S&PA Summer 2021

COVID-19

COMMUNITY WORKING

SPORT AMBASSADOR

Leaving a fitness legacy

Meet our vaccine heroes

Female fitness in Saudi Arabia

p30

p34

p45

ISSUE 42

SUMMER 2021

Getting applicants fighting fit for the military

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CONTENTS

5

10

Upfront 5

Editor’s leader

6 6 7 9

News Get to know your fitness consumer Message from CIMSPA CEO Coming back stronger Mildenhall Hub puts activity at the heart of community

In depth 10-18 CIMSPA update 10 ReTrain review 15 Coaching for success 16 Mastering digital marketing 18 Right Directions: Trafford Leisure — stamping down on its carbon footprint 20 Agenda BMF: Getting recruits fit for the Army 26 Fitness & Health Demand still up for exercise referral 30 Covid-19 legacy #DoingHerBit one year on 34 Community working Meeting our vaccine heroes

40

30 “We had a good number [of women] who were applying, but the conversion rate just wasn’t as strong as it could be, often due to individuals dropping out due to fitness reasons” (p23)

Product round-up Reassuring return

Management 42 43

45

10

Tech toolkit 40

42

26

Workplace focus Expert Advice

Last word 45

46

Sport ambassador Tracy Aldereyaane, Spectrum Wellness for Women, Saudi Arabia Sporting life Pete Burt, retiring MD, Inspiring Healthy Lifestyles

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Images: https://billybolton.com

S&PAProfessional / Summer 2021

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UPFRONT EDITORIAL ]DeeDee Doke

Learning lessons Some Covid restrictions can benefit our sector post-Covid

he full reopening of the UK economy and society are expected around the time this magazine reaches you.

One question that comes to mind is, what will it feel like to abruptly shift from, for example, mask wearing in shops and in communal corridors one day and not the next?

Among the post-Covid lessons to be learnt throughout many parts of our economy and society will be around the balance of positive social distancing measures and good business sense. From theatre owners to fitness centre operators, marking out regulated distances between

T

EDITORIAL Editor DeeDee Doke Assistant editor Patrick Appleton Designer Will Williams Production editor Vanessa Townsend Contributors Dean Gurden, Caroline Roberts, Sue Weekes, Roisin Woolnough Picture editor Akin Falope Publishing director Aaron Nicholls ADVERTISING Sales 020 7880 6230 sandpaprof@redactive.co.uk

people taking part in activities has its benefits. In theatres, moving rows of seating forward to leave prescribed health-driven space between audience members has benefitted theatre goers by making their viewing more comfortable, less cramped.

At the gym, regulating spaces between participants in classes has had a similar benefit, to the extent that people aren’t bumping into each other, crowding into each other, etc. At the same time, operators will likely want to increase class sizes that have been limited by virus transmission prevention measures. Small gyms, particularly, have fallen victim to

PRODUCTION Production director Jane Easterman Senior production executive Rachel Young SUBSCRIPTIONS S&PA Professional is available to selected members of the Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity (and is available on subscription to nonmembers). All member enquiries should be directed to CIMSPA. For enquiries from non-CIMSPA members, call 01580 883844.

© Redactive Publishing Ltd. S&PA Professional is published on behalf of the Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity (CIMSPA) by Redactive Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.

reducing already space-limited class numbers. But for larger ones?

Can we make money – and still retain some offshoot benefits of this crisis? That’s a question that the sector, its governing bodies and other stakeholders will need to explore after 19 July.

Contact us by Twitter @SAPA_Pro and email at sandpa@redactive.co.uk

without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Redactive Publishing Ltd accepts no liability for the accuracy of the contents or any opinions expressed herein.

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This publication (and any part thereof) may not be reproduced, transmitted or stored in any print or electronic format (including but not limited to any online service, any database or any part of the internet) or in any other format in any media whatsoever,

CIMSPA ENQUIRIES Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity SportPark, Loughborough University, 3 Oakwood Drive, Loughborough, LE11 3QF

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S&PANews A round-up of the latest developments in the industry

GET TO KNOW YOUR FITNESS CONSUMER

By DeeDee Doke

MESSAGE FROM CIMSPA CEO TARA DILLON ON THE BUOYANT MOOD OF THE SECTOR By the time you read this column, I’m hopeful that restrictions will have been fully lifted and the sport and physical activity sector is able to operate at full capacity for the first time since March 2020.

We’ve seen some encouraging data coming through from Moving Communities, which is tracking participation at public sector gyms and leisure centres to demonstrate their performance, sustainability and social value. The new data is showing a healthy number of members have returned to sites along with a lot of new users.

Gyms, sport clubs and leisure centres are busy, despite capacity restrictions, and this is great to see.

Speaking to sector colleagues, the mood is buoyant and people

are generally pleased with what they’ve seen so far, although I’m conscious that not everyone is enjoying the same recovery.

This is why we continue to work with our partners for an extension of the National Leisure Recovery Fund. It’s also why, following the success of several joint initiatives from CIMSPA and Sport England, we have launched another fantastic programme to support the sector. Part of Sport England’s Year 1 implementation of the Uniting the Movement strategy, the £5m ReTrain to

Retain job retention scheme will provide tools, training and services to enable up to 25,000 sector professionals who were forced to find alternative work during the pandemic, to return to work. The project again shows the power of collaboration as we work with our partners at UK Coaching and EMD UK to deliver the best possible support to our workforce (see p15).

We are slowly recovering and should be encouraged by the results seen so far. We do still have some way to go, but the pandemic has shown that we are

" SHUTTERSTOCK

A new report by global consultants McKinsey & Company has identified four types of fitness consumers, along with an increasing cross-segment focus on socialising and finding a sense of belonging that “dramatically improves” consumer loyalty, increases word-of-mouth advocacy and offers higher lifetime value.

Published in June, ‘Sweating for the fitness consumer’ says that the Covid-19 pandemic has “scrambled fitness consumers’ habits, and the next phase in recovery is a prime opportunity for industry participants to reset.

Selecting a target consumer segment and updating value propositions to better align with their wants and needs and

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UPFRONT S&PA NEWS

responding to industry developments will help industry participants survive and thrive in the new normal”.

The report suggests that clubs redesign memberships and pricing to offer more flexibility for members who are now exercising in multiple ways “and to optimise retention and average revenue per user”.

It goes on to say that like other industries, fitness businesses need to “regularly pilot new pricing strategies and expand their offerings across the in-gym and at home ecosystem”.

An opportunity for providers of health & fitness apps is “to design and position their apps as facilitators and gateways to fitness-minded communities”. The report says: “App providers should strengthen their user communities to keep users coming back.”

a well-organised, wellmanaged and resilient sector.

Now, as we nurture these green shoots of recovery, let’s look forward to an amazing summer of sport, including the UEFA European Football Championships, Wimbledon and the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics Games. And let’s remember that all of these athletes taking part have benefited from the professionalism of our fantastic workforce throughout their careers.

WELLNESS ENTHUSIAST (23%): Motivated by performance, identity or balance, enthusiasts put fitness, nutrition, and mental and physical well-being front and centre to achieve holistic wellness. They view their fitness schedule as a core part of their happiness and prioritise it in daily life.

They value and seek out incremental innovations that cater to their values but may be sceptical of radical new offerings.

RESEARCHER-EXPERIMENTER (20%): Seeking new and unique experiences, these consumers are always looking for the latest and greatest in fitness. They are early adopters of new products and may not remain loyal. Winning them hinges on constant innovation that creates and sustains excitement.

TRADITIONALIST (11%): The habitual morning runners, lunchtime gymgoers and evening-class participants, they have been following the same routines for years and tend to be among the last to adopt new offerings. Winning them is extremely difficult and may require incremental improvements to something familiar. However, relationships with them pay off in the long run.

PASSIVE PARTICIPANTS (55%): Fitness is not a priority for these consumers but they may consume fitness offerings in reaction to an external event. Winning passive participants is about accessibility, relationships and emotions management. Passive participants who develop intrinsic motivations for staying fit tend to evolve into one of the other consumer archetypes.

Source: McKinsey Figures may not add to 100% because of rounding

COMING BACK STRONGER

By Jenny Patrickson, Active IQ Leisure and sport apprenticeships did not fare well during the pandemic for many understandable reasons. Yet looking at other sectors where apprenticeships flourished, there are certainly lessons to be learned, and I can’t help feeling our sector could have done better than we did.

Despite being severely tested during 2020, we witnessed some creative solutions to problems and were surprised how some of the forced changes worked out well. If we learn from this episode and take the better elements forwards, we can improve the post-pandemic delivery and uptake of apprenticeships within our sector. In turn, this will help secure confidence and trust from our partners, employers and industry associates.

To my mind, apprenticeships remain valid and valuable. Yes, they took a knock during lockdown. But they can come back stronger if given the chance.

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Firstly, we must acknowledge the huge upset in our sector when the pandemic hit. Leisure and education facilities were closed, employers were forced to put large sections of their workforce on furlough, and everything felt deeply unsettling and uncertain. It saddened me to hear of staff and apprentices being made redundant.

It wasn’t a complete shut down for our sector with a few apprenticeships – namely Community Activator Coach and Community Sport & Health Officer – managing to continue where the primary delivery for these took place in larger sports clubs, schools and colleges that remained open. Furthermore, those training providers who managed

to shift their delivery online and keep learners engaged through virtual and digital means also kept going.

However, the Personal Trainer and Leisure Duty Manager apprenticeships suffered significant impact as the sector felt its way cautiously through the morass of unprecedented challenges.

The progress of learners subsequently slowed as they needed greater flexibilities.

MISSED OPPORTUNITIES Key to faring better was acting quickly and troubleshooting solutions. In the first lockdown, we joined many meetings to discuss how to adapt a number of apprenticeship end-point assessments. These were not easy

discussions, but eventually we found a way that was agreeable to all.

I absolutely acknowledge we were disadvantaged as a sector through the closing of facilities. I wonder, how could we have been more creative and braver? For example, personal trainers went online and outdoors: why couldn’t our apprenticeships sit in these new contexts? Not only did those who were innovative in lockdown keep going, they also now have additional skills and services to offer. Did our sector miss some opportunities to adapt?

