Hiring a Director of Racquet Sports? Ensure Success! - with Len Simard (part 2)
Welcome
Episode Narration:to Racquet Fuel, where we launch into great conversations and share powerful tools to help you become a stronger Racquet's leader. Your hosts are Kim Bastable, a former All American tennis player and now director of tennis management at the University of Florida, and Simon Gale, the USTA National Campus Director of Racquet Sports. Today on Racquet Fuel, we'll continue a two part conversation with Len Simard, search and consulting executive with Copland, Keibler, and Wallace, a firm that annually manages hundreds of searches for club leadership positions around The US. Len specializes in searches for directors of racquet sports, so he knows what it takes to succeed in the role. Here are Kim and Simon with part two of that discussion.
Kim Bastable:Welcome to Racquet Fuel. I'm Kim Bastable, and I'm here with my cohost, Simon Gale. How are you doing today, Simon?
Simon Gale:Great, Kim. I'm really excited to get back online here with Len and dig into this director of Racquet Sports and the evolution of it. So welcome, Len. Glad to have you back again.
Len Simard:Yeah. It's a pleasure. Thanks, Kim, for inviting me. Simon, it's always fun to work with you.
Simon Gale:So, Len, we just talked offline a little bit recently about the kind of rapid rise of the director of Racquet Sports. It wasn't long ago that you were just a director of tennis and the paddle courts were a winter sport for a handful of members, but the director of tennis took the winters off and moved to sunnier climates and then came back up next summer. So that has changed very quickly. And I guess my question to you is, is that been a good thing for a director? More annual year long positions and adding other racket sports to their ball of tricks.
Simon Gale:So just talk a little bit about how that's changed and and and your thoughts on whether that's been good for for the director of tennis to evolve.
Len Simard:Well, have mixed feelings on that one because I as you as you may or may not remember, I I spent twenty two summers up in in Connecticut from Florida and we valued that. Myself, my family valued that tremendously. But if I'm looking at it as an understanding from a club's perspective, a board perspective, a management perspective, a membership perspective, I do feel that the transition that is happening nationwide, which is an annual director of Racquet's, is the way to go. It just is because if you look at even Florida or Arizona or some of the climates that typically were very, very slow in the summer times, they're expanding. COVID changed a lot of that where people want to be outside and they want to stay involved in their community longer.
Len Simard:It's safe environment. So many clubs can to be honest, I can only think of less than a handful of clubs now in the entire state of Florida, for example, that allow their directors of Racquet's to leave to go to another summer opportunity. And that used to be very different than that. And and then vice versa from the northern clubs, the the seasonal professionals in the summertime, they've been asked to stretch out on both ends. They they want the courts open in early April now as soon as they can be, depending on where you're where you're at.
Len Simard:And they want outdoor programming to last as long as November November 1. So now immediately, it it sort of disallows you from from going back and forth, certainly as a director. But there's there's a few other reasons why I think it's it's it's taken a huge turn to be a trend now is because that director sees all the members year round. And and so the ones that they had, for example, playing paddle, and they're very skilled or they just love the sport. They don't even have to be skilled.
Len Simard:They they can transition into tennis and vice versa. So if if you only saw them on the tennis court and you weren't promoting platform tennis in the wintertime and you don't have indoor tennis, what an opportunity you have to combine and mesh the sports and the membership together.
Simon Gale:And I would think that because I'm now required to potentially teach three, four, five racket sports depending on the facility, does that not give the potential for a better compensation package for one of these directors of racquet sports versus being able to teach just say one sport? Has that evolved as well?
Len Simard:Absolutely. Yeah. So you're right. And we're not only just this person because we don't think the director of Racquet should be on court all that much, but it does allow for the program to be successful. And that means just from a programming perspective, but also a monetary perspective as you as you alluded to.
Len Simard:So now we're seeing a lot of hires that are head professionals or directors of pickle and paddle. So they actually can run platform tennis in the winter and do pickleball in the summertime. And Padal's coming both usually more summer, but certainly in shoulder seasons as well. So yes, you're absolutely right. And if the director has the ability to see and tie these sports together, which is probably one of their top five deliverables that they should be doing as a director if you have multi sports is tying them together, then then absolutely it should be something that in improves finances and and stability, which is something that doesn't get talked about a lot.
Len Simard:But you know, it it improves your your your likelihood of being retained for for a long time and becoming a long tenured employee.
