About Us

Club Roles (Draft)

Overview of Commitee

Common Responsibilities

Combining Roles

Role Descriptions

 

Overview of Committee

The club is run by  volunteer members who  meet and consult regularly as a committee.

Common Responsibilities

All Committee members have the following responsibilities:

  • Read, understand and abide by all Club Rules, Regulations, Policies and Procedures
  • Deliver their roles with diligence and enthusiasm
  • Act as ambassadors of the club

Combining Roles

The Club always struggles to fill roles on the committee which leads to instances where individuals fill more than one role.  Whilst this is common practice in many clubs, the following combinations should be avoided:

  • Treasurer and Membership Secretary
  • The Welfare Officer cannot be a Coach or Coaching Coordinator

Role Descriptions

Chair

  • Lead the strategic direction of the club
  • Ensure that the club has appropriate Principles, Rules, Regulations and Policies in place
  • Ensure the committee is properly staffed, organised and effective in its duties
  • Develop the roles of each committee member, and agree them with each individual
  • Support individual committee members in the delivery of their responsibilities
  • Develop and maintain good relationships with the community and neighbours including Trust and LPC
  • Lead the Club at the annual User Review meeting with the Trust 
  • Act as the key spokesperson for the club on external matters
  • Call and Chair committee meetings, the AGM and EGMs when required, ensuring they are effective meetings
  • Ensure that all members are kept informed and engaged on key issues and events relating to the club

More information:

Treasurer

  • Overall financial management of the club, covering planning, accounting and reporting
  • Establish and maintain club bank accounts and banking arrangements
  • Manage the financial aspects of the club's development plan
  • Maintain up to date records of all financial transactions
  • Report regularly to the management committee on the financial status
  • Prepare year end statements of accounts, and ensure these are appropriately audited or reviewed
  • Present the end of year financial report to the AGM
  • Advise the Committee on financial implications of proposals that come before it
  • Explore funding opportunities for the club/organisation 

Club Secretary 

  • Be the first point of contact for all enquiries to the club, other than membership enquiries
  • Deal with correspondence, and maintain accurate records
  • Organise and minute the committee meetings and AGM
  • Manage the club's registrations to the LTA (annual LTA venue regisration)

Membership Secretary

  • Lead the club's efforts to encourage membership, retain existing members and grow the club through new members
  • Maintain an accurate register of club members via the Clubspark system
  • Work with the Clubspark Administrator to manage the Clubspark membership module
  • Liaise with the Treasurer to propose membership packages, annual rates and subscriptions for the year ahead for approval by the commitee
  • Liaise with the Treasurer to propose pay-and-play rates for the year ahead for approval by the commitee
  • Manage the annual renewal process for existing members
  • Deal with enquiries on membership matters by current and prospective members
  • Support and manage new members as they join throughout the year
  • Ensure that new members receive a welcome email & induction after joining

Welfare Officer 

  • Lead and actively promote the clubs effort to ensure that the club is a safe and inclusive place to play for all but especially for children, young people and adults at risk
  • Ensuring safeguarding and diversity and inclusion are on committee meeting agendas
  • Promote safeguarding, diversity and inclusion and ensuring compliance with the LTA’s minimum standards for venue registration.
  • Ensure all club members are aware of their duty of care towards children, young people and adults at risk
  • Ensuring reporting procedures and details of the venue Welfare Officer are up-to-date, visible and available on club notice-boards and through the club website
  • Ensuring club policies are up-to-date, visible and available on club notice-boards and through the club website
  • Ensuring relevant people at the venue have completed a satisfactory criminal records check
  • Ensure relevant people attend the LTA Safeguarding training and LTA Equality training
  • Maintaining contact details for the LTA Safeguarding Team and key statutory agencies
  • Acting as the first point of contact where concerns about welfare, discrimination, poor practice or abuse are identified
  • Respond to any issues that arise in a confidential and sensitive manner,
  • Record any concerns reported to you on the Reporting a Concern Form and send to the Safeguarding Team
  • Respond to any serious safeguarding issue , liasing with the LTA Safeguarding Team and other agencies where required
  • Working with the LTA Safeguarding Team to facilitate audits of the venue in relation to the minimum standards

More information:

Newman Collard Park Trust Representative: 

Background Information

The tennis club does not own any facilities. The playing fields, tennis court and pavilion are owned by the Newman Collard Park Trust (the Trust) who act as Management Trustees with Liss Parish Council (LPC) acting as Custodian Trustee.

The tennis club has an annual licence agreement with the Trust that grants the Club the right to use the facilities, operate as a club and manage the courts for members and pay-and-play users alike. As part of the licence agreement, the Club must pay an annual license fee to the Trust and is required to appoint a User Trustee to the committee of the Trust. 

In the past, the maintenance of courts and tennis club facilities has been a shared responsibility with an agreement that major court maintenance costs is shared equally. This agreement has recently concludded and future support is less clear, but the  Trust and LPC remain two  very important stakeholders that the Club must collaborate with.

Overview of the role

It is the role of the Tennis Club User Trustee to join the Trust Committee and liaise, primarily with the Trust, but also with LPC on occasion, and represent the views of the Tennis Club to the Trust committee and vice versa.

Specific activities of this this role Include

  • Attending Trust Committee meetings
  • Liaising with the Trust as required
  • Attending the User Review meeting to discuss the renewal of the user licence, use of facilities and outline future aspirations

Club Captain

The Club Captain is responsible for organising competitive tennis and other tournaments at the club.  Competetive tennis and a regular schedule of tournaments for all ages and abilities boosts participation and helps retain members. 

The role carries three distinct tasks:

  • Team Fixtures Secretary
  • Club Championships Coordinator
  • Tournaments and Events Coordinator

These tasks can be the responsibility of a single individual but more recently the role has been split with different individuals each taking responsibility for one of the tasks.

