Soccer Tournament Review

Over the past couple days, I found myself traveling to Denmark and dealing with a lot of airport people. Two events stick out in my mind.

The first was an interaction between a Northwest ticket agent and a passenger who voluntarily took an earlier flight to help NWA with an overbooked situation. In short, she did them a favor. And because no good deed goes unpunished, her bags were not taken off the flight and sent along with her new flight as promised, but rather kept on the plane so she would now have wait until her original flight came in. When she asked where her bags were, the gate agent kept asking her the same question: “Have you voluntarily separated from your luggage?” By her definition (and every other common sense definition) she had not. But, by the “rules” or “policy” of NWA, she had. She got more and more irritated by this rather stupid person who could not or would not deviate from the policy to employ common sense and help her out.

The second event happened in Amsterdam when the people in London forced me to check a carry-on. I was not staying in Holland nor was I leaving the airport. Yet, since my bag was on the other side of customs, I had to go through when I landed in Amsterdam. The agent asked me “Are you staying for one day?” I, of course, answered: “I am staying one hour until I catch my flight to Denmark.” He wrinkled up his eyebrows as if he did not understand and then asked again, “Are you staying for one day?” I finally understood that the only answers allowed were “Yes” or “No.” I answered “Yes” because “No” meant I would be staying longer. He stamped my passport. (I may get a letter from the Dutch government asking why I only spent an hour in Amsterdam, but I will deal with that later.)

Our advice: When creating systems for your volunteers, guest teams or other people you deal with, speak in a language they understand. Remove as much jargon as possible. Also, ask yourself if what you are expecting makes common sense. Most teams - especially newly formed ones - only know they want to play in your tournament and give you money for the experience. If they ask “stupid questions” it is probably because they know what they want, but just don’t know how to ask for it in a way that makes sense for “the policy” or within the jargon of a tournament. Be patient with them and they will remember you as the only one who stopped and really listened to them.

On my way to other things, I stumbled upon the perfect logo. It is posted to the left of this text. Let me explain why the logo is perfect.

First, it is simple. Secondly, it reflects the culture of Wilkipedia; high, passionate energy by people who are passionate about human knowledge. Thirdly, it reflects the location of the conference; Taiwan. Look up the traditional Taiwanese flag and you’ll see it is red, white and blue whereas the Chinese Taiwan flag is red and yellow. Wikipedia is giving Taiwan a “nod” without saying a word.

Our advice: Resist the urge to literally put everything about your tournament in your logo or design. Think about simple shapes that convey the culture of your event and work with those. The most effective logos are those that are simple and allow the organization to shape their energy. If Wikipedia did not have passionate people, the logo would just be a scribble. But, because it does, the logo is a W and M that leaps off the page at you.

If you have not yet read anything by Seth Godin, start today. Start with his blog post about logos.

I found myself in the Detroit airport at 8:00am today, having first boarded in Mosinee, WI at 5:00am. As anyone who has ever taken a flight in the morning can attest, there are only two types of people in the airport that early; those who need coffee and those who are lying about their need for coffee. I belong to the former.

After landing, I make a beeline for the nearest coffee place, which happened to be an Einstein Bros. There were eight of us in line and the line moved something like this.

One person was taking orders and there were two people taking payments. Person one steps up, gazes at the menu for a few moments, ordered a hot breakfast sandwich, with an extra slice of cheese on an everything bagel… then asks about the selection of tea.. thinks a bit, orders something.. steps to the right to pay. Next person orders coffee, black, large. Third person steps up, coffee, large, muffin… next person asked about the hot dog bagel things.. then asked if they could have lean bacon on the sandwich.. then asked about, etc, etc… Meanwhile, I just wanted a cup of coffee and a chair. To add to the frustration, the two people taking payments were idle most of the time.

Einstein Bros, if you are listening: Between 5:00 am and 10:00 am, set up a coffee-muffin only line and you will not lose the people who only want coffee, but don’t want to wait in line. Again, coffee-muffins only line.

Our advice: Take a look around your event, especially at registration and concessions. Are there long lines forming around opportunities to create express lines? People do not want to wait when they know exactly what they want and perceive it to be a dispense-themselves item, like soda and coffee.

Do you send your referees to the concessions line with a ticket for their lunch? Why? When they are there, waiting in line cuts into their “decompress” time as well as increases the line congestion for your guest teams. Why not consider doing a “catering” to the referee tent, i.e., having a volunteer take the orders and run them from the concession stand back to the ref tent. Or, better yet, get a ref tent sponsor from a local restaurant.

Quick turn is the secret to increased profitability with your concessions.

Gerard McLean, TourneyCentral

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The weather has been hot days, but really cool nights for the past week in Dayton, Ohio. So, instead of running the central air, I have been opening the windows at night and running fans to circulate the cool air.

The past several years, you may have noticed that appliance makers have been putting shorter and shorter cords on things, presumably to save costs. I’m sure if you did the math, you might discover that a manufacturer could save million — maybe even billions — just shaving an inch off the cord. Who would notice! The problem with this kind of thinking is the next quality team that comes in trying to save a buck a year later would shave another inch off the cord, save more millions until finally the consumer is left with a cord that is exactly 33 inches long and just barely reaches the wall plug.

I guess the next step is to make the assumption that all consumers have extension cards and they can supply their own cord from the fan motor to the wall. After all, I only paid $19.99 for the fan!

I tell you this so the following makes sense. I hit my personal quality nexus this morning, the point where cheap cost and quality meet. I was attempting to redirect the fan with a fresh cup of coffee in my hand. When I went to turn the fan, the cord did not follow and pulled the fan, dumping the hot coffee all over me. If the cord had been a foot longer, this would not have happened and the fan would have moved easily.

Our advice: When looking to increase profitability for your tournament, be careful what you cut into. Make sure that you don’t start shaving off the core things that make your customers attracted to your event. If it is critical to the operation of your tournament (like a cord is to an electric fan) leave it alone.. or better yet, figure out how to provide more functionality with the same or fewer resources. Don’t just cut inches off your cords; they are the lifelines to your success.

I was reading a set of rules for an event that is happening soon, just to make sure the tie-breakers were consistent with the rules. Instead of the fairly standard points, head-to-head, goal differential, goals against, goals for, penalty kicks I was accosted by this complicated set of “bonus points” based on the GD being a particular spread and then the GD would be applied bonus points….

Arrgghh!! Stop the insanity on these arbitrary and “creative” tie-breakers. We all understand that the purpose of these complicated tie-breaking rules is to avoid the dreaded “shoot-outs” at the end of pool play, but this creative math that is different at almost every tournament is making it more difficult for software to support your rules.

Our advice: Simplify and standardize. Take a look around at other tournaments in your target market and try to standardize your tie-breakers so that they will be less confusing for the coaches AND PARENTS. Coaches can do the math easily, but parents don’t — and won’t — do the math. They just want to know who’s first, second, etc. And, there are a lot more parents than there are tournament directors at the event! You may also find that by simplify and standardizing, there will be fewer “challenges” to your math ability outside your HQ. You may also want to take more time in attracting and seeding teams to ensure ties (draws for the soccer purists) don’t happen.

STATE ASSOCIATIONS and US SOCCER: Mandate a standardized tie-breaking formula. Tournaments will become more and more of your members activities in the next several years and it is in your best interest to standardize NOW when the number of events in manageable. And, while you are at it, you may also want to take a look at standardizing the rules as well.

Caleb Pierce with Finest View talks about incorporating video into the tournament experience for your guest teams.

To contact Caleb, visit his web site at www.finestview.com or 937-216-0844