Sport and Management

Year 2 Core Modules

You must study and pass all five core modules

Brief description

Introduction to the basic concepts and importance of physical activity for health and wellbeing.

Indicative content:

• Health correlates and determinants: Introduction to factors that underpin health with a focus on the Dahlgren and Whitehead model.
• Role and importance of physical activity and health: Introduction to evidence of how physical activity can impact both physical and mental health, and the role and importance of physical activity in contemporary society.
• Principles of strength and conditioning training programme design: Introduction to the key concepts and fundamental principles of S&C for the general population.

Brief description

The opportunity to lead, develop and/or support the delivery of physical activity sessions to school pupils in Dundee. Engage with a range of employers from the Sport and Fitness industry to gain insight into the requirements of particular roles. These experiences should enable you to develop a career plan for future employment.

Indicative content:

• Planning and delivering activity sessions: Session planning; managing time/resources/people; working within a team; Active Schools/ Positive Coaching Scotland training; managing challenging behaviour; developing diversity competence; Growth Mindset; contemporary issues in the sport and fitness industry.
• Personal Development Planning (PDP): Completing SWOT analyses; personal objective/goal setting; action planning; electronic PDPs.
• Reflective practice: Application of models of reflective practice; guided reflection to highlight learning; making theory− practice links; career planning.
• Articulating skill development: Using electronic platforms and oral media to promote knowledge and skills to external audiences in the context of employability; careers/external speaker workshops.

Brief description

Introduction to the human resource management function within organisations.

Indicative content:

• Personnel management to human resource management: a historical perspective: The origins of personnel management, emergence of HRM, hard and soft HRM.
• The role of line managers and HRM practitioners: The range and scope of HR activities, recruitment, selection, employer branding.
• Employee resourcing: HR planning; pre-recruitment activities, recruitment, selection, employer branding.
• Employee development: Talent planning; training and development methods, designing learning and dveleopment, induction.
• Employee relations: Control, power and authority in the employment relationship, HRM and employee relations, employee voice, employee participation.
• Employee reward: Forms of reward, management or reward, reward systems, base pay, incremental pay schemes, contingency pay.
• Performance management: Measuring performance, performance appraisal, dealing with poor performance.

Brief description

An introduction to research methods for real world research.

Indicative content:

• Introduction to Research: Explaining the nature and purpose of research; Classifying the different types of research (quantitative qualitative, mixed methods) and how they map within the different philosophical paradigms (positivism, interpretivism, pragmatism).
• Dealing with Practical Issues: Identifying the main stages in the research process; Identifying/generating a research topic and setting research objectives; Developing a research strategy; Identifying ethical issues in conducting research.
• Searching and Reviewing the Literature: Explaining the purposes of a literature review and defining the main steps in conducting it; Searching, evaluating, organizing and synthesizing relevant literature.
• Data Collection and Analysis: Approaches to qualitative and quantitative data collection; Data collection using a mixed-methods design.
• Writing a Research Proposal: Purpose and structure of a research proposal.
• Descriptive Statistics: Summarizing and visualizing data sets; Exploring the relationships between variables.
• Inferential Statistics: Hypothesis testing; Selected hypothesis tests.

Brief description

Key social issues in physical activity and health contexts.

Indicative content:

• Interdisciplinary nature of social sciences: The ways in which various disciplines within social science help us to understand and explain issues relating to physical activity and health.
• Critically engage with the notion of ‘healthy’ lifestyles: The social construction of what bodies are defined as ‘healthy’ and which activities are seen to create a ‘healthy’ body.
• Research topics within the social sciences: Make connections between the approaches/findings of physical activity and health research, and how these inform debates around agency structure.
• Political ideology and Social Inequalities:The ways in which health and physical activity participation are framed by political ideologies and why this influences social inequalities.
• Qualitative methodologies: Qualitative research and how it has developed our understanding of physical activity and health.

Brief description

The core concepts of sport and exercise psychology and how these apply to real world environments. Intrapersonal and interpersonal factors and how they both shape and are shaped by involvement in sport and exercise.

Indicative content:

• Definition of the field of sport and exercise psychology.
• Fundamentals of sport and exercise psychology: The role of personality in sport. Models of achievement, motivation and competitiveness. Motivational climates, stress, arousal, anxiety and other emotional processes.
• Group processes: Group and team dymanics, group cohesion, communication, leadership.
• An introduction to psychological skills: Core psychological skills training, how they are applied and their limitations.

