Keynote Speakers - Kirstie Simpson

Kirstie started her career in local government sport development with her work focussed on excluded communities and their access to becoming and staying active. She has kept up to date with the industry both national and internationally through extensive external contact with a wide variety of organisations. She is currently the President of the European Observatoire for Sport and Employment. In terms of notable practitioner experience, Kirstie led the Volunteer Management Team for the World Swimming Championships held in Manchester in 2008 and has subsequently led numerous European Commission-funded projects on learning mobility. For example, working with European colleagues, Kirstie has designed and delivered a European Commission-funded Level 5 sports administration training programme for the Maltese Government sport agency, Kunsill Malti Ghall-Isport (Sport Malta). Kirstie has also led the development and delivery of a sport management and leadership programme for middle managers from 25 European countries at the Institute of Sport, at Viermaki in Finland. In 2019, Kirstie moderated the Inaugural European Sports Skills Summit at the Finnish Ministry of Education in Helsinki and is currently the Programme Director in a European Commission-funded learning mobility project with four National Olympic Committees in the Western Balkans; Kosovo, Albania, Montenegro and North Macedonia.

Lecture Title: Inclusive Employment and Workforce Development

About her lecture: Kirstie will outline the work of the European Observatoire for Sport and Employment and the challenges of creating an inclusive and diverse workforce in sport. An inclusive workplace can be defined as a work environment that makes every employee feel valued while also celebrating difference. Ideally, the workforce of any organisation would reflect the variety of people within the communities they serve and despite some progress, studies suggest that there is still a way to go to achieve equality in sport organisations.