LESSONS LEARNED It wasn’t just the facilities closing their doors that scuppered our leisure sector apprenticeships. A major lesson for our

" GETTY

MASSIVE UPSET

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sector to take on board for the ‘new normal’ must be about building In flexibility to our structures and a process to develop a ‘Plan B’ quickly and nimbly in the event of a future mass emergency.

When lockdown looked set in for longer, we started to see some flexibilities applied to apprentices’ progression and the end-point assessment processes. It was too late to save some of the apprenticeships but where people had held on, the changes that came through proved

ONWARDS AND UPWARDS Some key learnings from lockdown ● Rigid and dictatorial programmes

don’t work ● Apprentices will play a vital role in

making up the skill shortage, getting the right staff in the right roles and re-engaging an enthusiastic workforce ● Early flexibilities make all the difference ● People are comfortable with virtual meetings: we can use this to our advantage ● Flexible learning and assessments help apprentices progress and achieve ● Teaching and assessing apprentices in a more diverse way prepares them for life’s ups and downs ● Flexible adaptations give a broader training and more open-minded students ● Apprentices appreciate the security of a clear career pathway ● Our industry must be agile, responsive and somewhat braver in the face of challenge

highly successful. Key benefits arising from the new flexibility included giving the apprentices a more diverse look at the industry and providing scope for broader learning. Granting flexibility in the order in which assessments can take place and allowing these on Zoom made a huge difference. Added to which the virtual meetings saved people time, travel expenses and even accommodation costs that usually go with these events. In the same way, having panel discussions by Zoom rather than in person is much more efficient.

Where online training was allowed it succeeded: we have a wealth of digital resources and expertise in other vocational training and know it works.

Bringing this into our apprenticeships will make for a better, more cost-effective experience.

At the FE Week Annual Apprenticeship Conference in April, this topic was debated long and hard. The overall consensus across all sectors was that apprenticeship standards and assessments shouldn’t be so rigid or prescriptive.

LOOKING AHEAD There is no doubt many leisure operators and businesses had to make some tough decisions in terms of facilities opening and staff returning. It has been brutal but now we need to get back on our feet.

With our industry open again, the opportunities are clear. Apprentices have a distinct career pathway and a defined route, which is reassuring after all the uncertainties. Operators have a fresh chance to use apprenticeships to engage new staff, find new talent and improve skills among existing colleagues.

Lockdown has taught us to be more agile and responsive – and not fear any future adaptations that we need to make.

Jenny Patrickson is managing director, Active IQ

MILDENHALL HUB SETS NEW ACTIVITY STANDARDS A new £39m leisure facility that has been described by Sport England officials as “setting the standard for activity being at the heart of community” has opened its doors in Mildenhall, Suffolk.

Opened on 14 June, the Mildenhall Hub is set for co-location with a health centre, job centre, a school, library and offices for the NHS, police and both Suffolk County Council and West Suffolk Council, which are expected to move in over the summer.

Charles Johnston, executive director of property at Sport England, said: “The Mildenhall Hub sets a new standard for activity being at the heart of community. With £2m of National Lottery investment, the leisure facilities will help local people to move more and boost recovery from the pandemic.”

He went on to say: “The co-location… with a school, library and other services also supports the building of intergenerational relationships and connections in the community. The Mildenhall Hub has the power to change lives, and we look forward to seeing the impact that it has.”

Abbeycroft Leisure will operate the leisure facilities on behalf of West Suffolk Council.

The facilities include a 25m, six-lane pool, a teaching pool with adjustable floor, a 100-station gym, two fitness studios, a four-court sportshall and an outdoor 3G pitch.

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IN DEPTH CIMSPA UPDATE

" ALAMY

RETRAIN REVIEW Leon Smith, ReTrain Course coordinator at CIMSPA, looks at how the Sport England-funded training initiative has supported employers and training providers after lockdown.

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aunched in August 2020, ReTrain has proved a vital support for almost 100 employers in the sector. The initiative, which was funded by the National Lottery through Sport England, was designed to help sports, fitness, leisure and physical activity operators in England through the pandemic by providing free training for new and existing staff, to enable them to work in new areas.

Sport England commissioned CIMSPA to deliver the £1.5m fund after research by the sector’s chartered institute found that up to 6% of the activity workforce, that’s some 30,000 individuals, were planning to leave the sector.

Directly addressing this issue, ReTrain has helped employers to plug any skills gaps they may have, which has allowed them to reopen their doors to the public to provide valuable sport and leisure services to their local communities. To maximise the scale and impact of the scheme, CIMSPA brought together key partners to support the scheme. These are Community Leisure UK, ukactive, RLSS UK and Freestyle Agency.

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TRAINING PRIORITIES The programme particularly focused on areas of social deprivation and funding courses that led to new qualifications to help businesses to recover after the Covid-19 lockdown. The initiative had an enthusiastic response from employers with CIMSPA receiving more than 600 training requests covering nearly 300 sites via the online application portal in the first couple of months.

All training provided through ReTrain was delivered by accredited CIMSPA Training Provider Partners resulting in CIMSPA endorsed qualifications and/or CPD points for the individual. To date, the training

initiative has funded more than 18,000 new qualifications.

A key priority was meeting the urgent need for around 11,000 new lifeguards so that swimming pools could reopen safely. More than two thirds of training requests in the first 12 weeks were for aquatic roles and those that support swimming pool operations, such as assistant swimming teachers, swimming teachers, lifeguards and pool plant operators.

CIMSPA provided partners Royal Life Saving Society with funding

Splash Academy The Splash Academy was allocated ReTrain funding to allow them to continue providing valuable services to their local community, with a particular focus on the development of young children. Based in Bolton, the facility has been able to re-open their doors two more days a week with two trained staff managing their teaching lessons. They’re prepared to tackle the challenges that will come after the national lockdown.

“We had been restricted with delivering additional days of teaching and operating the venue due to not having the trained team in place,” said Nayna Patel, senior teacher at The Splash Academy.

“The funding from CIMSPA has transformed our timetable and allowed us to recruit the correct staff to help us grow as a team and increase our provision. We are proud to be in a position to give opportunities to people that will benefit from new training which will then bring new skills into our sector.”

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IN DEPTH CIMSPA UPDATE

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Hartlepool Borough Council For the staff of Mill House Leisure Centre in Hartlepool, the pandemic has proved a more interesting, albeit exhausting experience, than most. Unlike so many sports and physical activity professionals who were forced to endure long months at home on furlough, the Mill House Leisure Centre team have been working flat out throughout as the centre was repurposed, not once, but twice during the crisis to meet local need.

“We spent the first two weeks of the initial lockdown cleaning the building before it was turned into a distribution centre delivering PPE to local care homes and food parcels to shielding households. Then in January this year, the centre became a Covid testing site, so our team have been working throughout the pandemic in a variety of roles from delivery drivers to swab testers,” says David Grainge, Aquatics Assistant Manager at Hartlepool Borough Council, which operates the site.

Public sport and physical activity facilities are an important resource for Hartlepool, which is amongst the most deprived areas in the country and was ranked the fifth unhealthiest place in England earlier this year. The council was one of the sector’s employers to benefit from CIMSPA’s ReTrain programme, using

the funding to upskill existing staff and train new team recruits.

“Most of our permanent staff have stayed with us, but it was our casual team members that we needed to replace and therefore train the most,” says Grainge.

Following an advertising campaign for potential lifeguards, the council appointed new members of staff and enrolled them on a RLSS UK National Pool Lifeguard course. In total, eight members of the team completed the course. Six staff, some new and some existing, went on to receive a Level 1 Swimming Teachers certificate, whilst five duty managers completed an online Pool Plant Operator course. Three existing staff took up the offer to retrain as gym staff and completed the Level 2 gym qualification and a further four members of staff are due to take Level 2 Swimming Teachers course this September.

“If it hadn’t been for ReTrain, I would have had to go to my head of services with a begging bowl, which would have been unrealistic considering that we hadn’t had any income in more than a year. More likely, it

would have meant making decisions about which of our three centres would have had to remain closed when restrictions lifted,” said Grainge.

Thanks to the funding, the council has been able to re-open Mill House Leisure Centre as well as its dry sites Brierton Sports Centre and Headland Sports Centre to the local community with Covid restrictions and all of the extra work that entails. Open since 26 April, Mill House which has three swimming pools, is currently running at approximately 97% of Covid-capacity.

ReTrain has been vital for the council as well as the new recruits, some of whom have recently graduated from university, while others just couldn’t afford to pay for a lifeguard course themselves.

“Our new staff were desperate to start work and now they all have permanent shifts every week.

Our sector is often viewed as a stop gap rather than a career, but hopefully this training will help keep people interested so we can retain them for longer.”

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in August, September and October 2020 allowing the charity to provide core qualifications through its network.

This has resulted in almost 16,000 lifeguard qualifications, including: ● 9,333 Lifeguard – IQL UK National Pool Lifeguard Qualification (NPLQ) Generation 9/IQL UK NPLQ Generation 9 Anaphylaxis/Open Water Lifeguard Qualification ● 3,676 First Aid – Emergency First Aid at Work/Emergency First Aid at Work with Anaphylaxis/Emergency Paediatric First Aid with Anaphylaxis/ First Aid at Work/First Aid at Work with Anaphylaxis/Paediatric Emergency First Aid/Paediatric First Aid/Paediatric First Aid with Anaphylaxis ● 622 Lifeguard Trainer – Trainer Assessor/First Aid Trainer Assessor/ RLSS UK AED Trainer Assessor/NPLQ Trainer Assessor Specialism ● 2,274 Additional – National Rescue Award for Swimming Teachers and Coaches/Emergency Response Pool In addition to supporting lifeguard training, the programme has funded 2,347 individual endorsed qualifications

mapped to CIMSPA professional standards. These cover a variety of exercise and fitness roles, including gym, group exercise, strength and conditioning instructors, personal trainers, health navigators and duty managers.

MATCHING NEED WITH SUPPLY The programme used a purpose-built digital platform to match employers’ training needs with CIMSPA Training Provider Partner offers and to manage the delivery of qualifications.

Digital project studio Freestyle Agency worked with CIMSPA’s project team to develop and launch the platform, which allowed CIMSPA to identify local demand and match it with quality supply. It also enabled courses to be built from scratch, grouping numerous employers together and matching them

with CIMSPA Training Providers.