Years 1 and 2 Elective Modules

You must study and pass one elective module of your choosing

Introduction of the concept of smart cities - hard infrastructure, social capital including local skills and community institutions, and digital technologies to fuel sustainable economic development and provide an attractive environment for all.

Module content:

• Social impacts

There is an overall need for theoretical and methodological plurality in how we assess the impact and value of future cities in terms for individual and societal well−being. Gaps in our understanding relate to the complex ways individuals and groups engage with built and natural settings, the cultural goods and consequent benefits that may arise and the inequalities associated with these cultural benefits.

• Security

Different types of cyber-attacks that could be launched against a Smart City. Impact of cyber-attacks. Approaches to securing the smart grid and critical infrastructure, i.e. improving cyber resilience.

• Sustainable urban food production

Includes the long established allotments movement to large-scale projects based on sustainability throughout the food chain. Urban food production includes the long established allotments movement. The demand for urban growing also responds to the densification and intensification of living areas, due to population rise, migration and demographic aging with lower housing and ‘garden’ space standards placing greater importance on collective production.

• Energy, waste and water

At present, water and wastewater facilities are often the largest and most energy intensive responsibilities owned and operated by local governments, representing up to 35% of municipal energy use. Future cities will need to utilise more sustainable methods of water and wastewater management and renewable energy production.

• Digital technologies

​Digital technologies will play a major role in creating sustainable and resilient cities offering a vehicle for more inclusive decision−making process and promoting dialog amongst architects, urban planners, the public and technologists.

Develop a range of skills, knowledge and techniques within the natural, technological and social sciences relevant to the study of environmental sustainability and life in the twenty-first century. Understand the critical issues that confront humanity and begin to discern appropriate responses.

Module content:
• The challenge of sustainable development
Problems associated with life in the 21st Century and the relationship to scientific provisionalism and uncertainty.

• The genesis of sustainable development concept
Developments associated with the Club of Rome are outlined while Limits to Growth and the Tragedy of the Commons.

• Evolution of sustainable development
The Reo Summit and Suitability, and Policy Developments thereof.

• Scientific inquiry and sustainable development
Controversial issues like climate change, oil peak, and food production and the role of science in helping delimit them as problematic.

• Mainstreaming sustainability
Sustainability and Mitigation, Adaptation and Resilience, as individual and social concerns, and their role in transformation.

• Communicating sustainability
Human well-being, Environmental Justice, Environmental Policy and the practicalities of Sustainability in Scotland.

• Sustainable development in practice
Community Empowerment associated with Land Reform. Energy Production and Food Production in Tayside.

• Ethics and sustainability policy
Active citizenship and globalisation.

• Innovating locally, transforming globally
Transformations required to embrace Sustainability.

• Active relationship for sustainable futures
Thinking globally, acting locally.

How lifestyle can effect physical and mental well-being. This module enables you to reflect on your own lifestyle choices and how to incorporate good health behaviours into your life.

Module content:

• Sleep and stress
  The impact of sleep and stress on health and performance. Completion of sleep diaries and questionnaires related to sleep patterns and stress.
   
• Physical activity
  Current physical activity recommendations, components of physical fitness.
   
• Physical inactivity
  Understanding why people are inactive. The link between physical inactivity, obesity and type 2 diabetes.
   
• Physical activity and mental well-being
  The effects of physical activity on mental well-being.
   
• The effect of carbohydrate consumption and exercise on blood glucose
  Measurement and recording of blood glucose in response to the carbohydrate ingestion and exercise.
   
• Simple health and fitness testing
  Measurement and recording of data. Tests will include blood pressure, strength, endurance and flexibility. Data will be compared with normative values for these tests.

Develop critical thinking skills that form the basis for progression across the academic disciplines of the university. Learn how to recognise, construct, evaluate, criticise and defend different forms of argument.

Module content:
•    Potential 'timeless' debates 
Debates delivered by internal and external experts on: e.g. existence of God; privacy and civil society; private property; money as source of 'evil'; nature/nurture; free speech; pornography; capital punishment; prostitution; animal experimentation; meaning of justice; abortion; affirmative action; just war; trade union power; good life/good political community; human nature; monarchy; value of democracy; meaning of equality; citizenship rights.

