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Sport for Business
Sport for Business
Championing Women in Sport: Michelle Tanner in Conversation
Let us know what’s on your mind
The sporting landscape for women and girls in Ireland has transformed dramatically, but maintaining this momentum requires continued investment, strategic vision, and cultural change. In this illuminating conversation, Michelle Tanner – Chair of Sport Ireland's Women in Sport Committee and Head of Sport at Trinity College Dublin – takes us through the journey that's reshaping Irish sport from grassroots to governance.
Michelle shares her formative experiences growing up in north Dublin, where community-based sporting activities shaped her understanding of leadership and teamwork. From teaching herself camogie alongside her daughter to coaching volleyball teams, her personal journey mirrors the evolving relationship between women and sport in Ireland. As she puts it: "I just always knew that I wanted to work in sport, at a time when it wasn't recognised as a profession."
The recent announcement of an additional €4 million in government funding marks twenty years of dedicated investment in women's sport initiatives. While celebrating this milestone, Michelle highlights how the focus has matured from simply encouraging participation to building sustainable pathways for women's involvement as coaches, officials, and leaders. "We need to be looking at how we can sustain those programs," she emphasizes, "because we can't take a foot off the pedal when it comes to funding for women and girls."
At Trinity College, Michelle oversees a thriving sports program engaging 60% of the university's 22,000 students. This environment serves as a proving ground for female leadership, with women increasingly taking key roles within clubs – not just in traditional administrative positions but as performance directors and coaches. These experiences cultivate the confidence and skills needed to challenge persistent barriers in the broader sporting sector.
Despite significant progress in both grassroots participation and board-level representation, Michelle acknowledges that challenges remain, particularly in coaching and middle management. She advocates for "male allyship" and systemic changes to create truly inclusive sporting cultures where gender diversity becomes the norm rather than the exception.
Join us for this thought-provoking discussion on how strategic investment, cultural shifts, and dedicated leadership are transforming women's sport in Ireland – and what's needed to ensure this progress continues for generations to come.
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Subscribe to the podcast wherever you get your podcasts from and look forward to upcoming chats with those on the front lines of Pride in Irish Sport and the GAA All-Ireland Championships. We also have a chat with Enda Lynch, CEO of the recently awarded National Governing Body of the Year, Badminton Ireland, and next week with Hugh McCaughey, CEO of Ulster Rugby.
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Hello and welcome to the Sport for Business podcast. I'm your host, rob Hartnett, and in today's episode we are focusing on women in sport. We are getting an awful lot right in this area in Ireland and much of that is down to the leadership that's being shown by Sport Ireland. The team of Nora Stapleton and Bethany Carson are guided and supported by the chair of the Women in Sport Committee, who is Michelle Tanner, also head of sport at Trinity College Dublin and our guest for today on the Sport for Business podcast, beep. Our sport for business coverage of women in sport and ladies football is brought to you in partnership with Lidl, who are the sponsors of the Lidl National League in ladies football, and also partners with TG Kata, as the official retail partner of the All-Ireland Championships in which we are currently engrossed. Now, whether it's to go along and buy your sporting equipment, your cribbit materials, from the middle aisle, or whether it's to get the goodies and the snacks which make every blitz a winner for young girls coming into sport, little is definitely the place that you want to go. We really appreciate the support. It's been there for a long time and hopefully will be for a long time to come in the future. They have made a material difference to the promotion and the engagement of ladies football in the now almost 10 years that they've been involved with the sport, and it's great to have them on board with Sport for Business as well. Government in ireland has been giving money specifically to support women in sport programs for the past 20 years and this week an additional 4 million was set aside for those very programs to continue the good work which has led to a material change in the way that women and girls are welcomed and encouraged to participate in sport.
Speaker 1:The chair of the Women in Sport Committee is Michelle Tanner. She's also the head of sport at Trinity College Dublin, so a key player in this whole area. We spoke at length out at the Sport Ireland Institute on the occasion of the announcement of that additional four million and we cover Michelle's own upbringing in Beaumont in North Dublin, where she learned life through the medium of sport, whether it was out on her bike, whether it was out kicking a ball or punching a ball, as she became a good volleyball player, participating in all sorts of different sports and learning early lessons of leadership as well. It's a great conversation which then goes on to talk about the importance of a number of different areas in relation to women in sport leadership and coaching where significant work is being done, but which needs to be done and needs to be funded as well. I think you're going to enjoy it.
Speaker 1:So we're sitting out here in the lovely surroundings of the Sport Ireland Institute. Out on the campus, we've been announcing the celebration of 20 years of funding for women in sport, and I'm delighted to be joined this week on the Sport for Business podcast by Michelle Tanner, who wears many hats. You are the head of sport in Trinity College Dublin. You are the chair of the Women in Sport Committee in Sport Ireland. We spent time together over at the Olympic Games trying to get across a road race cycling to get to the Team Ireland party. You're very welcome onto the podcast, michelle.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Rob. It's good to be here. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Tell me a little bit about yourself first of all, before we get into the reads and the rushes about the jobs. How is it that Michelle Tanner ended up in these two very prominent, very high profile positions within Irish sport?