This has ensured that training courses are at capacity where providers can deliver, reducing the risk of cancellation and the loss of allocated funding.

There are currently 22 CIMSPA Training Providers delivering ReTrain support nationally. These are: ● Becky Adlington Training ● Fit Training International ● Future Fit ● GLL ● GUST Swim School ● Half Fish HQ ● Hertfordshire University ● HFE ● In At The Deep End ● Inspired Fitness ● Institute of Swimming ● Johnson Training ● P&P Associates ● Premier Global NASM ● RLSS UK ● Sport Structures ● STA Excel ● Study Active ● The Swim Surgery ● Train with Premier ● Trainer Maker ● Triton Training ReTrain has been a major investment in the sector at a time when it needs it most. By helping to shoulder the burden of training overheads, CIMSPA has been able to support employers to reopen their facilities after lockdown so that they can continue to provide a vital public service to help the nation recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.

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IN DEPTH CIMSPA UPDATE

COACHING FOR SUCCESS

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The skills of sports coaches are needed more than ever, says Natasha Eason, Interim Head of Education Regulation and Standards.

After months of closure, the UK’s sport and physical activity facilities, along with indoor and outdoor organised groups and sessions, have reopened. As we know, the pandemic has taken its toll on the nation’s fitness, but now that people can access our facilities – many doing so for the first time – it’s important that we have an appropriately skilled workforce to meet their needs.

However, as CIMSPA’s own research has shown, 20% of the workforce have been forced to seek work outside the sector during the pandemic. It’s essential that we fill any skills shortages caused as a result and the new Sports Coach apprenticeship is

one of the programmes that can help.

The standard has been developed in conjunction with the sector’s Trailblazer group, which includes UK Sport and Sport England as well as national governing bodies of sport and employers such as Places for People Leisure, GLL, Fit for Sport, British Gymnastics, Lawn Tennis Association, The Football Association, Everyone Active, EMD UK, ukactive, Sport Scotland, UK Coaching and the County Sports Partnership Network.

The broad purpose of the apprenticeship is to use extensive technical and tactical sports knowledge and skills to design and deliver coaching programmes that engage, motivate and evolve participants’ skills and performance. Suitable for both new and existing employees, the apprenticeship has three pathways so applicants can specialise in a specific coaching environment that meets their career aspirations. These three pathways are: High Performance Sport Coach: developing athletes and players in high-performance settings, including those on talent or development pathways, national or international programmes, professional or podium environments.

Community Sports Coach: motivating and engaging people of all ages and abilities in community sports and physical activity settings. Community sport includes local authority, charity and national governing body of sport community initiatives or clubs.

School Sports Coach: collaborating with teachers to develop pupils’ mastery of psychomotor skills by applying a whole child approach in their coaching.

Coaches work in all categories of school and registered childcare environments.

Apprentices must be employed 30 hours per week to qualify for the standard. With 20% of their time dedicated to completing the apprenticeship, the programme should take 12-18 months to complete. This extended period of study gives apprentices the time to acquire the skills to deliver meaningful and high-quality learning, development and performance experiences. Apprentices will receive training to the value of £9,000 while on the programme and will be supported and mentored by experts throughout.

UK Sport is the first organisation to utilise the new sports coach apprenticeship standard.

Its High-Performance Coach Apprenticeship targets coaches with high potential or those transitioning into highperformance environments and 26 coaches hailing from 16 sports across the Olympic and Paralympic highperformance community, as well as a small number of professional sport coaches make up its first cohort.

We look forward to the rollout of more sport coach apprenticeships. As we emerge from this crisis, coaching skills will be needed more than ever.

For more information on the standard and the providers that offer it, visit https://bit.ly/3x3vBoM

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IN DEPTH CIMSPA UPDATE

MASTERING DIGITAL MARKETING A new Digital Marketing Hub will help sport and physical activity professionals learn digital techniques to engage with new clients and grow, as CIMSPA’s commercial director, Ollie Bell explains.

ovid-19 has had a detrimental impact on the sector, both financially and in terms of participation in physical activity across the nation. As part of a range of measures we have put in place to support our members, partners and the wider sector during the coronavirus pandemic and as we emerge from restrictions, CIMSPA has been awarded £450,000 by Sport England to deliver a new Digital Marketing Hub. The new platform has been developed by the global software company D2L. Using the company’s cloud-based learning management system Brightspace, the Digital Marketing Hub will offer the self-employed, sole traders and small and medium-sized businesses in our sector the opportunity to develop their digital marketing skills for free.

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DIGITAL SKILLS GAP The move follows research conducted by the Digital Marketing Institute of more than 1,000 volunteers, junior and senior managers as well as self-employed professionals working in sports and physical activity. It found a significant digital skills gap, with 63% of those surveyed admitting they don’t have a clear plan to attract new audiences through their digital channels.

This was despite the fact that more than three quarters (81%) of those

surveyed said that attracting new participants was very or extremely important to them. A quarter (25%) of respondents rated their organisation as “not at all effective” at adapting to new trends and insights, while just 10% measured their organisations as “very or extremely effective”.

The research showed that the majority of respondents rated themselves as underperforming across all core digital marketing channels when asked to compare themselves to their peers.

THIRST FOR KNOWLEDGE Throughout the various national lockdowns, we saw the public adapt to digital fitness, but while many S&PA professionals successfully delivered online workouts and personal training sessions to their existing clientele, few acquired the skills needed to market themselves online and raise their profile in order to attract new clients.

The findings of the research bear this out and revealed a huge appetite for training, in particular for social media, content marketing, website and SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).

Developed in close collaboration with our partners at Sport England over the last few months, the new Digital Marketing Hub will focus on delivering foundation skills and will comprise the following:

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Certificated online learning programme – bite-size modules, both live and on-demand, certified by the Digital Marketing Institute ● Topic specific courses – on-demand courses developed and delivered in conjunction with partners, including Google and Facebook ● Live webinar series – featuring keynote speakers, digital marketing experts and other champions to demonstrate the power of digital marketing ● Peer networking – a support community where learners can post messages, ask questions, seek help, gain access to experts and share their successes ● Resources and micro-learning – including blogs, vlogs, pods, guides, experts, TED Talks etc. ●

This new and much-needed resource will upskill S&PA professionals in the most common aspects of digital marketing

The programme will specifically explore how people and organisations can boost participation and re-engage participants, while looking at themes, including understanding more about their audience. Other topics will include: ● Reaching new audiences – helping learners to reach new and more diverse audiences and drive growth ● Insight application – supporting sport and physical activity professionals to better understand and apply audience and sector insight to inform their digital marketing activities ● Measurement – helping learners to set goals and KPIs and measure them effectively ● Channel skills – increase understanding of the key digital marketing channels, such as social, search, websites and email, and provide the practical skills to use them effectively.

MUCH-NEEDED RESOURCE The Digital Marketing Hub is part of Sport England’s 10-year strategy ‘Uniting the Movement’, which aims to

help the S&PA sector recover from the far-reaching effects of the coronavirus pandemic, while supporting individuals and organisations to improve their digital capabilities and skills.

Entirely free for a year, this new and much-needed resource will upskill S&PA professionals in the most common aspects of digital marketing, giving them the tools and techniques to market themselves through digital channels, connect with and influence people online, and ultimately grow their business.

And in doing so, we can encourage more people to take up sport and physical activity to drive participation rates across the nation and put the sector in a stronger position than it was before the pandemic.

The Digital Marketing Hub is available to all people and organisations delivering sport and physical activity.

For more information, please visit https://digital.cimspa.co.uk/

Digital skills gaps identified in the sector It’s very important that we attract new participants, but we have very little or no budget for marketing ● We use social media to engage people and attract participants, but we don’t have a plan or clarity on their needs ● Digital marketing is key to our success, but we rate our abilities poorly ●

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IN DEPTH RIGHT DIRECTIONS

STAMPING DOWN ON ITS CARBON FOOTPRINT Trafford Leisure is pledging to cut its carbon emissions 10% year-on-year, and leading the way in local authority leisure.

For much of the past decade, one of Trafford Leisure’s aims has been to manage its operating environment, which began with quick but significant wins, such as LED lighting, a low hanging fruit, according to head of assets and IT Kevin Henderson.

But with nine swimming pools among its facilities, water has always been its bread and butter. Henderson explains: “Every second we use fresh cold water, we spend money and energy to heat and chemically treat it.

We wanted to understand how we could run more efficient facilities and embrace technology that would enable us to do that.”

SIMPLY SALT It is estimated around 80% of public swimming pools in the UK use traditional chlorine tablets to disinfect their pools, imported to the UK from mines in faraway

countries such as China, Russia and the US. “From a health & safety perspective, they’re one of the most risky aspects of running a leisure centre and have to be handled very carefully whilst gloved and masked up,” says Gill Twell, head of group development at leisure sector health & safety specialist, Right Directions.

Around eight years ago Trafford Leisure migrated to a new, totally safe system, which uses water and electricity to turn locallysourced food grade salt from Cheshire into a chlorine-type solution called sodiumhypochlorite, which is automatically drip-fed into the pool depending on the level required. “It’s as safe as the salt you put on your fish and chips,” says Henderson.

“The solution is below the threshold for classification as a hazardous substance, so we

instantly slashed our health & safety risk. We also reduced our daily maintenance costs, as we now only need a twice monthly site visits instead of full-time maintenance staff.”

IT’S A FIRST But Trafford Leisure has another gem up its sleeve – new Danish water filter technology. Most public swimming pools in the UK still use traditional sandfilters and, in January 2020, Stretford Leisure Centre was England’s only mainstream commercial pool to install micro filtration, where water is cleaned by being pushed, under pressure, through porous ceramic material. In fact, the system was so new that Sport England is using Stretford to run a study into its efficiency. Linked via the cloud and monitored 24/7, the system is so automated there are just two planned maintenance visits a year,

staff involvement is negligible and therefore the health & safety risks to staff too.

Trafford Leisure and parent company Trafford Council intended to replace each centre’s sand-filter as they aged, but early indications show the micro filtration is so efficient, they’re not ruling out earlier replacements.

Display energy certificates (DECs) commissioned in October 2020 gave Stretford Leisure Centre the best score of all Trafford Leisure’s sites at just 28; an operational rating of B in a 1970s building.

