It is with great pleasure that I can announce today a very specially agreed partnership with sportscotland in relation to the development of Scottish Volleyball’s high performance beach strategy over these next few months and in preparation for our beach athletes participation in the Commonwealth Games qualification process and our continued involvement within GB beach development pathways.
As part of the Scottish Government and sportscotland Scottish Volleyball’s investment principles Ben Pipes (formerly the Scottish Volleyball’s Club and Participation Officer) shall be returning on a one day a week basis to support and lead on the beach performance strategies. Ben has been offered (through his current employer sportscotland) a professional development opportunity to establish a link between us as a Governing Body to the High-Performance job remit, he is currently doing. Therefore, establishing a positive collaboration between our key partner sportscotland, performance beach volleyball and our members.
The below bulleted points are some of the work areas Ben will be developing over the next few months.
- Produce and implement a performance development plan which identifies the steps required to develop Scottish athlete potential and addresses existing gaps in the Scottish Beach Volleyball Performance Programme.
- Clearly identify the management structure, including roles and responsibilities, which will be required to implement the SVA’s beach performance development plan.
- Identify competition opportunities for our performance beach athletes and agree Key performance Indicator’s (KPI’s) with sportscotland and the SVA.
- Oversee the SVA Beach Performance Management Group. (PMG)
- Provide support for the delivery of the ‘new restrictions and athlete/programme guidance’ in relation to COVID-19 and the SVA beach performance.
- In collaboration with the SVA CEO support and deliver the agreed sportscotland development investment for all beach performance programmes.
On a very personal level it is great to have Ben back supporting Scottish Volleyball. Ben brings to us a huge level of understanding, skill, knowledge, both with athlete identification, recruitment, development and strategy and vision to our current project management of beach performance programmes.
Margaret Ann Fleming
CEO, Scottish Volleyball
