In the world today, the changes experienced in all aspects of life from social to economic and environmental spheres are in one way or another influencing the future of athletics. The changes in the environment for instance have had a direct impact on athletic event schedules. It is evident that today the world is moving from abundant to limited resources (Narayanan and Fahey, 2001). This trend of environmental depreciation has significant impact on the lives of young people who are the future athletes.
Human survival faces a threat from the environmental imbalances. In an athlete’s day-to-day life, a number of external factors affect their performance and hence the department needs to address this area adequately. In the initial states of an upcoming athlete, the frequent and tiring trips are a bit stressing.
The training schedules also can be quite strenuous before the athlete gets used to the programs set forth. With such understanding, it is paramount to compose reasonable schedules that focus not only on performance but also on maintaining their health as well.
Athletics as a sport has three major external environmental conditions that it has to submit (Narayanan and Fahey, 2001). These are the altitude, temperature, and time change. All athletic champions begin their careers at home. This means that they are used to a particular altitude while training that enables them achieve the results that put them at the top.
Attitude determines breathing rate and consequently work capacity. Exposure to high altitudes favors air resistance, which is vital and advantageous to for activities that involve speed (Kim and Mauborgne, 2005).
This is a good practicing environment for athletes but not all places have the advantage of such landscapes. This gives some athletes some advantages while others lack the same. Exposure to low altitude on the other hand increases the breathing rate as well as the heart rate.
This affects the athletes as it causes headache, nausea among other distresses (Porter, 1985). The altitude of the city or town where the game takes place is very crucial for the performance of the athletes. In order to improve the performance of athletes, diet is of great importance (Narayanan and Fahey, 2001).
The one meal per-day threshold set by N.C.A.A must allow unlimited feeding intervals. This is with the understanding that food consumption among athletes is very low and this is a major problem for the athletes. Temperature changes from one region to the other and this can affect athletes who adapt to home temperatures (Kim and Mauborgne, 2005).
Changing and adapting to new temperatures is not easy and can easily affect the performance. Time change influences the daily climatic conditions, which have the same impact on performance as temperature.
Nonetheless, other environments also have direct impacts on athletics. Political and regulatory environments have an unlimited influence on the sporting industry just as they have direct impact on all other industries (Kim and Mauborgne, 2005). Regulatory systems can influence the sporting industry positively or even negatively depending on the rules formulated in a particular state concerning athletics. For instance, a marathon event depends heavily on governments’ cooperation for it to take place in a country (Kim and Mauborgne, 2005).
The government is there to provide security and clear major roads used by the athletes. Regulatory bodies are there to formulate laws that govern the activities that take place in a country and their main aim is to protect the locals. However, these restrictions may be unfavorable to some events and can hamper the smooth running of an athletic event (Narayanan and Fahey, 2001).
For instance, considering immigration restrictions, participants of an athletic game from other countries may lack permission to enter the host country if they do not meet the set criteria by the immigration department.
The economic environment is also a factor to consider while looking at factors that affect the sports industry (Porter, 1985). Economic challenges especially in the recent past have had a negative impact on the sport. Lack of finances to support the athletes and to organize these events is a major challenge for organizers. With decreased economic activities and declining financial power for collages and countries to host athletic events has seen the game decline in its famous publicity (Kim and Mauborgne, 2005).
Gaming events require a great deal of finances to organize. These include paying for training facilities, allowances for the athletes, money to finance the unavoidable gaming trips, reward packages and much other expenditure. For all this to happen, the athletic department needs to have substantial funds to enable it to finance its events successfully. While in training camps, athletes depend on the athletic department for sustenance in terms of food clothing and other personal support (Porter, 1985).
Without finances, the athletic department may not be in a position to provide the basics required and hence the athletes become demoralized by lack of the essential allowances they get from the department. Other than just offering practice sessions for athletes, the athletic department is responsible for keeping the athletes properly motivated for them to perform better in the game.
It is the department’s responsibility to help the athletes focus on the game, motivate them, and help them to achieve the intrinsic motivation. Clearly, there are issues of finances that surround the athletic department and that they need to address to ensure a strong and successful team. It is easy to notice that financial strength is crucial for a successful athletic department since they also need to hire good coaches to train the athletes (Porter, 1985).
Other environments include the competitive environment, which consists of the competing teams. It is important to know what the competing team is doing in order for a team to remain relevant and competitive to match the opposition (Yow, 2000).
The gaming industry like any other industry in the world is facing some developmental transformation with regard to the rising developments in technology. Increased technological advancement is directly influencing the daily handling of the athletic departments.
For instance, the sale of tickets to gain access to the stadium to watch a game is done online in nowadays. To harness the technological infras2tructure will help keep up with the growing technology. Social and cultural environments also are factors to consider while thinking about the sport industry. This may include things like gender issues and cultural discipline that are paramount for the society to accept to get involved in the events.
All of the above factors directly or indirectly influence the athletic industry and are responsible for the increase or decline in athletic activities in the department. Dealing with these issues on a daily basis helps to mitigate the challenges in the athletics department.
References
Kim, W., C. & Mauborgne, R. (2005). Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant. Boston, Mass: Harvard Business School Press.
Narayanan, V., K. & Fahey, L. (2001). Macro environmental Analysis: Understanding the Environment outside the Industry, the Portable MBA in Strategy, 2nd edition. New York, NY: Wiley.
Porter, M. E. (1985). Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York, NY: Free Press.
Yow, D., A. (2000). Strategic Planning for Collegiate Athletics. Binghamton, NY: Haworth.