Henderson continues: “My projections were based on a saving of £16,000 after 10 years. However, early indications are the investment will pay for itself after just four years.

“What’s more, the centre’s original sand-filter is the size of a small living room, housed in the basement with the facilities built on top, so there was no simple, cheap way to remove it. The new system is around half the size and built like a Meccano set, so can be taken apart if we ever need to move it.”

Twell concludes: “Our team delight in finding best practice like this, whilst working with public sector operators to help drive the industry’s health & safety culture. LED, salt electrolysis chlorination and microfiltration are just some of the initiatives Trafford Leisure is championing to improve health & safety, whilst also reducing its CO2 footprint.”

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IN DEPTH AGENDA

By Dean Gurden

With the number of women dropping out of the Army recruiting process on the rise, Capita’s Army Recruiting Group joined forces with Be Military Fit to better prepare recruits 20 www.cimspa.co.uk

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IN DEPTH AGENDA

Bear Grylls Having trained with BMF before and after his service career, and now a coowner of the outdoor fitness company, Bear Grylls (centre) is delighted with the results of the Army Training Support Programme pilot. “Having been involved in the programme and seeing first-hand the candidates’ passion to improve, it is amazing to see these positive results.

“BMF is about training for everyone, whatever their ability, gender or ethnic background,” he adds. “We’re about community and the power of teamwork, which is why the programmes have seen such success over this initial period. It has been especially rewarding to see the female candidates progressing so incredibly well.”

As to whether online courses can be truly as effective as BMF’s more traditional face-to-face sessions in

hysical fitness counts for a lot in the British Army.

Without it aspiring soldiers won’t and don’t get in. They may pass the initial eligibility and medical questionnaires, but it’s the official Assessment Centres where their physical and mental capabilities are put to the test that have often proved a stumbling block. It’s an issue that affects women in particular and the Army has decided to do something about it.

Enter the BMF Army Training Support Programme, a bespoke digital training platform resulting from a collaboration between Capita, Be Military Fit (BMF) and the British Army.

Initially run as an exclusively online pilot from October 2020 to April 2021, it’s designed specifically to raise the physical standards and pass rates of candidates at Army Assessment Centres,

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parks, Grylls advocates a blended approach. “We have learnt from the military programme and from seeing the member retention within the franchise network during the pandemic that online training can achieve amazing results,” he says.

“Face-to-face remains a critical and core component of what BMF delivers, but we also recognise the continuous change in trends of how people train.

In most cases our recommendation is a hybrid approach, which matches our Train Anywhere operating system. It is this approach that’s provided a model of success for the Army recruits.”

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“The challenge we were facing was that we still didn’t have enough female candidates coming through to join the Army”

with the key priority of improving female conversion rates. The programme is now being deployed on a full-time basis and, as Covid restrictions ease, will increasingly feature more face-toface training components.

Gordon Lee, strategy and development director at Army Recruiting Group, Capita’s recruitment partnership with the British Army that manages its selection of soldiers and officers, explains the rationale behind the programme. “The challenge we were facing was that we still didn’t have enough female candidates coming through to join the Army,” he says. “The Ministry of Defence has a target of at least 15% female candidates being recruited every year, but we were sitting around about 10%. We had a good number who were applying, but the conversion rate just wasn’t as strong as it could be, often due to individuals

dropping out of the process due to fitness reasons.”

So what exactly does the programme involve and how did it come about? BMF was originally called British Military Fit before it was bought by veterans Bear Grylls and Chris St George. The pair have a long connection to what is one of Europe’s largest outdoor fitness companies, with Grylls having trained with BMF after his time in the military and St George being a former instructor.

However, it’s Ivan Rowlatt, BMF’s director of human performance and a former military man himself, who talks us through the pilot’s development. “We initially met with Capita and started to get an understanding of what its key issues were with recruitment, particularly around improving female performance, but also better preparing recruits generally for basic training.

“We then started to develop a solution with our systems and programming in conjunction with Capita and a series of working groups,” he adds. “It basically takes the best from the military, commercial and academic worlds. We visited the Army’s Assessment Centres, looked at all the data, spoke with candidates and former army physical training instructors, and handpicked performance individuals to help design and develop the programme.”

What BMF and Capita didn’t want was everyone in the programme to be solely former military individuals designing what they thought was right.

“We were determined to keep it simple, but with a range of experts involved,” says Rowlatt. “It’s also a very holistic programme. We refer to it as human performance, as it’s not just physical fitness conditioning.”

In fact, the programme looks at three components: psychological performance, involving mental resilience, performance under pressure and motivation to train; fitness,

Becky Bjorkman As a 25-year-old supervisor at a boarding kennel tasked with looking after people’s dogs when they go abroad, Becky Bjorkman was hit hard by the pandemic. It was while being furloughed and stuck at home that she decided to apply to the Army to be a dog handler. She was then referred to BMF and found herself on its Army Training Support Programme pilot and to her relief subsequently passed at the Assessment Centre.

“I admit I was a bit worried when I applied and was sent over all the physical stuff that I’d have to pass. I was relatively new to exercising, apart from running. But the programme involved webinars where instructors showed us each exercise and what we’d have to do on the day. It was really helpful.”

In fact, Bjorkman has nothing but positive words to say about her instructors. “The workouts can be very hard, but they’re great at telling you you’re doing well and pushing you forward. And afterwards there’s always a sit down where you can ask questions if you’re struggling with something.

They seemed to have no doubt that I would pass my assessment. And when I eventually went to the Centre I was pretty confident I’d pass too.”

And did Bjorkman feel that the programme addressed her needs as a female participant? “Yes, 100%,” she says. “One of the things I struggled with the most – and apparently a lot of women do – was throwing the medicine ball 2.7m. I didn’t really have a lot of upper body strength, but they teach you ways of exercising to help build those muscles.

“I’d definitely recommend the programme to others,” she adds. “To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have passed without BMF.”

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IN DEPTH AGENDA

Facts and figures 100,000+ 10,000+ Number of applications received each year by the Army

Number of successful recruits each year

involving moving more effectively to avoid injuries, building strength and aerobic fitness for running; and health and wellbeing, addressing nutrition, stress and injury management.

“I genuinely believe the platform wouldn’t have been so successful if we didn’t address all three components,” says Rowlatt. “This is as much about confidence building as it is about physical conditioning. It’s about making these individuals healthier. A lot of them want to change their lives, but some are from the toughest parts of the UK. Even though they really want to join the Army, many have no idea what any kind of fitness looks like or even how to move properly. That was the challenge: to engage with these individuals effectively but keep the programme really simple and easy to absorb.”

It’s a challenge the programme has met with success. Reviewing the candidates that participated in the pilot, Capita saw a 22% increase in the number of female candidates passing its fitness tests: 72% to 94%. The male pass rate went from 90% to 100% pass rate. But what makes these figures astonishing is this happened during a pandemic when everything had to be delivered online.

The programme is built on a six-week progression, with pre-recorded sessions taking participants right through their training journey, as well as live sessions every week. “But there is no set timeline for candidates using the

October 2020 to April 2021

1,200

22% and 10%

Duration of BMF Army Training Support Programme pilot

Number of Regular Soldier candidates participating in the pilot

Percentage increase of female and male candidates, respectively, passing Army Role Fitness Test during pilot

programme,” Rowlatt is quick to point out. “Some will go through in six weeks; some might have delays for whatever reason and be using the platform for as long as six months before they are ready for the Assessment Centre.”

It is also highly tailored to individual needs. Candidates are initially taken

through a detailed question set involving gender, health and body measurements. As Lee says: “All of the programming within the system is bespoke to gender and ability. It’s certainly not one-size-fits-all.”

Greater gender diversity in the Armed Forces can only be a good thing, broadening the range and number of

“This is as much about confidence building as it is about physical conditioning”

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potential recruits from which to draw.

The BMF Army Training Support Programme has blazed a trail in showing what can be achieved when individuals are both inspired, encouraged and helped to achieve their ambitions.

In fact, with the enormous success of the pilot, there’s now a proposal to develop it for the Royal Marines, and then possibly all three branches of the Armed Services. A similar platform has even been designed for the NHS, and BMF is currently bidding to the Department of Health and Social Care for a project to improve health and wellbeing in underprivileged communities around the UK. As we all emerge blinking from our lockdown caves as Covid restrictions slowly ease, it’s the sort of initiative that couldn’t have come at a better time.

Kate Lord Having spent 16-and-a-half years in the Army, Kate Lord brings a lot of experience to her role as instructor and performance consultant with BMF. It also means she knows first-hand the importance of BMF’s Army Training Support Programme.

“I joined the Army in 1999, originally with the Royal Corp of Signals, but then transferred to the Royal Army Physical Training Corp,” she says. “At the time, I was just 16 years old and there was nothing in place like this for me. There was almost no information about the tests, so this would have been fantastic – to know what the tests are and to be able to prepare with others that are going through the same process.”

She’s also heartened by the results of the online pilot programme and the feedback from candidates. “A regular positive comment from participants is that they get to speak to and see other candidates prior to going to assessment,” she says. “I think that really helps with their confidence and any burning questions they might have – in fact, these often get answered by each other, as well as the instructors.”

Building confidence and allaying fears and doubts is central to preparations. “As well as the fitness sessions, we also do online group mentoring sessions, where they can just chat about any worries they

have,” adds Lord. “They can also meet each other on our webinars and educational sessions, which cover everything from nutrition to strength and conditioning to injury prevention. We also partner them up so they can have peerto-peer chats, especially if they’re going to the same Assessment Centre.”

Lord cites the Beep Test as a particular area of concern and even panic for female candidates. Due to the pandemic, instead of the normal 2km run, Assessment Centres are running a Multistage Fitness Test (or Beep Test). It’s where candidates must run between two lines, 20m apart, in time with a beep. The beeps get steadily faster, and their score is based on the point where they can no longer keep up.

“For some reason, this test just petrifies the candidates, especially the women,” says Lord.

“Having said that, you can genuinely see their confidence levels grow week by week, and they start to speak up more in the sessions.

Even their appearance and general attitudes seem to change.”