Speaker 2:I'd like to say it was all planned but it really wasn't. I just always knew that I wanted to work in sport, at a time when, I guess, it wasn't recognised as a profession. I wanted to ensure that I followed my passion, which was sport, and I'd like to say I had a crystal ball that had become a big, massive sector. But I really didn't. I just knew I wanted to do something that I really enjoyed and felt passionate about. I grew up in a community where sport was really valued and really important and everybody got involved in playing sport, no matter what age you were. And I got involved in volleyball initially initially, but I did athletics and football and Gaelic and I played everything in the community games. Community games was quite lively in our area where I grew up and literally people were out on the street, in the parks and on the road. When Wimbledon was on, we were out with tennis rackets, on the road playing, where sport was pretty much part of my everyday life.
Speaker 1:Where was it? Where did you go?
Speaker 2:I grew up in Bowment and the community of Bowment and Artane became very much involved in volleyball. In those days Volleyball was introduced into the community through the army and my dad knew somebody and got involved in that and we had a summer project in the school called Elbow, which was a short name for the two estates that surrounded the school and the mams and dad this is in the 80s now, because I am a bit of a fossil the mams and dads used to volunteer on the, the summer camp. It was summer camp, effectively, for the kids in the area and you would go to Elbow, you'd get a badge for the age group you were in and the, the parents would take over the school and they would have arts and crafts classes, they would have sport outside for the month of July and you would also get to go on trips and as you got older you become a leader in the, in the camp, and you would take kids on the buses. I used to take them over to Dolphins Barn, to the ice rink and we'd go on different trips to different parks and that kind of bred that culture of activity and involvement and community involvement.
Speaker 2:So I really came from that background of get everybody involved. Everybody does something, whether you're participating or whether you're actually taking the lead with a group. I mean I was only 14 or 15 taking a group of 10 year olds across to Dolphins Barn, so you were just given responsibilities and you were, you were asked to take the lead and we did compete in in the community games, competitions at the time in various different sports, and that gave me an introduction to different activities in different sports and different people and I made so many friends who are still my lifelong friends, I'm proud to say. But it gave us that real sense of community.
Speaker 1:Everybody looked after each other it's great to be able to look back and to not rewrite, but just sort of to to fit your history into what it is that you've actually gone on to do. Yeah come, and like we never know it at the time when we're just doing this stuff because it's fun or because somebody asked us to do it, or. But when you look back in it and you think of all of the lessons that we learn outside of the classroom, how can? It's so important so then, where did the career go?
Speaker 1:you wanted to work in sport, but it wasn't really a sector yeah so how did it all come together?
Speaker 2:I. I remember thinking, well, p teaching is probably the only thing I could do. But then I noticed that there was a course in Watford at the time with the RTC Now it's SETU, part of SETU, but it was a program in business studies, recreation and leisure. I thought that's really interesting because I could see hotels were starting to open up leisure facilities, gyms and pools and they need people to work in those places. So I thought, well, and I loved business, I loved being know, had a bit of an entrepreneurial flair. I wanted to set things up and see them develop and grow and and start, you know, maybe nominal charges for things that we could cover equipment costs and things like that. So you'd start to think like a business. So that that course attracted me and I didn't get in the first year. I didn't get enough points.
Speaker 2:You had to do an interview at the time plus your leave insert points. I was talking to somebody earlier and I was saying well, you know, my leave insert was so not important, sport was important and I at the time you could go back and do your subject, some of your subjects, again and add the points to it. So I went back and did repeated some of my subjects. But I also at the time went to Intracore and did a PLC course in leisure and recreation for that year while I was repeating some of my Leaving Cert, and then went back and did the application again to Waterford, got an interview again and this interview this time around was with one of the lecturers who happened to be coaching the volleyball team at the time and he realized that I was a coach and I think I scored maximum points in the interview. But I didn't score maximum points in my leaving cert, but the combination of both got me into the course. So off I went to Waterford for three years and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was really really good lecturers.
Speaker 2:Jerry Fitzpatrick was involved in basketball Ireland. He was a high performance coach. He was always at me to play basketball. But he also then recognized my coaching ability and he sent me down to the local schools as part of our coaching studies to go and coach and I just learned. I just learned how to coach, I learned how to lead. I learned you know that this is something that can make a difference to people's lives and I just that.
Speaker 2:I guess that training I had in the community involvement really came into the college network then and I started to coach the volleyball teams and get involved in the university. Well, it was the college at the time, the college competitions, and we would travel to compete against other colleges and I just loved the college environment. It was really fabulous and just lucky then to compete against other colleges and I just loved the college environment. It was really fabulous and just lucky then to get work. Afterwards I did lots of, you know, very low paid jobs and worked in summer camps and got myself into some of the bigger leisure centres like ALSA at the airport, big, fabulous facilities at the time Still there, still going strong.
Speaker 1:My dad worked for Ellingus. Oh yeah, so ALSA was it was one of those acronyms that we kind of grew up with as well that it was just there, and at the time it was revolutionary because it was exactly what we want now multi-sport, everybody is welcome. You know great facilities and investments gone into it.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, it was my favorite part of flying into Dublin airport was seeing all the pitches coming in, and isn't this great that we can visibly see fabulous facilities. Yeah, and I and I wasn't too far from Morton Stadium as well, so I was always up there. My dad was into sport, and athletics in particular, and we were always up at the events up at Morton Stadium and I ran for the school, so I was always showed a bit of what would you say um talent for sport and you know the coaches were always trying the.
