Carolina Sport Business Club

November 3: Athletic Director Dick Baddour

• Past 6 months
  • Describes it as “dramatic”
    • ACC expansion
      • Wants UNC to hold onto the concept of a broad-based program of 28 sports
      • Will bring in additional resources to help improve our sports
    • NCAA investigation
      • Feels that we’ll be better as a result
      • 4 principles
        • UNC takes priority
        • Fair as possible to the people involved
        • Thorough investigation
        • Be better
    • 5 year financial plan
      • Student fee was important in maintenance of our programs
      • Blue Zone
        • Enables an atmosphere where our student athletes can have the best experience
          • Income for scholarship program
          • Student athlete services in one place
      • New AD
        • Athletic Directors
          • Bob Fetzer
          • Chuck Arrison
          • Homer Rice
          • Bill Colby
          • John Swafford
          • Dick Baddour
          • Bubba Cunningham
• Why did he feel they choose Bubba Cunnigham?
  • Baddour helped with a timetable for the new athletic director
  • Focused on having someone with some experience
• Is there any one year or event that stands out to you?
  • Toughest year was when football and basketball weren’t doing well
  • His most exciting year was when he came up with the Carolina Leadership Academy
    • Thought about the way the military looked at leadership
      • Leaders are made not born
    • His background was student affairs so this was great for him in that aspect
• Do you think they’ll hire a larger scale coach or scale it back because of the NCAA investigation?
• What kind of advisory role will you play in the next few months?
  • Wants to physically separate himself from the program
    • His office will be at Finley Golf Course
  • Wants to get heavily involved in the Leadership Academy
  • He feels he’ll be more helpful working with assistant coaches
    • Getting ready for higher positions beyond actual coaching
• How does turning an assistant coach into an interim head coach happen?
  • Most of the relationships formed are between assistant coaches and players
  • When you have a big group like football, continuity matters
    • To bring in somebody new with a different philosophy [in such a short amount of time] wouldn’t work
• Importance of work experience and internships
  • Most people don’t have a lot of time to develop a person
    • Who has the initiative
      • If they have experience, it’s better
  • Hiring is a lot about what that organization’s direct experience is with you
  • Have to get your Master’s degree
• What does the Carolina way mean to you?
  • One word answer: How
    • How you do things
    • The process by which you get to the end result and how you treat people
      • Ex: Winning a championship, changing the culture
• What do you think is the greatest challenge to the 28 sports?
  • Financial
    • What do we not have that UF, Texas, Alabama have that we don’t?
      • 100,000 seat football stadium
      • Instead, we add a Blue Zone to counter the lack of seats
  • Would paying the football and basketball player, who seem to be exploited, change the 28 sport system?
    • Yes.
    • Atlantic Monthly article
  • When you lose continuity in a program, you have problems

  November 16: Eric Douglass of AES Consultant, LLC

  • How did he get into the business
    • Find what you love
    • Moved to LA after trying to play tennis in Europe
    • Began teaching tennis
      • Taught the president of the Recording Academy
    • Was asked to monetize the seats in the balcony at the Grammy’s
      • Thought about creating contests to allow radio stations that would pay for the seats
    • Opportunities will present themselves, but it’s what you do with it
      • Find an existing relationship
    • He formed a small agency and began gaining money from sponsorships
      • Began to form relationships with NFL, etc.
    • Put a time limit/restraint on what you do
      • (you need to pay the bills)
    • Get an advanced degree
      • It will make you stand out
      • You can learn through the process
  • The business is about leveraging relationships
  • Most of his work is done behind the scenes dealing with agents, etc.
  • At a point, it becomes about giving back