As Covid restrictions become a thing of the past and face-to-face activities come back, Lord believes the digital offering will still play its part. “Yes, I think you’ll have candidates going to the parks to participate, but you’ll still have others continuing to enjoy the workouts at home. It’s the convenience of being able to do their training in their own space, yet still feel like they’re part of something.”

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IN DEPTH FITNESS & HEALTH

DEMAND STILL UP FOR

By Caroline Roberts

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EXERCISE REFERRAL

efore the first lockdown, exercise referral numbers were at an all-time high, says Stuart Stokes, managing director of ReferAll, an online platform providing a patient pathway from health services to exercise providers.

“All those people got stuck in the system, and throughout the pandemic, people have still been suffering from coronary heart disease, strokes and cancer and needing referrals,” he says.

It all adds up to large pent-up demand for the exercise programmes that can be a lifeline for those suffering from chronic health conditions. And this is without the rehabilitation requirements of the many thousands affected by ongoing symptoms related to long Covid.

Operators, meanwhile, are adapting to reduced physical capacity due to Covid restrictions and the need to balance the needs of referral clients with those of other customers.

Alongside these factors is the rise in social prescribing as part of local NHS services and the possibility that it could be used as an alternative option to referring clients onto formal exercise programmes.

Some operators may now need to rationalise the way in-person referral sessions are delivered, says Stokes.

“What we sometimes see is a Level 4 instructor delivering a falls prevention class, followed by a cardiac rehab and then a pulmonary rehab class, each with four people in them. These all involve really gentle exercise, so I would question whether it would be better to combine these classes as you’re using three times the resource you really need.

“It’s also important to ask yourself if capacity restrictions allow you to work efficiently with the current and proposed number of referrals. Don’t open the floodgates to referrals if

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Covid-19 and a changing NHS local landscape present challenges for operators running exercise referral programmes and are prompting changes in their delivery

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IN DEPTH

there is a risk that poor experience will follow.”

Many operators dealing with large numbers of referrals see the shift to online offers brought about by the pandemic as a positive thing for referral schemes. Before the pandemic, CIMSPA partner Places Leisure had around 4,500 referrals every year for programmes such as cardiac, cancer and stroke rehabilitation, chronic pain and falls prevention.

“Going forward, our schemes will be delivered using a blend of on-site delivery, screen time and phone calls.

We’re also using text messages to boost motivation and welcome people back,” says Sarah Roberts, fitness operations manager.

She believes that this blended approach will benefit clients and the organisation. “It’s early days, but we feel that people have come to expect changes in the way that programmes and schemes operate, and remote support makes them more flexible. I actually think that this will increase our reach. Previously people had to be well enough to visit the centre but, by supporting them remotely, their journey to health can start earlier and they can make health gains in their own home with no travel needed. This will also grow confidence so that when the time comes to for them to visit the centre, it’s not such a big step.”

At another CIMSPA partner organisation, GLL, the number of new referrals is now increasing quickly, says regional health intervention manager Lynn Almond. “Our good relationships with referrers have meant that we’ve hit the ground running, with really positive engagement with both the referrers and the potential participants.

“Everyone that was part of our referral programme prior to lockdown has been re-engaged to restart. Those that were referred but had not started are being

“Working with the link workers can help identify individuals who may benefit from specialist programmes” contacted, triaged and restratified to see if there’s a need for further information from their healthcare professional.

During the pandemic, we have reimagined our service to provide a

hybrid offering in centres. We need to be agile, providing services that can respond to local needs whatever the landscape.” The operator’s new Better Health suite of website resources and an online health assessment tool are also helping to support the aims of its referral scheme, she adds.

“The challenges ahead include being able to build and maintain the programmes’ financial sustainability, and to ensure we’re linking in with the new NHS integrated care systems to deliver support that contributes to local health needs.”

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FITNESS & HEALTH

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Integrated care systems are an attempt to build more partnerships between organisations meeting health and welfare needs across an area and to provide more joined-up care. Social prescribing forms part of these integrated systems. It involves health services and other agencies referring people to a link worker who then refers them on to local services or community groups, including those promoting exercise. Social prescribing has been around for some time, but it has been the focus of renewed attention and funding since it was incorporated into

the NHS Long Term Plan in 2019 as part of a new model of more personalised care. There are now more than 1,300 social prescribing link workers in post across England and the plan is for at least 900,000 people to be referred to social prescribing by 2023/24.

A concern for the sectors is that commissioners and referrers might see social prescribing as a substitute for formal exercise referral programmes, and that link workers may not appreciate the value of a structured programme delivered by a qualified fitness professional. However, GLL’s Almond sees it as an opportunity.

“Work with the newly emerging social prescribing workforce has already started and the services we offer complement the work that they do.

Working with the link workers can help identify individuals who may benefit from specialist programmes such our referral schemes through to our universal centre programmes.

Pre-pandemic we were seeing local relationships being built that allowed link workers to support their participants in our centres.”

This new wave of social prescribing makes it even more important that providers can evidence that what they are doing makes an impact, says Stokes.

“It’s important to understand your local social prescribing environment. It may well be that link workers don’t have the necessary clinical information at hand to refer into your medical-led programmes but there’s always the opportunity for referees to access activities in your wider offer. When they do flow into your facility, aim to identify those with a greater need. It may be that you need to go back to the referring partner for more information so they can be channelled into your referral programme, but at least the conversation has started. More conversations will lead to more active people and that should be embraced.”

How new technology can aid remote delivery CIMSPA partner organisation Everyone Active has joined forces with the creators of a new exercise prescription app to support the reopening of its exercise referral service by enabling staff to monitor participants’ progress remotely.

The EXi app is approved by the NHS and backed by a number of organisations, including ukactive and Sport England. It can be downloaded free by anyone and can be tailored to 23 different long-term health conditions. The app asks users to enter health information, measures resting heart rate, and has a fitness testing function to assess base level fitness. It then generates a personalised 12-week exercise plan.

Everyone Active has made the app available to all customers as part of its digital offer, Everyone on Demand, which was launched in May 2020. But it’s especially useful for those on exercise referral programmes as fitness staff have access to users’ health and activity data in real-time via the secure and GDPRcompliant web-based data portal. The user enters a bespoke Everyone Active centre code at the start, which links their data to the appropriate team.

“EXi is a game changer for us as it enables our trainers to offer their exercise referral clients a tried and trusted digital health solution,” says Ben Beevers, Everyone Active group development director. “The app accurately tracks people’s physical activity throughout the week and delivers the activity and health outcome data directly to our fitness team so we can clearly see how people are getting on and where any extra help or guidance is needed.”

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IN DEPTH COVID-19 LEGACY

#DOINGHERBIT TO LEAVE A

FITNESS LEGACY A fitness app designed to help NHS employees take on more physical activity in their spare time has been rolled out across the UK. Roisin Woolnough investigates

t’s no secret that stress and burnout levels are high in the NHS. Even before Covid-19 hit, NHS employees were operating under huge pressure, largely because of staff shortages. A new report published by the Health and Social Care Committee found that the workforce is now stretched to breaking point. The report references numerous studies that reach similar conclusions, including

I

research by NHS Providers, which found that 92% of trusts are concerned about employee wellbeing, stress and burnout following the pandemic.

It’s also no secret that many NHS employees find it hard to make the time for physical exercise in their leisure time. The demanding nature of the work, shift patterns and long hours mean that it’s all too easy for exercise to take a back seat.

This combination of high stress and sedentary living was something that Julie Davis (right), deputy chief operating officer at The Clinical Research Network West Midlands, was very worried about when the UK went into its first lockdown last year. So worried, in fact, that she decided to create a fitness app for the 180 staff in her department. An avid sportswoman herself – she is an amateur powerlifter

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IN DEPTH COVID-19 LEGACY

and is currently in training to become a personal trainer – she wanted to do something to help NHS staff with their physical, mental and emotional health.

What she didn’t expect was for the app to be rolled out across the UK, but that is exactly what has happened in the 12 months since it was launched. “We now have 100 NHS Trusts signed up, with a reach of 600,000 NHS workers,” says Davis. Called #DoingOurBit, the platform now offers over 50 workouts for NHS staff, free of charge. There are six sections on the platform: ● yoga and pilates ● family fun ● nutrition, hydration and motivation ● stretch and unwind your mind ● low impact aerobics ● high impact aerobics.

Each section features a series of workouts, externally and professionally verified by Active IQ. When the initiative was at the very early stages, Davis sought advice from her PT training provider (Study Active) and awarding organisation (Active IQ) about how the

TAKING THE WEIGHT OFF Julie Davis is an amateur powerlifter

“I want to create a lasting legacy to help benefit the NHS for years to come” sessions should be run. They thought her idea was brilliant, but stressed the need for workouts to be professionally created, presented and verified, and introduced Davis to the online apps and booking platform Fibido. By this time, The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust was interested in offering sessions to its 10,000 staff and demand kept growing.

And that is when #DoingOurBit was really born. Eight weeks later, in June 2020, it was launched, with StudyActive, Active IQ, Action Group and Fibido all offering their services for free.

The workouts are provided by a range of personal trainers, who have also all provided their expertise for free, to ‘give back’ to the NHS. The workouts are tailored for the NHS workforce and people are invited to send in requests, with new content added on a regular basis. For instance, the site has recently created some pre- and post-natal sessions at the request of an NHS employee. It will also soon be offering its first cancer exercise rehabilitation video, at the request of an employee who was undergoing chemotherapy.

Part of the appeal of #DoingOurBit is that it’s completely free and will remain so. In the early days of lockdown, several apps were made available to the NHS, without charge, but only for a limited period. “But this is free and free forever,” says Davis.

TRUST IN APP Samuel Skelding, health The Royal and wellbeing outreach Wolverhampton offered the app engagement lead at Black Country Healthcare NHS to its staff

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Lisa Neeson HR officer at Belfast Health & Social Care Trust “I am usually a positive person. However, the beginning of lockdown in March/April [2020] was difficult for me. I transitioned from working in a role that was officebased and involved a significant amount of meeting managers and employees in person, to the other end of the spectrum – working full time from home. I was also home-schooling a 16-year-old who was advised to shield owing to his underlying health condition and trying to keep my three-and-a-half-year-old safe and entertained!

“Not being able to see family, friends and colleagues was tough. Pre-Covid, I was an avid gym-goer so the new life changes took a while for me to adapt to.