•    Potential 'timely' debates
Debates delivered by internal and external experts on: eg, Scottish independence, academic freedom; drug legalisation; drug use in sport; immigration; free health care; war on terror; EU membership; euthanasia; progressive taxation; race and gender discrimination; gay marriage; human rights; politics/sport; global warming; internet censorship; nuclear power; education league tables; nuclear weapons; GM agriculture; religion; cloning; fair trade; value of contemporary culture.

•    Critical thinking seminars
Follow-up discursive discipline specific seminar sessions led by teaching staff on topics covered in formal debates. Learn to identify types of argument presented, evaluate perspectives and to reflect upon their own reasoning processes and value assumptions. The debates and seminars facilitate a foundation for the acquisition of graduate attributes.

•    WEB CT Wiki discussion forum
Work in small groups to write a short 800 word indicative "Thinking Summary" online Wiki of the arguments presented in each debate. These summaries will be constructed by each designated Thinking Group of three students using the Wiki facility on Blackboard which will facilitate further discussion on the moderated WEB CT discussion forum.

The social, managerial, economic, political, and technical challenges and opportunities associated with emerging renewable energy innovation, production, supply and consumption.

Module content:
•    Renewable energy non-technical challenges and opportunities
Social and political challenges and opportunities of renewable energy production supply and consumption. Economic and environmental challenges of renewable energy production supply and consumption. Strategic and managerial challenges of renewable energy production supply and consumption.

•    Renewable energy technological challenges and opportunities
Geotechnical, Geophysical and Hydrographic information; Knowledge of sources of hydrographic information and interpretation of published charts. Forces on structures; Appreciation of the various forces acting on marine structures. Technical limitations and challenges of energy distribution systems and energy storage. Current technological development trend, collaborative innovation in renewable energy.

An understanding of the concepts of tolerance, and the importance of making sound ethical decisions. Develop the qualities, characteristics and skills to meet the aspiration for Abertay graduates to become global and active citizens. 

Module content:
•    Introduction to equality and ethics legislation 

•    Diversity competence and moral/ethical reasoning 
Inclusiveness, equal opportunities, positive action, reasonable adjustment.

•    Attributes for the workplace and for global citizenship.

•    Reflective practice 
Application of models of reflective practice.

•    Contemporary issues

Learn how to adjust language to suit context. Analyse a range of linguistic issues, including “proper English”, how language can be used to create moral panics, and the ethics of communication.

Module content:

•    “Good English”
The role of standardisation, dialect and idiolect − how we choose language to reflect our identities and our role in a speech or discourse community.

• Language and influence
How the media constructs narratives to persuade or inform the audience (and how to tell the difference).

• Creating a narrative across genres
The conventions, freedoms and limitations of different forms; using these forms in new ways.

• Narrative changes over time
How authors reinvent old stories to reflect current concerns.

• Technical writing
The use and manipulation of data; hearing the author's voice; critiquing "bad science".

• The ethics of communication
 (Electronic) media and ownership, attribution and theft.

“Personal” digital safety to make computer security fun, practical and eye-opening.  Learn the base knowledge that will continue to be relevant to future generations of devices.

Module content:
•    Current state of computer security
An overview including legal aspects.

•    Cyber-attacks, vulnerabilities and threats
Malware, Network attacks (denial of service, packet sniffing etc.), bots and rootkits. How the bad guys can obtain your password.

•    Information leakage
Recovery and forensics recovering deleted or corrupted files. What your browser knows about you. Web browser forensics.

•    Securing networks, accounts and devices
Defence against malware, honeypots, Secure protocols, intrusion detection, Password security, Mobile device security.

•    Human aspects of cyber security 
The Psychology of Hackers, Social Engineering, identity theft, Usability vs security.

•    Breaking the code
An introduction to cryptography, Encryption and Decryption, public and private keys, the key exchange problem.

•    History of cryptography 
The Caesar cipher, polyalphabetic ciphers, the Playfair cipher, the role of Enigma and the Bletchley Park cryptographers in WWII.

•    Computers and Crypto Diffie-Hellman and RSA encryption
Phil Zimmerman and “Pretty Good Protection". Quantum Cryptography – Provably unbreakable information hiding. Mathematical Underpinnings – Large prime numbers and why they matter.

•    Steganography
 A picture's worth a thousand words when you're hiding the wood in the trees.

