The Need for Digital Transformation in Sports Clubs

This was the title of my master's thesis, which I submitted in 2020. Back then, I chose the topic to modernize TSV Bayer 04 Leverkusen, a club with a great history and 13 departments in professional and grassroots sports. Fast forward four years, I had the chance to experience the journey of digital transformation myself and to try out the proposals I suggested in my thesis. A significant part of the journey was first understanding why sports clubs struggle with digital transformation and realizing that managing a successful transformation is more about change management than merely IT and digitalization knowledge. The core elements that make digital transformation in sports clubs difficult are complex.

The first pillar is internal factors, which include the employees and the corporate structure. Lack of knowledge in the workforce and voluntary and old-age boards are key elements here. The second pillar is the external stakeholders who have an interest in the club and make certain demands. These include members, fans, sponsors, associations, and leagues. They can act as a driver or a brake on digitalization. The last pillar is strategic and includes a clear strategy regarding IT and digitalization, as well as financing. Using only individual problems with separate software solutions often creates silos, missing APIs, and extra work with too many misfitting solutions.

A key element in why we, as TSV Bayer 04 Leverkusen, managed to digitalize and make vital steps, is the major financial support from a large company, 拜耳 , which enabled me to work on this topic to a greater extent and get support when needed. Seeing a variety of sports organizations and working with the Landessportbund Nordrhein-Westfalen e.V. , Freiburger Kreis, European Multisport Club Association , and others showed me how hard it is for the rest of the sports clubs to do this. This was the main reason to start DigiRoot, an EU-funded project that aims to especially help grassroots sports clubs. It should help them figure out where they are with a digital check, show them where they can go in critical areas such as communication, cloud, and software architecture, and how to get there. Best practices and checklists should provide a certain level of IT consulting for clubs that cannot afford it. The goal is to create a community around the topic of enabling sports clubs to reap the benefits of basic digitalization. The topic of systematically helping sports clubs manage their digital journey can only be achieved in a collaborative approach where various stakeholders provide needs, discuss solutions, and find systematic approaches that could be replicated.

Sports clubs are more relevant than ever, looking also at the record number of club memberships in Germany, reaching over 27 million. At our club, we can experience the demand as well. Having more than 4,500 kids and young athletes under 18 in our sports clubs, there are more than 750 children on the waiting list who cannot be served right now. At the same time, the number of sports clubs has declined, and clubs are facing various existential problems. In addition to finances, the reasons include dwindling volunteer work and old-fashioned structures. This is where we want to provide relief with DigiRoot.

Embracing Digitalization: A Tool for Solving Various Challenges

Many clubs are held back by constraints like time, lack of IT knowledge, volunteer dependency, or traditional management. Digitalization can help with some challenges, such as relieving the burden on offices, getting more people into sports clubs via improved communication, finding volunteers, and relieving the burden on volunteers by automating activities or simplifying access in the cloud. Most clubs lack money for IT consulting, instructions for the introduction of new software, and basics on topics such as change management.

Here, DigiRoot should come into play. Being backed by the European Commission, DigiRoot is funded under the Umbrella Erasmus+ and will be available for free for all sports clubs in Europe that wish to take the next steps along the digital transformation journey. Strong partners such as the GSIC powered by Microsoft , Olympiacos SFP , University of Cyprus are already part of the team. Furthermore, experts such as Philipp Klotz , Lutz Thieme , Dr. Jan Dreisbach , and many more, are joining us with their invaluable insights.

If you want to help as an expert or are a representative of a sports club or organization, then join us on the journey. Get more information and sign up here