What? Stephen Smith delivered two lectures on setting up an applied practice (developing a business plan and marketing yourself). Considering my aim introducing sport psychology to polo, I felt the practical knowledge and knowhow from someone with so much experience in the industry would be invaluable. I was also pleasantly surprised to see an element on the MSc designed to prepare us for our future careers on a practical level as well.

Business Plan

So What? An interesting comment Stephen made was to be mindful of contract wording; something that can work for or against you. He spoke in terms of working for an organisation on retainer, for x hours a month; whether those roll over or not can be a minor contract detail with a big impact (e.g. if a company chooses to cash in on all their unused hours in a single month, it could leave you unable to work with any other clients while trying to catch up).

Now What? Stephen made me aware of how incredibly important it is to pay attention to details in contracts, especially early on when the excitement of getting hired might blind you to aspects that may be detrimental to your well-being and career in the long-term.

So What? He also spoke about personality: how to be successful in running a consultancy, there is more to consider than just your theoretical knowledge. He spoke about how incredibly proactive and self-driven you need to be (Brandstätter, 2011), as well as brutally honest with yourself about where your weaknesses lie in order to overcome them.

Now What? While I know Stephen’s lecture wasn’t supposed to scare us, it evidently shocked some of us, myself included. However, I already have some experience running a company, and so I feel relatively prepared for a lot of the administrational aspects of developing a consultancy. What I know will be difficult is setting up in a sport where there is no existing structure to follow, and therefore I will have to be open-minded to trying new models, as well as resilient and able to admit when something isn’t working, and trying a new method (Ayala & Manzano, 2014; Fisher et al., 2016).

Marketing

So What? While Stephen spoke about many aspects that are important for the future, of more immediate relevance was branding (i.e. naming the consultancy) which is something I have already put some thought into and struggled with. I was interested to hear his advice on the topic. While he made valid points (it has to make sense to non-psychologists; it has to reflect you), there was nothing that increased my existing understanding of how to go about it.

Now What? I have seen quite a few stage 2 candidates have their own websites and a limited company set up for their applied practice, as well as using the same name for social media accounts for the dissemination aspect, so it is important for me to spend some time developing a name that represents me (even if it changes in the future).

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Ayala, J. C., & Manzano, G. (2014). The resilience of the entrepreneur. Influence on the success of the business. A longitudinal analysis. Journal of economic psychology, 42, 126-135.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joep.2014.02.004

Brandstätter, H. (2011). Personality aspects of entrepreneurship: A look at five meta-analyses. Personality and individual differences, 51(3), 222-230.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2010.07.007

Fisher, R., Maritz, A., & Lobo, A. (2016). Does individual resilience influence entrepreneurial success. Academy of Entrepreneurship Journal, 22(2), 39-53.  https://doi.org/10.5465/ambpp.2014.11260abstract