•    The law, society and cryptography 
Why you can be imprisoned for forgetting your password. The Civil Liberties Arguments for and against strong-crypto. International perspectives on information hiding, information freedom, the right to privacy and the conflicts between these. Are unbreakable cyphers an unqualified “good thing”?

Develop perspectives on the key challenges faced by humankind such as environmental change, pollution, food security, energy provision, conflicts, terrorism, emerging diseases, and changing demographics. Understand the overwhelming complexity of the problems and the need for interdisciplinary approaches to create solutions.

Module content:

• Interdisciplinary research
  Introductory lectures will discuss the definitions, methods, benefits, challenges, and drawbacks of disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches and the role of public policy influencing research
   
• Global challenges
  Challenges from different disciplines. Examples include: Climate Change: causes and impact; Serious Games: science and application of visualization and games; Global Security: valuing ecosystems: balancing policy, economics and environment; Contemporary Challenges to Healthy Living; Food Security: global threats and local needs; Energy Poverty: space travel.

Design an activity to communicate and present scientific principles to primary school children. Learn about working as a group and how to communicate complex ideas.

Module content:
• Developing a science communication activity
Target audience, sources of information to identify suitable activities (CfE documentation etc.), health and safety, issues around working with specific groups, accessibility, ethics, costing and sustainability.

• The landscape of engagement and current practice
Types of public engagement activities, target audiences, funding, role of learned societies, universities and other bodies. Public engagement in Dundee and Tayside.

Work in a team to develop game design concepts for serious applications. Gain the knowledge, processes and techniques of game design and study examples of serious games developed to benefit society.

Module content:
•    Overview of Games
A brief history of games, game art and gamification.

•    Games for change
Understanding how games can benefit society.

•    Game mechanics
Deconstructing core components of popular game genres.

•    Gameplay constructs
What is gameplay and how is this broken down and communicated within the game design.

•    The game design process
Conceptualisation, iteration, phases of workflow.

•    Game design theory and practice
Identifying the elements within effective design and how they are implemented.

•    Documenting the design interactive
Oriented design, technical design, capturing requirements.

•    Business models
Exploring methods that can be used to generate revenue within the game design.

Develop the knowledge and awareness required to make good career decisions and the skills and confidence to successfully navigate each stage of the recruitment process for graduate jobs.

Module content:

• Developing self-awareness
  Profiling of personal strengths, values and priorities in relation to career choice.
   
• Developing opportunity awareness
  Generating career ideas based on your personal profile; Exploring the range of graduate opportunities within job sectors of interest; Reviewing occupations that are directly related to your own subject discipline.
   
• Developing a career action plan
  Matching your personal profile with best fit opportunities in the job market; Creating a timeline of actions to improve your prospects of meeting your aim.

• Developing job seeking skills
  Sourcing suitable job opportunities - both advertised and unadvertised; Creating a professional image online; Identifying the skills and qualities employers look for in graduates; Learning how to produce targeted applications for specific job roles; Practising the presentation of your strengths and motivations in face to face selection activities.

Learn about natural disaster such as landslides and flooding, structural disasters such as the Tay Rail Bridge and the system of critical infrastructure (such as road, rail, air and shipping transport networks, power grid, gas and water networks, health system) that constitute the backbone of modern societies.

Module content:
•    Overview of the scope and the content of concept of critical infrastructure failure during natural disasters and resilience against such failures
The consequences of geophysical, hydrological and meteorological disasters on critical infrastructure and critical infrastructure protection capabilities against natural disasters. Interdependencies of critical infrastructures during large disasters, presents a brief review of current research being done in this field, and presents a methodology to address interdependencies.

•    The identification of the vulnerabilities of the critical systems
The critical systems upon which modern society, economy, and polity depend. The identification of the vulnerabilities of these systems threats that might exploit these vulnerabilities. The effort to develop techniques to mitigate these vulnerabilities through improved design.

•     Flooding in Scotland
General overview of fluvial, pluvial and coastal flooding, the structural, economic and societal impact and responses to flooding. Resources will include historical examples, current policies and information (including SEPA flood maps). Case study (with virtual/actual field visit?) the Perth Floods of 1990 and 1993 and the Perth flood defence scheme*

•    Landslide origins, types and mitigations
General overview what landslides are, why they happen and what can be done to prevent them.

•    Structural failure
An example such as why the Tay Bridge failed and what it meant for the Forth Rail Bridge.