Simon Gale:And I would think you've also mentioned in the last episode when you talked about the skill set required and understanding budgets and presenting to committees and so on. Surely if you've engaged more members and you're getting golfers who never used to come and play tennis start to try pickleball or Padel and the wives of members are getting their kids and themselves out more often, That must help in terms of presenting budget requests and the ability to ask for more for your team if you've increased the level of engagement at a country club, which is ultimately what the experience is about, isn't it, for these members?
Len Simard:Yeah. Spot on. Exactly another very important element to it. I remember one of my clubs, this was a member equity club. I won't say which one at this time to protect the guilty.
Len Simard:But they said, hey, isn't Racquet a profit center? Now again, we know it could be if it's in a commercial environment, but we also know it could be in an equity environment, nonprofit scenario because they're it's a dues driven business and and and and type of process. So again, when you see a loss in a department at a member equity club, it's not taking into account the dues allocations. So it really does allow you to to say, here's where we are. We've just now introduced 50 or 60 new players to to to our department, and we're still only operating at three and a half percent of the gross annual revenue of the club, which is about the national average, three and a half to 4%.
Len Simard:Boy, we're really taking care of a lot of people. So I had to actually go back and and and list all the people that we took care of. And it know, it was two I'm just you know, 250 people and there might have been 500 players. Sorry, 500 members. So, you know, there was a lot of people engaged in Racquet Sports.
Len Simard:And this is a great time then to say, hey, you know, can we increase our budget? Can we hire more new staff? Can we have more amenities? Can we expand with more pickle or paddle courts? It gives you all the justification in the world to proceed with, as you just said, Simon, raising the bar in in rackets.
Len Simard:This is the time to do it. And sometimes you have to get that granular to explain that to your general manager.
Kim Bastable:But but I heard a stat lately, and I don't know if this is a good stat or not. Is it true that, about 20 to 30% of most country clubs are engaged in the Racquets. And at this club, I kind of heard that through. It was about 24% tennis and about 32% pickleball. And, of course, there's some crossover there between them.
Kim Bastable:But how is that about the nationwide? Because that doesn't count for a lack of, you know, power to make change in the Racquet's facilities if golf is is theoretically, I think, you know, maybe a 100% of the people don't play golf at a club that maybe 90 do. What's the stat?
Len Simard:I don't I I would say 90% would be a little high for for for golf too. But let me say, I I don't have the the statistics for that club benchmarking. Our partner partners will probably have that, but off the top of my head, I don't wanna miscalculate that that data. But I will say that if it's 25 or, you know, between 2030% that are that are playing racket sports, I can assure you that's up considerably from ten years ago.
Kim Bastable:And that's the key. Yeah. That's the important note.
Len Simard:Right. Right. So, you know, again, it's I always would try and, present my case to to my superior, my general manager at any club that I've been at, that we take care of a lot of people, whether it's 20 or 30% or 35%. When you when you actually if you have a thousand members, that's a lot of people. So I go, we take care of so many people and they're so satisfied and they're so happy.
Len Simard:Do you do you do you not feel that this three and a half or 4% that we're being allocated is is is fair. Again, that's that's without any dues allocation. So that's just, you know, a three and a half to 4% so called loss without dues allocation. I keep putting that in there. You know, is that not a pretty good thing?
Len Simard:You know, especially when, you know, that includes maintenance too where golf and and and golf course maintenance are are are almost always subdivided out, right? So a very different budgeting process there.
Simon Gale:So Lynn, just shifting topics a little bit and focusing in a little more on one of what we would probably call an industry issue, definitely a future issue, is that we stand to lose potentially 30 to 40% of our industry's teaching pros which will include an extensive number of leaders, which is good for your business I would think. We stand to lose a lot of our veteran teaching pros as they age out over the next ten years or so. So the concern is going forward and you've heard me speak about it, Kim and I have spoken about it at conferences and on this podcast as well. Are we attractive to the next generation of tennis professionals? And there's a lot of talk about what this generation needs moving forward for any business or any job to be attractive.
Simon Gale:But in relation to the tennis industry, we hear about work weeks, development pathways, compensation. What are your thoughts on how we move forward and evolve to be more appealing and continue to be a healthy industry?
Len Simard:Well, Simon, the first thing I'd like to say is I have a 100% confidence that the next generation of leaders will will follow through and they will fill in and we will be successful in Racquet's. That's that should be firstly stated. I think that there's so many ways of presenting our profession and sport better than than how we're doing it. And and every leader talks about that in in our world, but we really haven't come up with a bonafide way of of doing it. Listen, I I've got a son who who's who's in the business myself.
