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Writer's pictureMarc Portus PhD EMBA

Bring your sport's strategic plans to life: the MAAD framework

Updated: 6 days ago

Marc Portus PhD EMBA | Managing Director & Strategy Lead | Praxis Performance Group


There’s nothing worse than having strategic plans that don’t deliver. Works of art sitting on the shelf that no-one knows or cares about, collecting dust. It happens all too often and has inspired the sentiment adapted from Robert Burns work - “the best laid plans often go awry”. Plans, good or bad, often work out as not intended.


Does that mean you should not strategise or plan? I’m biased, as assisting organisations with their strategic and operational planning is my occupation, so I’d suggest the success in the planning is somewhat determined by how you do it. Luck, timing, serendipity, adapting to the market, amongst other factors, all play a role too. But you can increase your chances of strategic success by laying solid foundations in the planning phase.


MAAD is an acronym for Mission, Ambition, Accountability and Deliverables. The MAAD framework can be used in a variety of contexts and environments, and it works well at an operational planning level for divisions and departments of sporting organisations, in support of a more global strategy (e.g. Australia’s favourite sport). The crucial part of the framework to bring your plans to life is the D for Deliverables, but more on that soon. Here’s an outline of how it works.

The MAAD planning framework
Figure 1: The MAAD framework, where the D for Deliverables is the nexus between the company’s external facing strategies and internal operating documents, enhancing chances of bringing strategic plans to life.

Mission

Historically, plans start with the Vision, but the MAAD framework starts with the Mission, which I have found useful to get folks thinking more easily about the big picture. If I can start them talking about their passions, obsessions and interests, it generally helps them articulate their Mission. It’s what gets you and your team out of bed in the morning. Your daily work that energises you.


It may be to introduce a new format of a sport, develop a new commercial revenue stream or build a pathway that better serves and develops female athletes. It’s a large part of what drives people in and around their career. There needs to be passion behind the Mission. If there’s not, you would have to look at why and whether the right people are in place.


Ambition

Think of this as what has traditionally been called the Vision. Once the Mission is bedded down, the question is then about the end game. After you’ve been doing all this passionate hard work for the next 2, 3 or 5 years, what is the milestone you’d like to achieve, what’s the Ambition, what does success look like?


The Ambition needs a timeline and it is like drawing a line in the sand. We want to have achieved this specific goal; it describes the state of the business area at a certain point in time. It can be things like a sustainable financial position, an accessible and supportive sports pathway in a new territory or girls participation in a schools sports program on par with the boys.


Accountability

This is straight forward. Who is responsible for making these initiatives happen. In this section indicate who’s the lead, who will provide support and the critical partners needed. If you’re introducing a new coaching accreditation in your sport, the Game Development Manager would likely be the lead. They will need support from some expert coaches in the area, and perhaps the digital experts in the company will support with an online platform and social media promotion. A key partner may be an academic in the area or an industry organisation, an external entity that’s partnering to deliver the knowledge and evidence behind the new coaching accreditation content and/or process.


Deliverables

This is the crucial part of the framework where all your strategies and operational plans should come to life. Across the life of the plan, say the next 3-5 years, these are the ‘tangible’ things you are saying to the world, your staff, your partners, your sponsors, investors and customers that your business will deliver. A basic rule of thumb is roughly 5 deliverables for each Mission - Ambition pillar of the plan. They could look something like this:


·       New format of your sport (e.g. Pickleball) introduced in a specific year

·       New commercial partner agreement in place for the next World Championships

·       Most productive high performance pathway across the country

·       Introduction of the new coaching accreditation process in a specific year.


What make the Deliverables the important part of the framework is that these are the tangible outcomes for all your stakeholders. But to bring them to life they need to drop into your organisations internal operating documents and processes. Staff job descriptions with a range of supporting key performance indicators, the company’s budgets and they should also inform the structure of the company’s organisation chart (see figure 1).


If you don't make the Deliverables the nexus, chances are internal resources won’t be aligned to your outward facing strategies, which brings inefficiencies, frustration, confusion and conflict, which lower the chances of delivering on the business's strategic imperatives. Not good.


The MAAD framework is an excellent way to help your vision and strategy come to life throughout your organisation. It is relatively simple, which is part of its appeal, and increases chances of delivering business outcomes. If you think the MAAD framework might help your business, drop us a line at info@praxis-performance.com.au, we would be happy to help.


Marc Portus is the founder and Managing Director of Praxis Performacne Group. He has over 25 years of sports industry experience, including roles with Cricket Australia, the Australian Insitute of Sport and the PNGRFL. He has a PhD in sport science from UWA and an Executive MBA from QUT.

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