Testimonial

Quotes

Our School Sport Partnership has been employing staff through Spire Recruitment Solutions for several years. Their expertise has not only saved us valuable time and effort but also a substantial amount of money. We find their charges more than competitive for recruiting and employing our staff.

— Partnership Development Manager
Sheffield

Why We Do It

Research commissioned by sports coach UK in the south East of England suggests that 20% of coaching vacancies are deemed to be "hard to fill" positions. These tend to be part-time positions and particular difficulties are faced when recruiting for after school positions. 

The survey also showed that during the previous 12 months 66% of the jobs advertised were for part-time positions and only 4% for full-time positions, the remainder was for voluntary positions. Further research by sports coach UK has found that the most common reason for coaches giving up coaching is due to a lack of available paid opportunities, particularly full time positions.

One of the main reasons for such a high percentage of part-time positions is the way in which sport is funded in the UK. The funding streams which organisations can access are constantly changing and many have restrictions around how the funds can be spent. This can often limit the scope for a coaching role and may mean that a part-time position is the only option available, often for only a couple of hours per week. The outcome of this is that many coaches have a fragmented working week which can lead to disillusionment with a career in coaching and in turn weakens the drive towards professionalising coaching in the UK.

In addition to this, there is also a lack of understanding into the legal implications associated with employing people and in some cases no infrastructure to support the employment of coaches. The result of this is that many coaches are paid “cash in hand” often under the assumption that they are self-employed. This can have serious implications for the “employing” organisation if the coach is not actually registered as being self-employed.

Spire Recruitment Solutions recognise that organisations throughout the UK face the same problems and have been working with a number of clients to address this and other issues that can arise when employing staff.