Team Fixtures Secretary

Responsible for organising and managing the club’s participation in matches in summer and winter leagues: This includes:

  • Liaising with the league secretaries to enter appropriate teams in the league
  • Completing required entry forms with the number of teams and NC team captain details,
  • identifying specified days for home fixtures (avoiding existing club commitments such as club sessions and coaching).
  • Liaising with NC Team Captains to support the entry of the relevant teams, as above
  • Attending or arranging for a club representative to attend any League AGMs (normally in November of the calendar year)
  • Note: Failure to send any representative from the club means deduction of points prior to the next league starting.
  • Booking NCTC courts in advance for all home fixtures for the coming league season, so they are not double booked by members or the public.

Club Championships Coordinator

Responsible for the organisation of the Club Championships which start around late May /June and traditionally come to a completion with Club Finals Day in September. Activities include

  • Identifying and agreeing a date for a finals day or weekend event
  • Agreeing and then publishing the finals day dates, rules and a deadline for entries
  • Promoting the championships to all members to encourage participation

Following the entries deadline

  • Creating a draw for each tournament format (mens singles, ladies singles etc)
  • Encouraging members to play matches early so that there is no backlog and scheduling issues prior to finals

Activities to organise and manage as part of finals day or finals weekend

  • Organising a schedule for the event (eg what finals, at what time and what court)
  • Organise any sideline events if the schedule allows (eg family cup, pickleball, etc on court 3)
  • Promoting the event to members leading up to the event to encourage participation and an audience for the finals
  • Encouraging members to bring cakes etc so that there is a social element to the event
  • Reminding current trophy holders to return their cups so these can be presented on the day
  • Booking the courts
  • Reporting the results to the committee so these can be published and recorded

Tournaments and Events Coordinator

Responsible for the organisation of club tournaments throughout the calendar year including the Mike Hillman and Milkwood Cup tournaments. Activities include:

  • Identifying an agreed set of tournament dates and formats for the year ahead
  • Booking the courts in advance
  • Publishing the tournament schedule to members

Activities to organise and manage an individual tournament may include

  • Promoting the event to members leading up to the event to encourage participation
  • Encouraging members to bring cakes etc so that there is a social element to any tournament
  • Distributing tournament templates (eg format, rules, scoring template, etc) to the organiser on the day
  • Organising the event on the day (or arranging for a representative if unavailable)
  • Organising play so that all are able to participate and enjoy the event

 

General Commitee Member

Committee members represent the views of members and contribute opinions and make collective committee decisions in the best interests of members and venue. They also help the chair and the commitee generally by picking up additional roles and tasks including:

  • Clubspark administration
  • Maintenance coordinator
  • Coaching coordinator
  • Junior Representative

Clubspark Administrator

The Clubspark platform is vital to the running of the the club . As well as hosting the club website it also provides a range of back end functionaility that supports the committee and simplifies club and court administration.

Any new clubspark administrator needs learn and understand the capabilities of the platform so they can support other committee members fulfil their roles. The Clubspark platform  is well supported with a range of  free training videos, webinars, help desk and documentation provided for new administrators.

  • Provide commitee members with appripriate admin rights within clubspark to fulfill their roles
  • support the commitee in ensuring that the website is up-to-date and a first point of reference for members and pay-and-play users
  • understand the court booking and configuration process so that courts can be booked by members and pay-and-play users 
  • support the chair and others communicate as required via emails to membership
  • support the welfare officer maintain the club policies so that these are up-to-date and available online
  • support the coach and coaching coordinator in the creation of coaching programs
  • support the membership secretary with membership functionality so that members can  renew and new members join and pay online

Maintenance Coordinator

The maintenance coordinator helps prolong the life of the courts and facilities by ensuring that they are well maintained. The greatest threat is organic matter from trees and hedges which quickly build up and turn to mush, encouraging moss which makes the courts slippery and unplayable and dangerous for older players. The only way of removing this is by spray cleaning the courts which is both expensive and also reduces the lifespan of the court surface. The cost effectivce solution is to prevent the build up in the first place.

  • Organise and encourage member-led work parties throughout the to remove leaves and weeds from the courts
  • Organise for a contractor to trim the hedges surrounding the courts (annual)
  • Inform the committee of any court hazards or issues
  • Organise for other contractors as agreed (eg to repair fencing, remove weeds, etc)
  • Change the combination lock codes on the courts as required
  • Ensure the First Aid kit is stocked, sign-posted and accessible

Coaching Administrator

The coaching coordinator supports the club coach and helps ensure that the club has an appropriate paid-for coaching programme for minis, juniors, families and adult members. 

  • Liaising with the coach to develop a term-time coaching programme
  • Setting up each programme in Clubspark so that it can be promoted online via the Club website such that participants can book and pay for the programme online
  • Ensure that courts are booked through Clubspark for each program 
  • Ensuring that the website coaching pages are relevant and up-to-date
  • Monitoring the Club email account and responding to coaching enquiries
  • Working with the club welfare officer as appropriate to ensure a safe, fun and inclusive environment is provided for all players
  • Working with the Treasurer to ensure that the Coach is remunerated based on the number paid for participants

The coaching coordinator also helps attract new members and retain existing members by ensuring that  there are some free coaching opportunities throughout the year for members and non-members alike. For example, via:

  • Liss and Greatham School Sports Weeks
  • Outreach programs for Liss Guides, Brownies and Scout units
  • Coach led Open Days for members and  non-members

Junior Representative 

  • Encourage and support junior members 
  • To represent the interests of junior members
  • Liaise with the Club coach and events coordinator to ensure that there is a program of events of junior members and adult beginners