Speaker 2:The principal of our school was Jim Kilty, who was involved in athletics as well, and he was really keen for me to to stay in athletics, but I just gravitated towards the team sports. I think that was my. My real home was that. I guess the community sense that being a part of a team was really important to me. But now I know obviously athletics is is very much a team sport, but at the time it probably felt more individual.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the training of it. It's a different set up. You don't have quite that same dynamic as yeah it's great listening to you talking about the leaving, so it's like we're just coming off the back of. Yeah, you know plenty of the listeners will probably have had children doing the Leaving Circle, siblings and the fact that you know, from then to now there are still so many different opportunities to get it right that it doesn't need to be perfect the first time around, you know doing a PLC course you know, back then, you know, was a pathway that if you hadn't taken it or if the availability hadn't been there, that your life might have gone in a totally different direction it might have, and we were a bit younger during the leave and start then as well.
Speaker 2:So I think it did give you another opportunity to mature. There was no transition year then either, so that was kind of like a transition year give you an opportunity to mature before you go to college or go away from home.
Speaker 1:So I'm still maturing. I was in an August baby, so I was you went in too early. Yeah, I was 16 when I actually had my leaving cert results, so I'd done the leaving cert at 16. And then it was the day after my birthday was the day after when the results came out, so I had the leaving cert results at 16. They weren't great either ridiculous.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they weren't great either. Yeah, I hear your pain, but I think, know, my parents were always very encouraging of doing something that you liked, and I think that's something that I always say to my children and other kids now that I did enjoy the year in Inchicore and it gave me real hunger and appetite to go back and study it more. But like I've studied throughout my career working, you know, working at Trinity College, they're very supportive of your education and training, as you would hope.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I've done my MBA in sports management through Trinity with the support not well, with Gloucester University distance education, but with the support of of Trinity. So they're always, you know, having an employer like that is it's really helpful for for your development, that you can add to your qualifications. You can constantly I feel like I'm constantly learning anyway. I'm literally doing all sorts of coaching qualifications and coach developers and assessors and all those programs, so it's really good to see that there's. You know, opportunities are not. I joke about the story. When I was doing my leaving certs, myself and my friend were in our bedrooms and we looked out the window and we saw a girl down the road from us who would have been regarded as quite studious and very bright. She'd been in primary school with us and she went the night before the leaving cert started. She was out for a run, her family were quite into athletics and she went out for a run and me, myself and my friend went. She's gone for a run. It's the night before the Leaving Cert. We should be cramming.
Speaker 2:Here was the two of us doing study notes and we said we're going to take a leaf out of her book. Now let's go out on our bikes. We got our bikes, we went out for a cycle, totally chilled out, went into the exam the next day feeling confident. You know, it's okay, I didn't. I didn't study and cram everything in the last minute, but I feel relaxed and I did my leaving cert, which wasn't amazing.
Speaker 2:But I did my leaving cert and when we got the results the night we got the results and there was a few kids around that you know got the results they were out celebrating and we noticed she wasn't out and we're like why is she not out? And then we realized that she never did her leaving cert that year. She stayed back a year. So I took that as a sign. You know it was the right sign that we got that night to just go out chill and not take it too seriously.
Speaker 2:I know I work at the university and you know you see when it comes to exam time how much pressure is put on and also taken on by the students that it's sport and exercise is such a brilliant way to keep yourself in check and to make sure those stress levels are managed, particularly at exam time. So I always encourage our kids, my kids to and any any of the kids I coach, to keep training during their exams. You know it's only a couple of hours and you can plan your study around it, but it's really good to have an outlet to just relax and enjoy yourself.
Speaker 1:Just to get out of your head. All right. Trinity has got a pretty important role to play in the life of Dublin in many ways, but primarily from a sports perspective as well. So when people think of Trinity, they probably think of academia and the Book of Kells and so many other of those things, and maybe Trinity thinks of itself as being a very academic institution. But when you walk through it or around it the climbing wall, the gym facing out onto Pier Street and Westland Row, walking through with the rugby pitch, on your right-hand side, with the cricket pitch and the football pitch, the athletics track I've seen Quidditch played on the grass in Trinity College as well. So, like, sport is very central to the university's identity amongst those like myself who would be passing through or passing around it as well. So tell me a little bit about the job of head of sport in there. What's your responsibility and what's your motivation every morning to actually just make sure that you're doing it right for the college and the students?
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, it's a really good question actually. You know, I think Trinity because it's steeped in history and tradition. You know it almost has one foot in the past but also one foot into the future. So it's trying to nurture and manage that heritage piece, which is huge. So there's no other university in Ireland that has the sporting heritage that we have. And College Park is synonymous with some of the first ever athletic races in Ireland.
Speaker 2:Trinity is synonymous with some of those foundation meetings you know for the formation of the GAA which people don't think about Trinity as being part of that journey, but there's a huge history of sport over hundreds of years and I think one of the things that Trinity does really well is it acknowledges, you know, that history and that tradition, but also ensures and acknowledges the importance of sport and exercise in students lives, so the whole student experience.
