Thank you for reading this far and giving your time and attention to these thoughts. Of course, no secret recipe for sporting success or the blueprint for the club of the future was provided here. Rather, these thoughts should serve as a simple impulse and encourage people to think in unconventional ways, because this will definitely be a critical success factor for organisations in the future, not only in football.

Co-written with Matthias Werner

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Source: Barnard, M., Boor, S., Winn, C., Wood, C. & Wray, I. (2019). Deloitte's Annual Review of Football Finance 2019. Deloitte.