Foundation Trust, says the combination of #DoingOurBit being free and being accessible remotely makes it a real winner. “We had a few things at the start of the pandemic, with free access to apps, but they expired after a few months. Whatever we put in, we want it to be long lasting, so this is a really helpful tool.”

Skelding’s Trust introduced the app soon after it launched. “We were trying to put in place as much as possible that we could offer staff around health and wellbeing that was flexible and

“When I was asked to be involved in promotional activity of the #DoingOurBit campaign, I immediately said yes as I thought this was a great initiative during difficult and challenging times.

“Its focus on health, fitness and nutrition was exactly what I needed. It meant that after a long day working at home, I could log onto this free website and have a choice of workouts. My 16-year-old loved doing the short HIIT sessions with me and my 3-yearold got involved in the Family Fun section!

“I’m very aware that exercise is great not only for the physical benefits but also for sustaining mental and emotional health and wellbeing. The platform has really helped me through these difficult times.” accessible,” he says. Even before the pandemic, the Trust had started looking for schemes that could be accessed remotely. “With about 3,500 staff, we’re not a big trust, but we have a lot of sites – 60/70,” says Skelding. “So we need health and wellbeing initiatives that are accessible from anywhere. To have something like this, especially during the pandemic, something that they can log in and use whenever they like, is really good.”

Mathew Tidball, physiotherapy lead at Swansea Bay University Health Board,

agrees that 24x7 remote access to fitness and wellbeing programmes has been really important for a lot of NHS staff.

“During the height of the pandemic, this was so needed. From an emotional and mental health perspective, it has been a very challenging time and this has been an invaluable resource.”

A physiotherapist himself, he was impressed by the quality and variety of workouts. He also likes the fact that they are not just aimed at people who are already doing regular exercise. “Variety is really important – people were fed up of just going for walks and this has given them an option to do something else.”

Davis says she has been amazed by how many people and organisations have been willing to give their time and energy into helping NHS staff by getting involved with #DoingOurBit. Lyndsey Wyse, health and wellbeing co-ordinator at the sporting charity The Albion Foundation, says the organisation signed up as a thank you to the NHS and to help the local community.

An ambassador for the Foundation, blind athlete Dave Heeley OBE, who goes by the nickname of Blind Dave, recently recorded a video for #DoingOurBit, stressing the importance of the initiative.

“Blind Dave caught Covid in October last year and it completely knocked him off his feet,” says Wyse. “He is one of the fittest men we know but he went from running marathons … to not being able to put his shoes on because he couldn’t breathe properly. He did his story to camera and gave a massive thanks to the NHS for saving his life.”

Davis is forging new relationships all the time, with CIMSPA and Public Health England recently coming on board. Her ambition is to have the app freely available to every member of the NHS workforce in every NHS organisation in the UK, forever. “I want to create a lasting legacy to help benefit the NHS for years to come.”

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IN DEPTH COMMUNIT Y WORKING

The UK has had one of the world’s most successful Covid-19 vaccine rollouts, and members of the sports & physical activity sector have generously played their part. We highlight just a few exciting contributions

By Caroline Roberts

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“It’s good to know we’re making a difference”

ACTIVENEWHAM

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IMSPA partner activeNewham has played a key role in setting up and running pop-up vaccine centres across the east London borough.

Since March, 11 centres have been established in places of worship and community centres to help with the rollout of the vaccine locally. The scheme, likely to run until the end of the year, has come about through a partnership between the Leisure Trust, Newham Council, faith groups and the NHS. “The thinking behind it was to provide more spaces for Newham residents to get vaccinated closer to home and in more familiar surroundings,” says activeNewham’s head of service Daniel Burford.

Daniel Nixon, general manager at Manor Park Fitness Centre, has overseen the set-up and running of the centres. “I’ve been utilising my skills in preparing the spaces, managing staff, and making sure everything runs smoothly.” Staff back from furlough have also been deployed at the vaccine venues when they have not been needed at their usual activeNewham workplaces. “Being customer-focused and engaging with people is important to ensure they come back for their second dose of the vaccine. Our staff have those skills,” he adds. “The community groups are all doing a wonderful job in encouraging

“I feel more connected to my community”

" ALAMY

P

Harrison, education and ippa Harr at British training coordinator c Rowing, a CIMSPA training partner, has been provider p volunteering at least once a week at her local vaccine ccentre in Marlow, Bucks. check-in, putting “I work on ch details onto the system people’s det when they come for their appointments and making sure appointm have the right person at we hav time,” she explains. the right ri “We recently set up a “W

people to use the centres. We’re all pulling together, and it’s good to know we’re reaching as many people as possible and making a difference.”

Jason Strelitz, director of public health at Newham Council adds: “The contribution of activeNewham has been invaluable – their local knowledge, connections with our communities and customer skills have really helped the borough reach out to many of our residents.”

Pfizer clinic for the younger people now coming through, so we’ve doubled our capacity as a vaccine centre and the first day of that was a bit mad. But we manage to run a really efficient service and people are very happy. The check-in desk is right in front of our little tea kitchen, and there’s always thank-you cards, cakes and biscuits.

“It’s made me feel a lot more connected to my community, and I’ve come across so many people with links to the club where I row. With volunteering, you meet a lot of key people in the community and build relationships with people that you wouldn’t normally have met.”

PIPPA HARRISON

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IN DEPTH COMMUNIT Y WORKING

“I’ve vaccinated more than 8,000 people”

W KATE FOSTER

hen Kate Foster was furloughed from her job as quality and compliance manager at Oldham Community Leisure, she retrained to become one of an army of volunteer vaccinators. “I’m passionate about our community and want to give something back,” she says.

After a rigorous programme of online and face-to-face training with St John’s Ambulance, she started giving the jab in January,

doing five or six shifts a week at various hubs in the area, including Chester Racecourse and the Etihad Stadium. “I went back to work part-time in April but my employer has allowed me to stay on part-furlough so I could carry on with the vaccination work, which I’m really grateful for. I must have vaccinated over 8,000 people by now, and I’ll be carrying on until October.”

Foster also has a counselling qualification, which has come in useful in the role, she adds. “Communication is important. There’s been such a lot of scaremongering out about the vaccine so it’s about trying to reassure people and give them all the information they need to be able to make that informed choice.”

However, the vast majority have been

M

ore than 100,000 jabs have now been delivered at two leisure centres in Rotherham Metropolitan Council in South Yorkshire, and Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council in Leicestershire.

The facilities, run by CIMSPA partner Places Leisure, have been operating as vaccine hubs since the beginning of the year, their sports halls providing the perfect setting for managing large numbers of people while maintaining social distancing. And the work is still going on in parts of the centres since reopening, with customers segregated from those coming to receive their vaccine.

“We’ve been working closely with NHS to make sure the doctors, nurses

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overjoyed to get the jab.

“Everyone is so grateful for what we’re doing. Some people will just sit there and cry as they’re so happy to be one step closer to normality.

A lot have been shielding, so when they come to the site they just want to tell you their life story as they haven’t seen anyone for so long. That’s the part I love most – just being able to sit there and talk to them.”

" JIM TOMLINSON / HINCKLEY AND BOSWORTH BOROUGH COUNCIL.

“We’re privileged to be part of something historic”

ave h e l p “Peo ed me for t thankg them ge” helpinlives back their

L

ast year, personal trainer Julia Buckley volunteered to be part of trials for the AstraZeneca vaccine.

“It was a really tense time. I was doing free, live workouts on Facebook but I was watching all these other people working on the frontline and felt quite impotent. I just wanted to do something more to help us all get out of this mess,” she says.

She filled in the online application and, after a screening appointment at Northwick Park Hospital near her West London home,, she was accepted onto the trial and soon had her first jab. “At the time, I didn’t know if

and other staff have everything they need,” says Paul Harpham, general manager at the Rotherham Leisure Centre. “It’s amazing to see what they’re doing and work with them. It just shows how good the NHS has been with the rollout. We also have an army of local volunteers, including some of our own staff, manning the car parks and doors. The community has really responded to make this happen.”

Nicola Parratt, general manager at Hinckley Leisure Centre, adds: “We feel really privileged that we’ve been able to be part of something that is quite historic. On the first day, seeing all those people lined up in the sports hall, and then the joy on their faces when they had their vaccine – that was a reward in itself.”

it was the control, which was a meningitis vaccine, or the real thing.”

She was then followed up by having weekly swabs, filling in questionnaires and having periodic blood tests.

“Although I had faith in the science, obviously you do worry a little bit. But I was really surprised by all the praise I got on social media. Lots of people have told me their stories of shielding and thanked me for helping them get their lives back. I’ve seen how hard the doctors involved in the study have been working, and I was just a small cog in the machine.

“It was so exciting when it got approved and the rollout started. Then when my family and other people I know started being vaccinated, it began to seem real. That was probably the best part of it. My got his vaccine early p y dad g y on and it was the AstraZeneca.”

All the while, Buckley still didn’t know if she’d received the real vaccine or the placebo. “I only had a sore arm, so I thought I’d probably had the control. Then, at the end of April, I was told I’d had both doses, so I was very happy.”

JULIA BUCKLEY

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ADVERTORIAL LEISURE FRAMEWORK

UK LEISURE FRAMEWORK

As it completes its first four-year term, Jamie Groves, MD of Denbighshire Leisure, and Sarah Watts, CEO of Alliance Leisure, look at the impact of the UK’s first dedicated development framework for leisure.

Client quotes “The UK Leisure Framework allowed the Council to avoid unnecessary bureaucracy and get our projects to market with expediency. Working with Alliance Leisure, provided a range of options, early cost certainty and our projects were delivered on time and within budget.”

Damian Hughes, Senior Manager, School Planning & Provision, Flintshire County Council “The cost certainty element of the UK Leisure Framework meant we had absolute clarity on costs that would be incurred by the proposed capital investment. This was hugely helpful in achieving project sign off. Throughout the project, Alliance Leisure worked in partnership with us – from concept to completion, helping to ensure the achievement of desired outcomes.

The leisure development expertise they brought to the table was central to the success of our investment.”