Speaker 2:We have a really strong tradition of clubs and societies in trinity. The clubs, sports clubs, come under our umbrella, under the trinity sport umbrella, and we've approximately 50 sports clubs for all different types of sports and activities indoor, outdoor, adventure, field sports, et cetera. And you know you mentioned the climbing wall, you know those iconic looking facilities that we have so many people using that facility, from young children for birthday parties to our really active climbing clubs and our club, sorry. And we have so many different things going on. The the, the facilities and the activities that take place in our sports center, for example, are so far and wide it's it's hard to keep tabs on everything we we've.
Speaker 2:We've over half a million visitors each year into the sports center itself we have a population of 22 000 students and we know that at least 60% of them are active and have been involved in our programmes at some level 60%, that's great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really, really amazing. So we've got high levels of activity and the thing for me about Trinity Sport is that you can see that sport matters to a lot of people in the university. Our leadership, our current provost, is looking at ways to invest in sport. She recognises that it's honestly, it's been underfunded and needs attention. We purchased the Ivy Grounds in Crumlin 17-acre site fabulous site but we haven't had the money to develop it.
Speaker 2:We have grounds out in Sanctuary, 34-acre site. We've developed half of those facilities. We need to do it. We have grounds out in Sancho, a 34-acre site. We've developed half of those facilities. We need to do more. Our clubs and our students want to be able to have quality facilities, want to be able to compete in the competitions, many of them competing in the national leagues, many of them competing in the diversities or college university competitions, and it just is a brilliant way for our students to connect with each with each other. They create friendships, lifelong friendships, and they develop just not just the opportunity to play different sports and some of them take up sports for the first time, yeah and but they get the opportunity to become a part of the organization of their club or the organization of their activity. They become the captains or the secretaries and they get involved in running the sport. So we see it as an opportunity.
Speaker 2:My job is to see an opportunity to facilitate that journey to facilitate the students, whether they want to participate, whether they want to lead, whether they want to learn how to coach, whether they want to be involved in sport at whatever level.
Speaker 2:You know at a beginner level or at an advanced level that we create that opportunity through the provision of quality facilities, through the provision of support of our expert staff and managing that whole portfolio and balancing the needs of the university and making sure that you know our funding mechanisms, that we bring in income streams as well to encourage and support the subsidized activities for students. So it's it's quite a plethora of responsibilities that I would have, but I have to say, rob, as a team player, I don't do any of this on my own. I have an amazing team who who give me the opportunity to do this kind of representative work with Sport Ireland, whilst also managing the day-to-day operations of the sports facility. So I'm very blessed but and I also feel very privileged that I have a job that I love and that I have a team that are fantastic and we all have each other's backs and we work very hard together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, great team to deal with. And it was probably part of the reason why, when the opportunity to join the board of Sport Ireland as an independent director arose, you had the confidence and the comfort to know yeah, I can invest time in this, which will be good for me, it'll be good for Trinity, it will hopefully and has proven to be the case good for Sport Ireland as well. And then, when Lynne Cantwell stepped away from the position of chair of the Women in Sport Committee, she's got very small shoes, but they're very big shoes to fill. Small feet, big shoes to fill. Was there a moment's pause when you thought, oh, do I really want to take on this role which has got such a central and important part of what sport island is all about?
Speaker 2:oh my god, it's hugely daunted, not only by the fact that I had to follow in lynn's footsteps which, as you quite rightly point out, are huge she's. She's an incredible legend and somebody I've admired for many, many, many years so, and I got to know Lynn as a fellow board member when, when she was already on the board and when I joined she was, she was a real welcoming friend, you know, just helping me navigate the volume of stuff that you know, the papers and the, the, the, the, I guess, the way things happen, just the format of things, and she was really helpful in guiding me through that. So I felt Lynn has kind of she probably doesn't know this, but she's mentored me a little bit and I felt then, when I was asked to step into the role, that she could no longer continue with. I felt completely daunted by it and unbelievably, when you talk about confidence, yeah, I had no confidence. There was no way I could do Lynn's job, but so she was really instrumental, really helpful in explaining how it all works. And, to be fair, you know and Lynn is right, you know, and I absolutely 100% can see it the executive team of Nora and Bethany are amazing and you know their ability to, you know, manage that workload, which is enormous, is incredible and you know they don't really ask too much of me and it is an honor to be able to work with them. You know they're very talented individuals and I think you know having that support and knowing I guess I'm trying to support them rather than you know I'm not trying to lead them, I'm just trying to support them.
Speaker 2:And of course, we have the Women in Sports Strategy. That you know is our roadmap and is essentially and that was all done before I came into the role. So I love a good roadmap and I love a good strategy. So that gives me a real good focus. So once I get away from the oh my God, I can't do this I'm daunted by the work and I just go back to the each element of that strategy and look at which bit that can I help support with rather than try and lead. So if you look at yourself in a supporting role rather than a leading role, it's a little bit easier to manage.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think the team that we have, the women in sports group that we have, are incredible as well. We've two of our board members, deirdre and kevin, and a number of people with vast experience in this area and huge expertise. So I I feel like it's a bit of a dream team and and I've just I'm constantly looking up at this people. I know I'm a tall woman, but I'm constantly looking up at people and admiring them for what they've achieved and what they've overcome, because nobody gets to this point in their career without having overcome some obstacles, and we all have. We all have learnings, we all have experiences and things to learn from each other. So I I really love working with people and understanding how they got to a certain point or and just different perspectives. It's a really healthy environment to listen to other people and get their perspectives and, as I said, we have the roadmap there so we know what we're trying to achieve, and that makes life a bit easier, for sure okay, yeah, you are tall, but you're working with Deirdre Ryan, who is even taller a volleyball player and a high jumper together you kind of feel for Kevin Hoy a little bit in the middle of it, although he's a good
Speaker 1:street fighter right now from the days of Dublin ladies gaelic football as well. There's something in that. It's nice that you're surrounded in both of those key roles by good teams around you, and perhaps that's a reflection of your leadership style as well is that good teams don't just come together by accident, which is great to see. But you're right, Nora and Bethany, the volume of work that they get through across so many different sports is a pleasure to behold. Through across so many different sports is a pleasure to behold. Government plays its part. So the announcement this week of 4 million in funding, specific funding for women in sport initiatives and a program which is now going 20 years since it was first decided that we need to carve out specific funding to actually help to promote women in sport.