Len Simard:He's he's getting the experience that he needs in Texas. He's teaching. He's learning the industry. And he he knows, you know, what is what his dedication is going to need to be to become a director of Racquet's, which ultimately I think is where his ambitions lay. But there are so many ways of of getting it across.
Len Simard:I alluded a little bit earlier that I think that directors of Racquet's are doing a better job than they used to ten years ago or more about developing their staff. And I think that that should be everybody's role as a director of Racquet's to to take a chart and start knocking off how many directors of Racquet's have you created in your lifetime, or how are you helping them become directors, assuming they want to be, and aiding that. That's that's one way. You know, education through all associations on why this is such a phenomenal career. There's a lot of people who have come out and said, you know, very controversial to what I just said.
Len Simard:They said, I would never tell anybody to get involved in in the rackets industry. It's crazy. They there's so much work they get yelled at. There's there's hours are long. They're working holidays, weekends, and evenings.
Len Simard:There's very little job security. I And I typically disagree with almost all of those things. We get into a pretty heated debate. And some of those people that I'm referring to are very high profile in our world, but they just say they haven't seen it. But first of all, I think it's a very lucrative way.
Len Simard:It's not such a bad living. Quite frankly, it can be a great living. You do your due diligence with savings, you can do very well in your career monetarily. Number two, I think it's a very rewarding way of of earning a living. Dealing with people and making them feel great and helping people and helping your your club and and your and your the success of the club and doing your part and getting to work with other great people and department heads and progressing through a career, I think is phenomenal.
Len Simard:I would never tell anybody not to get into this business. I think that we are making strides now to to a little bit of a more reasonable work life balance. I think that that today's world has changed our industry a little bit. And although I think the first year is is something that you might have to prove yourself a little bit, you know, but I have always been able to talk to my club and say, hey, I'd love more time off. I'd I'd love to have instead of three weeks off, I I would like five weeks off in lieu of pay in some cases.
Len Simard:And they have always said fine to that. If you have a great staff, in which we we we talked about a little bit earlier, that one of the key ways of being successful in this industry is hiring a very reputable staff and decision makers as number twos and threes in in your organization. No member, no club manager, no board is going to say no. You have to work here morning, noon, and night. They're not going to do that.
Len Simard:So so I think that, you know, with the correct hiring, with a good outlook on what this profession is, I think that your boards, your your Racquet's committees, and your managers will support a good work life balance.
Kim Bastable:That's great insight, Lynn. I would love for you to share with us the story you told about your son and how he decided that he wanted to get in the Racquet's industry. And it was growing up with a dad in the industry. He was not inspired, but it wasn't until he saw you be recognized, if I recall, that he realized the impact you had had. Can you tell about that?
Len Simard:Well, now now I'm gonna get emotional. I mean, I can't believe you remembered that because I must have told you that story years and years and years ago.
Kim Bastable:Well, I think it's impactful because it speaks to the point that tennis pros maybe don't they look like ball feeders. Yeah. But they're quite more than that. And I think your story tells it well. I'd love for you to share it.
Len Simard:Well, I I was very fortunate as as as I mentioned to spend twenty two summers, mind you, at the New Canaan Field Club. And when I tenured my resignation, you know, it was very emotional for me for the club. I loved it there. You know? And again, not to cut through it, but I had many opportunities to to to go on to another club, but I chose not to because they treated me so well.
Len Simard:And that's by the way, that's that's a great lesson to all search committees and and Racquet's committees. If you treat your staff well, and this is more than just what you're mentioning with ours, Simon, but if you treat them well, they will stay. It's that simple. When I talk with with search committees all the time, they're like, well, how do we know they're gonna stay? I said, well, that's up to you.
Len Simard:That's your job. So going back to it, it was emotional when I resigned. But what they did, they were at a time when they didn't have a ton of money in the bank, so it's not like I got a big twenty two year severance package. They decided to throw me a party. And during that party, they they decided to to name the actual tennis complex after me.
Len Simard:And they had a picture of me done on on on bronze and they had a great quote about excellence in in the programming underneath it. They invited my whole family to the party. My son who who had been in the army for five years in the US army wasn't sure what he really wanted to do. And he was doing it, floundering around in a few different things. So he came as well as my my two daughters and obviously my wife was there.
Len Simard:So we we had this party and one after another came up and started to to give a little story about how I had affected their life or or their or their child's life. And one in particular came and talked. It was it was a doctor, and and both he and his wife were doctors. And they had a very high performing junior member who who who was starting in tournaments and doing very well in tournaments, but but had quite frankly a lot of trouble dealing with it. And I was able to to work with her and and spend a lot of time on and off the court with her.