Malcolm Fleming, Programme Manager, West Suffolk Council

WHY DID YOU LAUNCH THE UK LEISURE FRAMEWORK? JG: Launched in 2017 by Denbighshire County Council and managed by Denbighshire Leisure Ltd, the UK Leisure Framework was designed to help public sector bodies transform their leisure offer with successful and sustainable facilities.

It was born out of the success of our first partnership with Alliance Leisure, where we spent almost £10m upgrading facilities after years of under investment. Our positive experience of the process led us to develop the framework, appointing Alliance Leisure as leisure development partner, to help other local authorities by removing the burdens of public procurement.

HOW IS THE FRAMEWORK BENEFITTING LOCAL AUTHORITIES? SW: The UK public sector procurement process is one of the longest and most expensive in the EU. By making the process quicker and easier, the framework makes the development of public sector leisure facilities much more efficient and affordable. The focus on reducing costs and improving efficiencies means local authorities can dedicate more of their budget to the development.

The framework adopts a full service approach, supporting all elements that contribute to a successful, sustainable development including design, business planning, funding, construction and marketing. Most other frameworks do not have such scope, focusing instead on individual elements. This approach helps to mitigate investment risk.

Working with experts in leisure regeneration and maximising efficiencies at every stage of the development helps ensure the finished project delivers desired outcomes and creates income-generating opportunities which drive sustainability.

JG: The process is also completely transparent, so local authorities can be certain of the costs, which gives them the confidence to invest in their leisure stock. Thanks to the framework, we’ve seen that confidence grow with £144m committed investment in public leisure facilities across the UK over the last four years.

WHAT IMPACT HAS THE FRAMEWORK HAD? SW: The framework has ensured the successful completion of vital leisure projects designed to deliver lasting

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Framework in numbers

41 120 £144m 12 Completed projects

Completed project questionnaires

Committed investment

impact. Many of these would never have gone ahead without the framework; the local authorities quite simply wouldn’t have been able to afford to deliver the schemes. Projects range from new pitches, such as the first 3G pitches in Anglesey, to transforming leisure facilities at scale as we helped Inverclyde Leisure to do, investing £2.6m in three leisure centres to achieve a 75 per cent increase in net income and 51 per cent rise in membership.

JG: To date, 41 projects have completed under the framework and 12 more are currently underway. Regardless of their size or cost, all framework projects are designed to impact local health and social outcomes by creating healthier communities, while also being economically sustainable to ensure local authorities achieve their income targets.

HOW CAN THE FRAMEWORK HELP LOCAL AUTHORITIES AFTER THE PANDEMIC? JG: These are extremely challenging times for public sector leisure. The pandemic has highlighted just how important physical activity is for our mental and physical health, yet Sport England figures show that

Covid-19 has had a profound effect on people’s activity levels, with those from black, Asian and minority ethnic and lower socio-economic groups disproportionately affected by the national lockdowns.

The need for public leisure will be greater than ever post-pandemic, but facilities have to be much more relevant if they are to create better social and financial returns for local authorities. By mitigating the risk and making developments easier and more cost-effective, the framework will allow councils to invest in the right leisure provision to bring economic, health and social benefits to their communities.

SW: Local authorities will need to broaden their offerings, both indoors and in outdoor spaces, to create active environments that can be used by as many members of the community as possible to ensure value for money.

They must consider activities like splash pads, zip wires, outdoor play and parkour to really invigorate their leisure spaces and generate returns.

The UK Leisure Framework is a proven vehicle for delivering inspiring schemes that increase opportunities for physical activity.

Projects underway

Some of the projects procured through the UK Leisure Framework Sevenoaks District Council, White Oak Leisure Centre (on site) Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, Dudley Leisure Centre (on site) Denbighshire County Council, SC2 Wiltshire Council, Melksham Community Campus (on site) South Somerset Council, Chard Leisure Centre (on site) Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, Halesowen Leisure Centre (on site) Brentwood Council, King George’s Playing Fields (on site) Monmouthshire County Council, Monmouth Leisure Centre St Helens Council, NewtonLe-Willows Leisure Centre Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, Crystal Leisure Centre (on site) West Suffolk Council, New Market Leisure Centre Kirklees Active Leisure, Batley Sports & Tennis Centre Denbighshire County Council, Rhyl Leisure Centre Conwy County Council, Stadiwm Zip World

£20m 17.4m £15m £14m £14m £8.4m £8m £7.4m £4.2m £4.1m £1.8m £1.5m £1m £0.25m

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TECH TOOLKIT PRODUCT RO UND-UP

REASSURING RETURN

Tech welcomes members back to the gym safely COMPILED BY SUE WEEKES

Building back stronger

Matrix Fitness has expanded its strength and cardio portfolios. The new Go Series of strength units are aimed at facilities which want to attract members who are new to strength training and circuit programmes and comprises 10 single station machines, including chest press, shoulder press, lat pulldown, biceps curl, seated triceps press and seated leg curl. Each is designed with low starting weights, compact footprints and back-to-back configurations, which Matrix says will improve traffic flow and help cater for more members when space is at a premium. Storage space on top of stacks lets users keep their personal belongings such as water bottle and devices in reach.

Meanwhile, Matrix’s three-tiered cardio offering spans the Performance, Endurance and Lifestyle series of equipment (including treadmills, ascent trainers, upright and recumbent cycles and suspension ellipticals) and consoles. The five new consoles range from basic LED designs to touchscreen interfaces and provide users with control over the data they collect.

Price: On application

Polar hopes its latest watches will help people come back “stronger than before” in the wake of the pandemic by providing a more holistic experience and focusing on a person’s overall physical condition and mental wellbeing. The Polar Ignite 2 smartwatch provides sleep insight and heart rate features and is compatible with gym equipment and cycling computers. It also provides personalised daily workout guidance based on recovery, readiness and training history with FitSpark. Meanwhile, the Vantage M2 is an all-in-one multisport smartwatch to help athletes “level up” their performance. It offers a running programme to help achieve goals, insights to aid complete physical recovery before the next session, heart rate and sleep data, and a “smart fuelling” assistant to find optimal ways to refuel during long sessions. It also offers personalised workout guidance.

Price: Ignite 2: €229.90 (£198); Vantage M2: €299.90 (£258)

www.matrixfitness.com

www.polar.com

MATRIX EXPANDS PORTFOLIO

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VIDEOWALL HELPS VISUALISE SUCCESS

CLEARING THE AIR FOR MEMBERS A hospital-grade air purification system, which claims to “trap and kill” 99.9% of viruses and bacteria, including human coronavirus, is available for gyms and health clubs. Brought to the UK by the Goji Group, the system uses nano-confined catalytic oxidation to purify the air without, it also claims, generating any harmful bi-products. It can work independently or alongside health club ventilation systems and also removes toxins from the air, including pollen, dust mites, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), particulate matter (down to PM2.5) and other airborne pollutants. Professor Greg Whyte, a former Olympian, is science director of the Goji Group, and said the system will give customers of large and small clubs confidence to “work out together” and reassurance that their club is “future-proofing” its facilities. It can also be targeted in changing room areas.

Price: On application

Technogym is bidding to attract members back to group fitness with its latest immersive riding experience. Its Group Cycle offers different riding classes that combine music, visual effects and performance data to create an interactive experience. A large videowall plays a key part in the experience to visualise personal and class results or help riders to immerse themselves in the environment. There are three experiences: Peak Class, for those who love performance training and data; FreeBeat Class, for those who want to “ride into a live show”, with the environment influenced by the riders (as their intensity changes, so does the speed and colours of the screen); and Group Cycle Virtual, which can be held without supervision with classes booked via the Mywellness app, and riders join their favourite trainer on the videowall when convenient.

Price: On application

www.technogym.com/gb/

www.gojigroup.co.uk

RIDING AS ONE Schwinn wants to ensure it takes an inclusive approach to creating a community for beginner and experienced bicycle riders, and its latest bikes take its ‘Ride as One’ philosophy to the next level by simplifying user experience and simultaneously expanding the possibilities for instructors.

Users can choose between the competitive class Zone training (Z Bike) or what it calls “a captivating class” based on the Experience (X Bike). Core Health & Fitness, which sells the brand in the UK, says for classes that “live in the metrics” the Z Bike is ideal while the X Bike allows riders to climb through four zones, determined by rider effort. Green, yellow, orange and red LEDs illuminated on the forks encourage everyone to ride as one group. Such features are also designed to help instructors re-engage with members as group fitness re-emerges following lockdown.

Price: On application

www.corehealthandfitness.com/schwinn

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WORKPLACE FOCUS

THREE WAYS TECH SUPPORTS STAFF Ross McCaw highlights how the right tech can recharge your freelance group trainers as classes return s pandemic restrictions continue to lift the public are growing in confidence and returning to gyms. PureGym has experienced tens of thousands of new members, while ClassPass has seen a 600% week-on-week rise in sign-ups.

Growing numbers combined with remaining Covid regulations present a challenge to full-time and freelance gym staff who need to be equipped with the same information to keep people safe.

In these uncertain times technology can help structure and simplify communications, while providing the depth of information returning freelance staff need, following limited access to communication channels on furlough.

At OurPeople, we’ve seen three key areas where technology has helped support gym staff transition back to in-person classes: that staff feel listened to, are informed and the information provided is up to date and relevant.

A

Listen to teams, get regular feedback In-person feedback sessions are one of the most important elements of support, giving the opportunity to check in with individual team members’ wellbeing, and gather feedback on how they feel processes are working for them.

Gyms are only expected to get busier, so scheduling in short, regular catch-ups

“Communicating with teams clearly is the best way to ensure returning employees are fully supported” is the best way to communicate clearly without inconveniencing teams.

Calendar tech via smartphones is a vital tool for active staff members who frequently work on the go.

Providing short surveys on a regular basis via these virtual comms channels also boosts team engagement levels, with concise questionnaires providing a channel for staff to feedback their experiences and workload. Not only does this ensure no one falls through the cracks, but it also offers managers with up-to-date insights, allowing them to change any protocols which might be causing issues as soon as they stop working for the employees.

Update procedures through training With many group trainers returning from furlough or prolonged absence, training and retraining teams can seem like a substantial task and one that will vary from person to person.

With gym staff on the go most of the working day, a centralised platform that is accessible on smartphones and supported by video content, allows access to vital information wherever team members might be working.

Short quizzes on updates and protocols, such as cleaning regimes or entry and access routes, also encourage engagement and training by flagging knowledge gaps ahead of issues arising.

