PEOPLE
B
usiness is often told to consider what it can learn from sport. But what about the other way around? What
could sport learn from business? Sport
focuses on winning, the team spirit and match analysis, but could it also learn how to focus on customers, empower teams and better use technology? Could technology disrupt sport and the talent-scouting process? I think it could definitely benefit from technologies that could decentralise decision-making. 56
I had an experience in Africa that convinced me to try and develop a solution. In Abidjan, a city on the southern Atlantic coast of Côte d’Ivoire, I came across a group of young footballers. Boys, with sandals on their feet, were playing on a field that looked more like scrub than a Premiership stadium. They let me join in for a little game. And we lost 10-0! Despite having never set foot in a training centre and playing in sandals, one young player scored 8 goals! It disappoints me that this boy’s raw talent could go unspotted due to a lack of resources and visibility. The sports world wouldn’t be the first entertainment industry to be challenged by technology. The music industry has had to reinvent itself by harnessing, rather than AUGUST 2019