Speaker 2:It doesn't feel like 20 years and yet if we think back to what the landscape was like for women in sport 20 years ago and maybe 30 years ago it barely existed at all- yeah, and you know, when you say four million it sounds a lot, but actually when you look at the programs and grants that have been awarded this year, there's like we could do with another four million. We could do with 10 million because there's so much great work going on. But I think the difference from what I've seen is that it there's a shift away from not away from it, but you know that piece around. Let's get girls actively involved in sport and physical activity and that has always been the groundwork, thatwork that's been going on within the national governing bodies and I think maybe the early days people weren't sure how to do that and a lot of really great programs emerged. I was on one of them myself with my daughter. We did a camogie training. I forget what it was called, god, anyway, it was for mums and daughters, come on and try, try.
Speaker 1:was it something like that?
Speaker 2:and there was 24 clubs selected and we went to our local club, which was whitehall colin kills. My daughter was in primary school and I know the ga network is much more established than a lot of the other ngbs and they have a ga development officer in the area and the word gets into the. You know the leaf comes home in the school bag.
Speaker 2:Yeah and I said let's have a go with this. And we went along to it and they took the mums and there were some dads, in fairness, but mostly mums for half an hour. The tutor, the natural tutor, took us and taught us the skills of camogie and how to teach it okay and they took the kids for the other half hour.
Speaker 2:So we were on the other side of the pitch and they just played camogie with kids that never played before girls and obviously and they brought you back together for the last half hour. So then I had to teach my daughter what I'd learned. So it's like being a coach. You know I was going well, this is what you do, and this is what you do it was brilliant and that connection with my daughter was really super special.
Speaker 2:But that program finished after six weeks with a tournament and the tournament was a great crack. We went to a club and we played in a tournament against clubs around the country and the mams and mostly mams and dads played the first half of the match and then the girls came on and played the second half of the race and, jesus, I was deadly, like I hadn't played camogie since school and I thought, god, you know, we're so competitive, aren't we?
Speaker 2:we're playing we're having great time and my daughter really enjoyed it and I really enjoyed it and I thought, at the end of the program we walked out of the club facility and nobody contacted us to get us to stay and I thought, oh God, that's not good. You know, we need something to keep us involved. A brilliant initiative, yeah, keep us involved. As it happens, I did know one of the mams and I asked her. I said how do we get into the club, how do we stay? How do we? And you know I did and I got my daughter involved. Now she didn't stick at Camogie and Gaelic, for she stayed with it for a few years but took up volleyball as her sport now.
Speaker 1:But we played that there's always a way back.
Speaker 2:There's always a way back. Yeah, you think? Yeah, I really enjoyed it but.
Speaker 2:I just I thought you know for me then that kind of signaled to me that there's some really great programs out there and initiatives that we're giving, you know, women and girls an opportunity to try. But when I started working on the Board of Sport Ireland, my question was well, how do we keep them? You know they're brilliant initiatives and some really genius ideas to keep you engaged, but how do we get people to stay? You know, or even like it's fair enough, you won't keep them all. I understand that, but to get the kids that want enjoyed it to keep playing.
Speaker 2:So I think for women and sporting girls, the programs have moved on to that now that there is more longevity, there is more sustainability involved in, in getting them to stay in the sport and I think that's why the different strands of focus on leadership and governance, on visibility and on the officiating getting involved in coaching and officiating that the programs, the real mix, the grants are going to real mix of programs that have those initiatives or sorry, have those objectives involved. So I think if we can get girls and women involved in running their clubs, a bit like the universities, and taking on leadership responsibilities and giving them the confidence and the knowledge and the education to stay involved, is that's where the magic is happening and you can see from some of the funding that has been awarded.
Speaker 2:There's some collaborative projects where ngbs are working together and that really excites me because that's that gets back to my, my dna about community and people working together where they're trying to tackle the same obstacles of girls being staying or getting involved in sport, but yet they're coming together to do that and I think there's a bit of magic in that yeah and I think we need to be looking at how we can sustain those programs, how we can sustain funding for those programs so they're not coming back each year looking for additional funding, that it becomes part of what they do, because we can't take a foot off the pedal when it comes to funding for women and girls, because it will literally fall yeah, and those programs will fall and the resources behind them will fall.
Speaker 2:The ngbs and the lsps we have to find a way to embed some of that funding into their core activities somehow there's a double edge to it really isn't there.