Target information Communicating effectively against a tumultuous backdrop means being precise with the information you push to individual staff. There is a risk of confusing people with irrelevant information or worse, fatiguing them with updates and making communication strenuous. With teams working different hours and often across a variety of locations, ensuring the right people get the right information is vital.

Some platforms provide additional insight, which allows managers not only to target specific groups of employees, but also identify who has and hasn’t engaged with the content. This means they can easily follow up with those they need to, rather than sending out a message to the entire group. Ensuring all the relevant teams have seen the information they need will have a huge impact on how fast and effectively a team responds to a critical incident.

At this unusual time, using the right tech and communication platforms will help ensure managers can cater for the individual needs of staff members, whilst also keeping the wider team connected on the go. Communicating with teams clearly, with decisive and timely information, is the best way to ensure returning employees are fully supported and kept safe.

Ross McCaw, CEO and founder of OurPeople

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EXPERT ADVICE

CHANGES TO IR35: WHAT’S THE FITNESS INDUSTRY’S NEXT MOVE? Following our Spring 2021 article, Abigail Halcarz advises trainers and instructors on further complying with new tax regulations n April 2021, the updated IR35 system went live, forcing off-payroll workers across the UK to re-examine their employment agreements, many of whom work in the health and fitness industry.

The new IR35 regime, which requires trainers’ intermediaries to define their employment status, might have slipped under the radar, but to avoid any issues with HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), instructors need to keep on top of the least active part of their careers: the administration.

With intermediaries now playing a pivotal role, trainers must carefully consider their choices. There are two routes they can explore: either setting up a limited company themselves or signing up with an umbrella company.

Limited companies give individuals more autonomy, but also mean that instructors must stay on top of administrative duties themselves.

Alternatively, joining an umbrella company lightens the administrative workload, but does incur a fee and the loss of self-employed status. For some trainers, this is an attractive option as the lightened responsibility means they can focus on building a client base and delivering the best service possible.

In brief, an umbrella company gets paid for the work the instructor completes, and they then pay them

I

“If their offer seems too good to be true, then it often is” through PAYE, deducting costs like taxes, National Insurance Contributions and workplace pension payments.

Paying these fees is essential, so it’s vital the chosen umbrella company carries out its monthly duties correctly.

Choosing the right umbrella firm can be a minefield, as not all are compliant with some tax regimes, but there are some ways that trainers can ensure they partner with the right company.

Firstly, when it comes to umbrella companies, if their offer seems too good to be true, then it often is, so choosing

accredited, reviewed and audited companies is the best practice. Websites such as Trustpilot can be useful in determining the validity and reliability of umbrella companies before any commitment is made. Offers such as 80% take-home pay or suggesting that claiming expenses without receipts is allowed, often suggest that the company is not compliant with HMRC rules.

Trainers will also want to avoid a company with unclear contract terms.

These range from having complicated payment regimes, with entry, leaving and document fees (such as submitting a P11D or receiving a P60), to ‘pay when paid’ clauses or any other unusual contractual obligations. Contract clauses should be laid out clearly, but it’s always good to double and triple check the fine print when signing up.

Lastly, perhaps the best way to choose an umbrella company is through word of mouth, professional forums, or recommendations from professional bodies, such as CIMSPA and the Freelance and Contractor Services Association (FCSA). For added protection and clarity, employment legal experts can also help to identify the best approach for an individual.

Navigating changes to IR35 may seem like an unnecessary headache but taking the time to decide on the best employment path will prove valuable in the long term. Whether that’s setting up alone, or finding the right umbrella company, there are plenty of options that will allow trainers to continue to do what they do best: helping their clients.

Abigail Halcarz is an employment specialist at law firm Shakespeare Martineau

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FREE eLearning for CIMSPA members The CIMSPA Academy provides free online CPD opportunities exclusively for CIMSPA members and student affiliates – maintain your excellence as part of a recognised and respected profession.

START LEARNING TODAY

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LAST WORD SPORT AMBASSADOR

Tracy Aldereyaane is founder and vice president, Spectrum Wellness for Women, based in Saudi Arabia

PASSION FOR FITNESS IN SAUDI audi Arabia isn’t the easiest place to be a female business owner, which makes Tracy Aldereyaane’s achievements all the more laudable. As founder and vice president of Spectrum Wellness for Women, she has not only made her business a runaway success, but also inspired other women to follow her lead.

When Aldereyaane first came to the country in 1984, women had limited options of somewhere to go and get fit. A privileged few that lived in what are called compounds had their own gyms, swimming pools and tennis courts.

Aldereyaane herself was forced to visit such a club in the diplomatic quarter.

But fitness was a real passion and in the early 1990s she decided she wanted to pursue it as a career. “Saudi women were looking to get fit,” she recalls, “and I felt it was something I could really promote.” So Aldereyaane started going from palace to palace offering her services as a personal trainer to princesses. In fact, it was during this period that one of the princesses asked her to start a club within her fitness centre in the diplomatic quarter.

Aldereyaane leapt at the opportunity and eventually established Spectrum Wellness for Women in 1999.

“It was all about women empowering women to stand up and be counted,” she says. “As we like to say here at Spectrum,

S

it’s for women by women. We’re getting the message out there that fitness is a reputable and respected business. Before it was something that was questioned, but people now realise there’s a science behind it.”

Witnessing this surge in interest from women to participate in fitness activities, Aldereyaane realised she couldn’t possibly meet the demand and took the decision to train as a trainer to bring more female instructors on board (only women can train women in Saudi Arabia and all fitness centres are gender segregated). She trained on the Active IQ Professional Career Development programme and gained her accreditation in September 2020 enabling her to train other women to become instructors.

Based in the capital Riyadh, the take-up has been fantastic, she says.

“They love it because it can be a freelance-type of career, where they can work a few hours a day and then be with their families and take care of their kids,” she says. “It creates a nice balance for them. Some have even opened their own centres. In fact, several of my competitors actually qualified with us at Spectrum.” Currently there are two branches of Spectrum in Riyadh and one in Allkhobar (eastern providence).

Aldereyaane has also noticed a marked change in the make-up of those attending her courses. “When we first

started training the trainers, almost all the attendees were expats and not from the Arab world. But with fitness finally being seen as a reputable industry, Saudi women have signed up like crazy.”

Aldereyaane is the first to admit that Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman’s Vision 2030 programme, with its push to increase public participation in sports and athletic activities, has helped her cause. “That certainly got the ball rolling quickly,” she admits. “Suddenly women were excited about embracing fitness, empowering themselves and becoming fitness instructors.”

And as she is quick to point out, women hold a lot of sway in changing general behaviours in Saudi Arabia. “If you convince the woman in the household to lead a healthier lifestyle, this will impact on her family and children,” she says. “Before too long the whole community starts to change.”

The pandemic obviously pulled the handbreak on in-person training, but things are gradually coming back, says Aldereyaane. “People here used to think the point of exercising was just to lose weight, but now they realise it's also about mental health. All the lockdowns have involved a lot of mental stress – getting people active can only help.”

Tracy Aldereyaane was speaking to Dean Gurden

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LAST WORD SPORTING LIFE

Pete Burt, retiring MD of Inspiring Healthy Lifestyles (IHL), reflects on his 17 years in the sector, and what the future holds

THE HIGHS AND LOWS I realised I wanted a change of direction back in 2003, away from my career up to that point in utility, service and retail firms. But I was reaching my late 40s and wanted to do something different that had a social purpose and meant something to the community. I wanted to use my commercial skills in the social enterprise and charitable sector.

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR LEADERSHIP STYLE? My philosophy has always been that you can’t do it on your own. It’s about leading and developing a team, not dominating it.

But that team also brings 200-plus people with it, for which you’re setting the culture and values as a team. You’re also answerable to a board of trustees, made up of volunteers that give their time because they believe in your organisation’s culture.

WHAT’S BEEN YOUR GREATEST ACHIEVEMENT? I’m really proud that as part of GM Active, and in conjunction with the NHS and Greater Manchester Cancer, we developed and piloted a scheme

called Prehab4Cancer. It assists people who are facing major cancer surgery or chemotherapy to prepare for their treatment by getting them fitter, and then supports their recovery. It’s now being adopted throughout Greater Manchester and is expanding into other parts of the North West.

HAVE THE LAST 18 MONTHS BEEN THE MOST DIFFICULT YOU CAN REMEMBER? I’ve had a 41-year career, but the last 18 months have been by far the most challenging. For IHL just to survive and still be here is quite an achievement.

Thankfully we’d built up good reserves as a charitable trust and have run the business well. We’ve lost a significant amount of money like others, but the furlough scheme and government funding have helped.

WHAT CHALLENGES DOES THE SECTOR FACE GOING FORWARD? It’s all going to be about recovery. The next two years will be about recovery, growth and stabilising. If anything, the pandemic has made it more important than ever that we play our part in making a fitter and healthier population. The sector has got to be supported in its work towards creating fitter communities,

so that we recover from Covid-19 and have better resilience for something similar in the future.

WHAT CHANGES HAVE YOU WITNESSED OVER YOUR 17 YEARS IN THE SECTOR? Gyms and exercise facilities are now far more technical and digital-based. But the biggest change is the level of understanding in the sector, as well as in Public Health England and the NHS, of the value that physical activity plays in our mental as well as physical wellbeing.

Yet we still haven’t got the systems, processes and channels in place to fully capitalise on this understanding.

WHAT WILL RETIREMENT BRING FOR YOU? I’m passionate about the sector and love what I do, so I’ll definitely continue being involved in a voluntary capacity.

For example, I’m working with an organisation trying to save Grangeover-Sands Lido, which is a rare Art Deco swimming pool overlooking Morecambe Bay. It’s been closed since the early 1980s and they are looking to raise about £5m to restore it. As for my spare leisure time, I want to concentrate on getting my own personal health into top gear through walking and cycling.

The past 18 months have all been about work; now I want to do lots of hiking in the Lake District and Cornwall.

Peter Burt spoke with Dean Gurden.

" ISTOCK

WHEN DID YOU FIRST KNOW YOU WANTED TO WORK IN THE HEALTH AND WELLBEING SECTOR?

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S&PAProfessional / Summer 2021

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