As CEO of Welsh Triathlon Limited, Beverley Lewis has plenty of opportunity to speak with senior managers within the world of sport, what she lacked was the opportunity to learn from small business leaders outside of sport. When Beverley heard about the Help to Grow: Management Course, it seemed like the perfect opportunity.

“In my head, we were a small organisation still but in actual fact in the last 10 years we’ve grown from 3 people to a team of 10, we’ve moved from 300 members to 3,000 individual members and we now work with 70 clubs. I needed to know where to go next. How to move from a small organisation to a medium-sized organisation that was able to manage its assets to make a profit.”

Beverley entered the world of Triathlon as the mum of 3 children looking to improve her own fitness levels. She then saw an advert for a part-time administrator for Welsh Triathlon Limited in 2011 which she thought would work well around other commitments. However, the board went through significant changes in 2012 and she soon found herself rising up the ranks.

A geologist originally, Beverley had no previous business leadership experience when she joined Welsh Triathlon. Sport Wales part funded a two-year, part-time Leadership and Management in Sport Masters course when she first took the helm of the organisation. This provided a lot of the academic framework for leadership but a few years on Beverley felt there was more to learn.

“I was looking to fill the gaps in my knowledge, particularly gaps in the business world. The Help to Grow: Management Course definitely provided the perspective I was looking for. It gave me a lot of confidence that what we were doing was the right thing but also showed me we could do more, push more boundaries. My experience was very different from that of other people on the course. We were incorporated as Welsh Triathlon Limited in 2010, but we exist to raise money to put back in to the sport of triathlon. Despite this difference in purpose, all the learning was relevant and very interesting.”

A small organisation with a large remit

The organisation of just ten people has a huge remit. Through the triathlon community it strives to help the health and wellbeing of all people in Wales. It does this in a number of ways. For example, it delivers grass roots experiences, starting with children as young as 4 years old to embed “physical literacy”. It works with schools, clubs, local authorities, event organisers and FE colleges to achieve this. It also has responsibility for the athlete performance pathway in Wales so athletes can achieve on the national and international stage including the Commonwealth Games.

Recent projects have included working with Women Connect First in Cardiff. By enabling women not traditionally interested in Triathlon and their children to take part in sport in a way in which they are comfortable. Beverley and the team have also successfully worked with British Triathlon, World Triathlon, Swansea City and Event Wales to secure an international event in Wales. This international elite para triathlon will take place in Swansea on August 6th and return for the following two years.

“The event delivery is with British Triathlon and World Triathlon but Welsh Triathlon is responsible for the legacy that this creates and we have already started engaging with 8,000 children in the community.”

Help to evolve the employee experience

Beverley joined Cardiff Business School’s first Help to Grow: Management cohort in September 2021. She found the Employee Engagement and Leading Change Module particularly useful.

“I conducted an intensive staff survey; it was much broader than anything I would have done without the course. I asked questions about our values, as well as what motivates and is important to the team. The insight and honesty I received from doing this survey was phenomenal. I have already made 10 to 12 significant changes as a result of the feedback I received.”

The first change that Beverley made was to the working environment. “Through the survey, I realised that the office was not somewhere people wanted to come back to after Covid. I approached Sport Wales and asked for help in making the office a better place to work. They replaced the carpet, installed better lighting, painted the walls and we went paperless. This really lifted everybody’s spirits. It has made the office the tool it needs to be. The team enjoys coming into work and collaborating together and then works from home when they need to have more thinking time. It is working really well.”

Beverley has also implemented changes to the Personal Development Review, moving from a once-a-year review to a more continuous review process.

“I wouldn’t have done any of this without the Help to Grow: Management Course. I was able to share the theory with the team, explain where the thinking had come from and then put it into action. I realised that if I did such a comprehensive survey then it was really important that  changes were made. Taking action in this way validates me as a leader.”

The value of mentor and peer support