Speaker 1:So there is the funding. That is imperative and it's so important, but there's also motivating the volunteers that are actually delivering it at club level, and that's across the GAA, across football, rugby every single sport is dependent almost entirely on volunteer enthusiasm and volunteer engagement. So that ability to actually excite volunteers not on the basis of a one and done that, you do a course for six weeks and then we might come back and we might do the same course next year, but it'll be a completely different group of people and we won't have held on to any of those. So that longevity is vital in order to do. Do you know of any of the programs that funding is going to provide for this year that are specifically looking at that?
Speaker 1:Because you know, sport was designed by men, for men back in the day, and I feel that, whilst we're doing great things in terms of participation and in terms of visibility, the coaching side of it is still. I I look around. You know a mentor's room of yeah, in my own club and I don't see enough. You know female coaches that are feel comfortable about stepping in? Yeah, I know that there is the talent there. I know there is the enthusiasm, but there's something of a block which says, and and maybe it's us, maybe it's the men that are there that we're not quick enough to actually give up a spot well, I can speak with lots of hats on there because I am a volunteer coach myself.
Speaker 2:It is harder for women, there's no doubt about it. It is harder for women and I sometimes and no disrespect to the guys I work with as coaches sometimes feel that they don't hold me in the same regard as maybe one of the other male coaches, and you know they're kind of unconscious bias. You know that we need to tackle. There's a big culture there that you know men have been running sport both as officials and as coaches. But I think there's, you can see now that some of the programs that apply for funding who are focused on coaching and officiating. We might not see the returns for that for another few years but, for example that's why I think you know the Her Moves initiative and campaign that some of the LSPs are linking in with makes a difference because we're really changing, trying to change the culture and the mindset of young girls that they can do this and that they can coach and they can have role models and we see so many female athletes now at the top of their game who are household names yeah we.
Speaker 2:We want to see the same for coaches and officials within sports. I know they're not going to have same role model status, but within a sport that you're involved in, you should be able to walk to a sporting event and know that there's female officials or coaches and that needs to become the norm. But we've a bit of a mountain to climb on that. But I think we've made a lot of progress and we're starting to sow those seeds with the horror moves, initiatives and things like that where we're targeting young girls for education programs yeah and I get a great opportunity in the university to see those young girls come through and as leaders in their clubs.
Speaker 2:So there's a lot of girls now, you know, not taking on the stereotypical roles of being the treasurer or the secretary of the clubs, but being the coach or being the front-facing person for EDI or for gender we have a women in sport campaign in Trinity and taking on the leadership roles for that and running the initiatives and organising the tournaments and being part of the leadership model of the clubs.
Speaker 2:So I think you can see it from some of the initiatives that have been funded this year that there is more of a focus on the leadership and governance and having women sit around the table at the committee decision level, at the boards, and a lot of our ngbs have done done an awful lot of work on that and making sure there's a gender balance around the table. But it is about having women in the room. It really is, and we have to have more women having those conversations with male coaches. Yeah and yes, there's obstacles. We know it's different for women to be involved in those volunteer roles and we have to address those obstacles. But I would always encourage women to to take on those roles because they're so fulfilling so rewarding being a coach.
Speaker 2:It's the most rewarding thing you can ever do in sport.
Speaker 2:I I think, and maybe I'm biased as a coach, but when you see young people develop a skill or just even have an outlet, I have kids coming into volleyball and they've loads of stuff going on at home and they walk into that hall and they're just themselves and they get to relax and they get to be who they want to be. Yeah, and they walk out the door and they might have loads of stresses and challenges school or life or whatever and they come in and they play their sport and they relax and they enjoy themselves. And I remember coaching a young lad and he was he was from the ukraine and he just wouldn't follow. He had two female coaches and he wouldn't follow our instruction. He wouldn't do a particular skill. And I went over to the coach and I said I was assisting her and I said he won't do this like what you want me to do with him. And she said he's here, isn't he? And he keeps coming every week, so let's not get too hung up yeah about.
Speaker 2:You know, maybe he didn't want to hear from us as females, I don't know. But let's not get too hung up with the kids about you have to do it this way, you have to do that way. They're there, he's coming back every week and he's playing the sport and maybe they still hear it.
Speaker 1:They just don't react.
Speaker 2:Yeah, immediately there's a bit of teenagerism going on, I'm sure. But you know, I think the important thing around encouraging girls to take on those roles is to give them the opportunities, to make sure that the opportunities are there so they can build their confidence and build the belief in themselves. And we, you know, I think you can see where it becomes normal then, where there might be a female coach and a male coach. Our male coaches might coach the girls and the female coaches might coach the boys, and we might flip over and do things like that. But I just think, yeah, we've a bit of a way to go. Now, rob, I'm not going to deny that. You know, we don't want to paint the picture that everything is sorted when it comes to women and girls in sport, where, you know, we definitely need more investment, we need more education programs, but we need them to become normal and we need to make sure the opportunities are there.
Speaker 1:That's right. Making it normal is something which is really important and which doesn't feel exciting or big enough, but is perhaps the most important thing. I remember Sarah Keane chatting to her a couple of years back and she said look, yes, we have made progress in this whole area. When you look back, you can see that. But as soon as we take our foot off the pedal, it will disappear very quickly. So we have to keep pressing, we have to keep pushing, so we have to keep pressing, we have to keep pushing and we also have to incorporate that idea of male allyship, because this is not just a women's issue. This is about men having the confidence and the comfort to say yeah, come on in. This doesn't need to be an old boys club. Maybe some sports will find that a little bit more challenging, but we're nailing the participation side of it.
