Griffith research calls ‘Game on for Women’ for local sport reforms
Research into women’s human and social capital is reforming sport organisations, boosting individual and organisation’s capacity to succeed.
Griffith University Associate Professor Popi Sotiriadou has collaborated with Logan City Council (LCC) since 2018 to investigate how to get more women to play more sport, more often, and create pathways for them to engage in leadership roles within the sport system.
Following concerns that women are underrepresented at Logan’s sporting activities and in leadership roles, Associate Professor Sotiriadou undertook a number of research projects in the community and implemented a women-in-sport strategy, ‘Game On for Women’ (GOFW) in 2019.
The initial research findings connected lower participation rates with facilities not catering to female needs—specifically, safety and accessibility. To address these issues, improvements were made to sport facility design principles such as providing changerooms and player amenities, as well as adequate lighting, and programs were designed to cater specifically for women.
These changes improved women’s access to sport venues across the area, increased female sport participation, and improved participants’ overall health and happiness. Participants also expressed feeling empowered to inspire others close to them, including their children.
The ‘Game On for Women’ initiative contributes to Logan City Council’s strategic commitment to stronger communities—to put community first and deliver what matters to the Logan community.
Beyond sport clubs modifying their venues and grounds, the women-in-sport framework improves sport development policies, accommodates more women in sport, and ultimately improves social capital.
A formal collaboration with the Queensland Government and Brisbane Lions AFL club also followed and, in 2020, the research team attracted a state government grant of $177,000 to implement the second iteration of the strategy, GOFW 2.0, to channel much-needed women leaders into the management of sport club development practices.
This research showed that equipping women with leadership skills and guiding women leaders into sport organisations helps to not only close the gender representation gap in sport but also boost organisational capacity and human resources.
Social capital is a highly valuable organisational commodity and source of knowledge, resources, and networks. It has been demonstrated a more gender-balanced approach is an important asset for creating and maintaining healthy communities, robust organisations, and vibrant civil societies. It can be seen as the key to creating equality for women in the workplace, their career advancement, levels of compensation and achieved status.
Associate Professor Popi Sotiriadou
Associate Professor of Sport Management, a foundational member of the Sport and Gender Equity @ Griffith research hub, Co-Editor Journal of Sport Policy & Politics, and a Senior Fellow with the Higher Education Academy.