The management of sports intercultural teams

Abstract

The sport world has been turned into an industry and businessmen are looking to get profit out of this business. Like every single business, sports organizations need to manage their human resources, but is sport human resources different from others fields of activity? In sport organizations the things are really different because a team full of stars cannot create a group and they cannot achieve the expected results. Nowadays, sports team management is more complicated because of the globalization. The mobility of the workforce made that intercultural contacts are more often than before and managers have to adapt to this interculturality in their teams. The concept of intercultural management is a hot issue in many countries all over the world. Many people do not give importance to this aspect, but intercultural education is more and more important. This paper emphasizes a case study aiming to illustrate the cross-cultural issues in the case of Sven-Göran Eriksson who is ranked as the second most successful coach in England but he failed spectacularly in Mexico. It is unlikely he had heard much about the Mexican league or the players before his assignment in Mexico, but Sven’s failure could be blamed on a lack of intercultural awareness and a lack of adaptation on his side.