Speaker 1:I know in Gaelic game circles now there are counties, some very big counties, where there are more young girls playing at minor level than there are young boys, and that would have been unheard of a decade ago, which is great.
Speaker 1:We're also nailing it at the kind of the top end of governance. So, to be fair, the government and respective ministers had the big stick and they said look, gender balance is really important, you have to have 40% and we'll give you a deadline. And some sports looked and they thought we'll never make that because of there's always a reason where it might be elections or it might be people coming up through the ranks. But we got there and pretty much every sport now has that. So we've got it in participation at the young level, we've got it at the leadership. The next stage now is to is to bridge that gap, is to fill the middle and to actually open up like men and women work well together. It is a much more fulfilling, much more satisfying, much more fun environment when the differences between us actually create something better between us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I 100% agree and I think, yeah, I see it at the international level as well. I have a role as vice chair of FISA, which is the World University body for, you know, student support, and you know you're trying to change cultural practices. But, yeah, if you have women at the table then it becomes easier, and I do. I'm a real believer in male allyship and champions like yourself, rob, in particular you.
Speaker 2:You were there from the get-go, involved in promoting and putting the spotlight on women's sport, and I want to thank you for that, because you did, you did bring it no seriously, like I talked to a lot of people in the sector and you were instrumental in putting the spotlight on women in sport. And I think that's you know, it's put it, it's put it up to some of your male colleagues to to also be the same and be supportive. And we do get a lot of that on boards. And I know it feels weird to change changes. Change always makes people feel a little bit uncomfortable. Yeah, you know they get a little bit uneasy, but you know the gender quota issue, which the government did really push on and a lot of people feel threatened by gender quotas. But gender quotas work. They work.
Speaker 1:If you're coming from a very low base, yeah.
Speaker 2:They do. No, they work. If you're coming from a very low base yeah they do know they work and you know it's. But and you often hear the argument against that is we want the right people around the table. Yeah, and I, I and I hear this a lot at the international level we want to make sure we've got the right women around the table, and we're well. Nobody ever says have we got the right men around the table?
Speaker 2:yeah, nobody ever asks that and nobody asks the right men around the table yeah, nobody ever asks that. Nobody asks what's your credentials as a male to come to that table. So I think you know it's one of those things that's really hard to deny. It's really hard to deny gender equality.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I think lots of the obstacles are kind of subtle and maybe not properly understood, but it's it. When you publicly announce a program for change or you bring in recommendations to to make things better from a governance perspective or leadership perspective, it's really hard to object against it yeah so I think we've made a lot of progress, because it's hard to deny, it's hard to say that's not a good idea.
Speaker 1:You know, I don't think I've ever met a self-identified misogynist, and yet misogynist behaviors exist everywhere, all around us, whether we recognize it or not. It's the way that society has kind of formed. It's funny. You mentioned about the international. I have great privilege to serve on the Gender Equality Commission of the OFI and we're split down the middle there's three boys and three girls and we were involved in an EU program which brought us together with a lot of different European colleagues and Ireland was really being held up and looked upon as being an absolute beacon in this world that there are parts of Europe never mind in Africa and Asia and where the cultural change might need to be greater. There are parts of Europe where that cultural change is nowhere near as advanced as it is here. So we do. We have to keep on pressing on and keep on trying to do the right things, looking forward to your work involved in that over the next couple of years as you run through the first term, shall we say, of your position as chair, and we'll come back to having this conversation and many different guises and forms again.
Speaker 1:I always like to finish off these interviews with a few quickfire personal questions. Try and get to know Michelle Tanner, the person as opposed to Michelle Tanner, the great leader of sport and education and in women in sport. So if you don't mind, I'll throw some of these at you now you can't see an eye roll on the audio, but thanks for bearing with me. You answered the question normally. My first one is your earliest childhood memory of sport. But you kind of answered that with being elbow and out on the greens and the streets. So I'll ask if I could give you a golden ticket to go to any sporting event around the world. What would that be?
Speaker 2:oh, my god, oh god, that's really hard. I love, I love track. So, although I don't compete anymore and I only did when I was young I love like the big showcase track events. Yeah, the Olympic finals or something like that would be amazing, okay. But then of course, my sport is volleyball, so it would be fantastic to be at the Olympic volleyball yeah finals that'd be amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, maybe one of the college finals in America that they play in the college football stadium. Yeah, nebraska. Volleyball is insane,000 fans oh Nebraska, yeah Nebraska.
Speaker 2:Volleyball is insane. The women's program is insane there. Yeah, so it's great. Yeah, something like that, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd be very excited, cool. We'll try and go backwards into a few little easier ones now Tea or coffee.
Speaker 2:Tea 100%, Never coffee.
Speaker 1:Okay, barry's or Lions, oh God, lions. Lines, gold blend please.
Speaker 2:netflix or night of the movies, netflix, okay, what have you watched recently that you enjoyed? Oh god, and I've just moved house so that's really hard and we've no internet. So I love, I love, like sports biographies and I really enjoyed. What's the one? Michael jordan oh, yeah, yeah that was cool, but I also have to say one of my favorites on Netflix, which I watched at the start of COVID, was Ted Lasso. Just absolutely loved that Pure cheesy, funny, hilarious, with a sporting context.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that and Afterlife are the two series that I just like to dip in and out of every now and again Brilliant. Just pick an episode at random and it'll always make you smile. Brilliant ted lasso the bitch when they played hey jude at the end of the song when he was over with his son.
