Date: 25 November 2025 Author: Energise Me
Our Sport Welfare Officers joined over 60 representatives from clubs and physical activity providers at the Hampshire Sports Club Conference in November. They spoke about their role and gave examples of their work with local clubs.
Sessions during the event were designed to empower local clubs and set the foundations for work that will support their future growth and development.
Our Sports Welfare Officers spoke about their CORE offer (to Connect, Offer support, Raise Awareness and Enable). Also highlighting our ‘Safeguarding in Your Pocket’ resource, our work with a local running club surrounding social media use and explored how to amplify youth voice.
Safeguarding, wellbeing and welfare in sport is everybody’s business and needs to be embedded throughout all aspects of a club; membership, competitions, marketing and communications, and at all levels, from recreational through to high performance. It can’t be left to be the sole responsibility of a club welfare or safeguarding officer.
The Sport Welfare Officers also took part in discussions highlighting opportunities and impacts for clubs across the county. Including the implications of local government re-organisation and devolution and how to influence the future of community sport.
Collaboration was a key theme, with the changing political and economic landscape, club representatives agreed strategic collaboration between clubs and sports and other local stakeholders becomes ever more important to benefit from investment opportunities.
As well as the support from Energise Me, other training and learning opportunities were spotlighted. Such as support resources available to clubs through UK Coaching and Buddle. These can make a real difference to clubs seeking to develop inclusion, grow memberships, and ensure sustainability.
Our Sport Welfare Officer’s table display
Making club welfare work for a club will mean having a long-term sustainable vision in place. Leadership, volunteers, governance and training all play their part, and were all topics of conversation on the day.
Helping newer and younger members build their confidence to step into leadership roles can really help with club sustainability. By offering simple, supportive pathways for people to get involved and making sure everyone feels welcome and included, clubs can build a stronger, more sustainable future with shared leadership.
The topic of attracting and retaining volunteers was also discussed. Clubs were encouraged to reach out to local voluntary and community agencies (like Southampton Voluntary Services or Community First) for support. As well as appeal to individual motivations for volunteering like socialising or gaining new skills, even giving people the opportunity to develop knowledge in specific areas like Treasury, and matching people’s skills to specific projects and responsibilities.
National governing bodies are asking clubs to meet more compliance and minimum operating standards which are important for things like safeguarding and good governance. To help clubs who may have limited digital access, less availability or generally fewer resources, it helps to offer flexible support, easy-to-use tools, and clear, practical guidance.
Discussion also turned to how the industry could keep coaching attractive to younger members and new entrants. Ideas centred around how qualifications need to evolve beyond technical skills and also include communication, inclusion and wellbeing to help reduce barriers while developing the next generation of coaches to inspire and lead.
“For us, the best part of the event was the opportunity to have face-to-face, informal conversations with people from clubs during the networking break. We were able to answer specific questions on subjects such as DBS checks, use of social media, and safe participation in sport of adults with learning disabilities. We had several sign-ups to our Sport Welfare mailing list, and we made offers to visits a couple of clubs requesting our support.
“The event also gave us the chance to put some of our sport welfare resources directly into people’s hands. Our ‘Safeguarding in Your Pocket for Clubs’ and ‘Safeguarding in Your Pocket for Parents’ leaflets were popular, and some club representatives went home with multiple copies for their committee members, coaches and welfare officers. This was a really positive indication that many of the conference delegates had taken on board our ‘Safeguarding is Everybody’s Business’ message.”
If you’d like to join our Sport Welfare mailing list and benefit from our SWOs support, please get in touch.
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