We celebrated 20 years of the LEAD1 Institute this week. The Institute is the premier mentoring program helping senior administrators prepare to become athletics directors. We hosted the event at The Ohio State University and are grateful for the hospitality of Athletics Director Gene Smith, Deputy Athletics Director Diana Sabau and the entire OSU staff.
During the program, we discussed fundraising, the art of hiring head coaches, tips on how to secure your first athletics director position, and much more.
We also had nine national search firms in attendance to network with Institute attendees.
We are so thankful to have newly retired NC State AD Debbie Yow as one of our featured speakers for the Institute. She has been to 19 out of 20 Institutes. This year, we created a scholarship in Debbie’s honor that will be awarded to an outstanding female athletics administrator.
We are also very proud to award minority scholarships to Institute attendees once again this year. Since I joined LEAD1, four minority candidates have ascended to the AD chair, including two this year in Marcus Blossom at Holy Cross and Brian Baptiste at La Salle.
Hats off to our faculty, and Ohio State, for helping us put on another great event. We are excited to go to Notre Dame next year for the 2020 Institute.