Speaker 2:Hilarious and tears, of joy, tears of emotion, everything, yeah, floods of them, yeah great great show.
Speaker 1:Okay, what would be your favorite listen as you're driving down the country or you're heading off to another sporting event. You're in the car on your own. Is it music? Is it podcast? What would it be?
Speaker 2:I do some podcasts but I have to say I am a bit of a dance junkie so I love like Block Rock and Beats. Dec Pierce is my hero. Yeah, I love that up tempo. Give it to me loud, let me dance. I prefer not to be driving a car because I just want a bop cool. So if I'm at a party, a wedding or whatever, I'll be first on the dance floor and last off the dance floor okay, I love a bit of dance music, but I love all music, but I just love to have a bop.
Speaker 1:I did an ENAS conference in Belfast recently last year, the European academic sports directors. And yeah, I can vouch for the fact that you are a mean dancer. Okay, just a couple of other ones. Are you a reader, is there a book that you've got a well-thumbed copy of that you kind of think, oh yeah, that, just that set my fire.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm not a great reader. I'll be honest, because I'm so busy reading papers or reports or whatever, or coaching that by the time I and this is probably my parents because he used to read stories to his bedtime, so stories put me asleep so I would read a page and fall asleep. So I'm brutal at reading. But when it comes to holidays I will have a book for my holiday and I will read it. Maybe I might get through the full book in a whole week or two weeks, but I'm yeah.
Speaker 2:I have a favourite author who's a friend of mine. I'll give her a shout out. Keira Geraghty is best friends with one of my pals from school and she's from North Dublin and she writes kind of you know, that kind of light fiction literature and she's just really funny and she's got a bit of the Northside girl in her, which I'm a north side girl. So here's some of the places that you know she writes about and does and I just love that. But when it comes to real books that I can never put down, they're always sports biographies you know sonia and sylvan's books, read them all.
Speaker 2:I absolutely have to say andre agassi's book open was by far the best I've read of all the sports biographies and the first lines. I hate tennis. I mean I was like what, so that was amazing book, brilliant.
Speaker 1:I'll give you a recommendation yeah, for the holidays. Yeah, and it is pure fiction, but the north side or inside of you will love this. Fiona Scarlett, first time author from a couple of years back. She wrote a book called boys don't cry and it is my go-to recommendation to anybody that will listen. It will make you cry. I gotta be honest, okay, and even when I say that to people, they say yeah, right, okay, they all cry. Yeah, oh god, yeah, okay, so it's, but in a good way, yeah, then sometimes in a sad way. I like a good cry, it is. It is just absolutely brilliant. So, boys don't cry.
Speaker 1:Fiona scarlet, before I let you go to practice your dance moves or do whatever it is that we're moving on to next, I've got a table booked in a very fancy restaurant let's say Chapter One, stick on the north side theme and I've got four seats around the table. One of them is yours. Three people that you would love to break bread with and spend time in their company. They can be dead or alive. They can't be family. You can't bring your husband or your children, because that's a given. We accept the fact that they would be first on the list, but three other people from history or from the current day that you'd love to spend time with that you'd love to spend time with.
Speaker 2:Oh God, I have to say I've always admired Mary Robinson and she was the Chancellor of Trinity as well, but I just find her fascinating and her political experience and just her life experience, and I have a little bit of a fascination with Hillary Clinton as well. Okay, that's one of the other biographies I've read, not a sports one, but I just think she's incredible yeah, as well, I think what she achieved, yeah, that's, yeah, god, it's really hard.
Speaker 2:I have a lot of female figureheads here, but that's never a bad thing. Yeah, I think. I think I'd like to put darryl breen in there just for the crack, okay, yeah, yeah, because he's funny and that would make the conversation quite interesting.
Speaker 1:Brilliant Look. It is always a pleasure spending time in your company.
Speaker 1:It has been a pleasure recording it and putting it out there into the airwaves. Michelle Tanner, a woman of many parts, thank you very much for your time. Thank you, rob. The buzz out at sport island for the announcement, with so many of the different women in sport leads and athletes that will benefit from the funding, was a joy to behold and really appreciate michelle taking the time away to step back from that to uh to sit and record this interview. I hope you enjoyed it and the work that Sport Ireland are doing in this area, funded by the Government of Ireland, is really, really important.
Speaker 1:It's also in very good hands in those of Michelle Tanner's, so thanks to her, thanks to you for listening and thanks to Lidl, who are our sponsors of women in sports coverage, on Sport for Business, proud partners of the Ladies Gaelic Football Association, sponsors of the Lid, who might be in your charge. Then make you wait a little and support those who are supporting us. It will be very much appreciated. Thank you for taking the time to listen. Next up next week is going to be an interview with Hugh McCaughey, who is the CEO of Ulster Rugby, looking back on the course of the season and the importance of having a community focus on a professional rugby setup. Really looking forward to recording that up in Belfast and bringing it to you next week. So enjoy your weekend, have a great time doing whatever you do in sport and thank you for supporting sports for business.