Len Simard:And he, in front of everybody says, you know, not only did you do a great job with programming, you know, making our program better and and teaching us and having a great pro shop and always making sure you met budget. He said, you saved our daughter's life. And he went into some more detail about it, which I probably couldn't talk about right now, but it was very impactful to me. And and my son was listening to all this, and he, of course, went to this doctor later and wanted more information about it. But it does play to the point that we have a profound effect on our members' lives.
Len Simard:And if we're doing our job correctly and getting to know who they are and what they like and and getting to know their family And I I I will say that that also translates very accurately to staff, and that's how you become a great leader in your industry too is doing the same kind of thing with your staff. Then I think this this is is impactful a a profession as anything out there. We have one on one time. We've got time with them in a social environment. We can talk to them in a professional managerial type way.
Len Simard:We can talk about their profession and how they're so successful and translate to us. There's a relationship that this profession allows us that almost very few others allow us. And if that's meaningful to you your life, then this is a phenomenal option for you to take.
Simon Gale:It's a great story, Lynn, because I'm not going to share similar stories, but I think if you make that commitment to a facility and you are treated well, that is the ultimate reward, isn't it? Because I think that's a story from years ago that still resonates with you and is so important to you and part of your reward for those twenty two years, that's what you will remember more than how much you got paid I would think. I agree 100% and I don't think we sell that enough in our industry. I think we talk about forehands, backhands and drills a lot that is we're in this people business and we do 10 a second. You hear that a lot.
Simon Gale:So great story and I appreciate you sharing that.
Len Simard:And by the way, again, to answer it, my son heard it went, wow. It is a little bit more to it as you just mentioned, Simon. So he decided to go into the profession at that point. He had been in and out, but mostly summers, and he decided to get into the profession. And by the way, every single day he's grateful for the opportunities he's had.
Len Simard:And every single day he says, I love going to work.
Simon Gale:That's great.
Kim Bastable:That's awesome. Well, I love that whole story just because I think there's a lot of young people out there who misunderstand the role that a a tennis pro can play, does play, even though before their very eyes, that person has probably impacted them greatly. I've been amazed at the number of young people I ask that are players and say, do you think about a career in racket sports? And their answer is no. And I don't really understand why that is.
Kim Bastable:But we need more stories like yours to be public. We need to spread the word of the impact that racket sports leaders can have, and any tennis pro can have. So I I think that's the greatest thing. And then if we have good leadership, we can keep them Yeah. As employees.
Len Simard:I agree.
Kim Bastable:So that is an excellent summary for today. I think, we've realized that there's just I would like to say that if every director of Racquet Sports would develop someone, we would not have a hiring shortage. We would have plenty of people, you know, one for one into this industry constantly, whether they're mentoring a 18 or 20 year old to get into the industry or mentoring a 30 year old to become a director of Racquet Sports, that that is something within our industry that we can sort of stop complaining that we have a shortage and we can do something about it. And I think that could be a a great takeaway from this episode. Would you have any other thoughts, Len?
Len Simard:No. I I think I think that, you know, so many people will try it whether you know, ultimately, what we all get into the business because we love the sport. And I think that's gonna start changing too to just loving the sport of say pickle or or something. And because I think pickle's gonna become a very prominent sport for for youth. And there's now various pathways to make a great profession in pickleball.
Len Simard:Or it's certainly coming. So again, if you try it and it's a summer job and you like it, talk to somebody about how this can be a career. It's not something that should be viewed as as non academia or or non business what like. The skill set that you will need to be successful matches up against anyone in in most professions. And and it is very rewarding because you do use your business acumen, you do use your skill sets with people, you do use your your diplomacy, you do use your your obviously, physical pieces that that go along with it.
Len Simard:It keeps you in great shape And and it it's a business. And if you like that whole idea, it it it can be very rewarding for anybody.
Kim Bastable:Well, we thank you for your time again. We really appreciate it. Your expertise is well known and it's great to have you be with our listeners today on Racquet Fuel. So we want to thank everyone for listening and we'll see you next time.
Len Simard:Thanks.
Episode Narration:That's all for today, but we're not out of fuel. You can find more information and resources in our show notes and by visiting racketfuelpodcast.com. If you liked what you just heard, please subscribe. And also leave a review, which helps other people join the mission to become stronger Racquet's leaders.
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