•    Reports and investigations
The role of reports in accident and disaster investigations in creating informative reports; case studies of accidents, disasters, learning from history, learning from case studies, learning from common law

Introduction to the skills and knowledge needed to launch a small business successfully. This module will define and help you acquire the personal and professional skills needed to develop a professional career and/or to succeed as entrepreneurs in Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs).

Module content:

• Understanding entrepreneurship.
   
• Generating successful business ideas.
   
• Environmental scanning.
   
• Developing a credible business plan that includes evaluating business ideas.
   
• Presenting the business idea.

An understanding of some of the processes involved in food production. Discuss common misconceptions and ideas which present the food and nutritional industries in a bad light.

Module content:
•    Student led investigations
Student led investigations of the different sectors within the food and drink industry including: prebiotics – and the controversy surrounding the term; if barbequing is a healthy cooking method; and exposing the celebrity chef - common Myths about cooking.

•    Consumerism
Does the food industry listen to us? Understanding consumer and sensory science to better understand why you buy the products you buy.  How food/public health is reported by the media? The French paradox / Mediterranean diet.

•    Future of food
Ethical food production and the future of foods, and what’s waste got to do with it?

•    Debunking myths
Debunking food myths, more science than science fiction in our food today, like the science behind getting sauce out of a bottle and what to drink – Whisky or Beer?

•    Facts from fiction
Finding facts from fiction, investigating the three-second rule – should I eat things that have fallen on the floor? What’s so super about super-foods? Fat or sugar: Which is worse?

Learn how we approach and understand mental health, from historic, social, therapeutic, and individual perspectives. Explore questions such as ‘what is madness?’, ‘how does society position people with mental illness?’, and ‘how do we best respond to challenges to our mental health?’

Module content:

• Historical and cultural perspective on mental illness
  How do we ‘think’ about mental health, and mental ill health?
   
• Diagnosis and the anti-psychiatry movement
  Who holds the power to decide what is normal in terms of psychological well-being and behaviour?
   
• Gender, culture and mental health
  How gendered cultural expectations and representations influence how we respond to mental health issues.
   
• Media representations
  The impact of film and literature on attitudes and understandings of mental health.
   
• Resilience, treatment and recovery
  Common mental health problems in the UK, treatment and management, and frameworks for enhancing well-being and resilience.

An introduction to the wide range of disciplines in forensic investigation. Learn how crimes are investigated from the moment of reporting through to the presentation of the evidence in court. A hypothetical case study provides an over-arching framework in which to explore the critical aspects of forensic investigations. It involves not only physical and electronic evidence, but also statements from witnesses, suspects and victims which requires cross discipline collaboration of professionals.

Module content:
• Crime scene investigation
How a crime scene is examined in the context of incomplete contextual information and to avoid loss or contamination of evidence and the maximising of the value of evidential material.

• Media involvement
Positive and negative effects of the media/public interest in the crime.

• Forensic biology
Examination and evidential value of body fluids, DNA, hairs and fibres.

• Forensic chemistry
Analysis for drugs, toxicological analysis, firearms, explosives, and trace evidence.

• Digital sources
Evidence from CCT, mobile phones, computer hardware, on−line behaviour.

• Forensic reasoning and practice
An introduction to forensic problem solving, thinking styles, case assessment and interpretation.

• Psychology of witnesses and suspects
False confessions, offender profiling, effects and avoidance of cognitive bias in forensic science through process design.

Year 3 Core Modules

You must study and pass all four core modules

Brief description

Critical overview of sport development in the UK to provide knowledge and expertise to effectively develop sport in line with current policies and strategies.

Indicative content:

• Sport governance in the UK: How sport is structured and organised in the UK. The effectiveness of these structures.
• A basis for sport policy: The underlying socio, cultural and political issues underpinning contemporary sport policy (e.g., health and wellbeing, physical activity, social inequality, protection of vulnerable people, elite sport)..
• Sport policy: Contemporary sport policies at international, national, regional and local level.
• Policy to practice: The way in which sport policy is sanctioned by national organisations as part of sport development, and sport development officers.

Brief description

Develop your ideas about research in sport, exercise, physical activity and health, to better understand and appreciate published research and carry out your own research project in your final year of study.

Indicative content:

• The research process: Learn and engage in a research process to understand the steps associated with planning and conducting a research process.
• Formulating and refining research questions: How research ideas are questions are generated and refined.
• Research methodologies: Various research methodologies (e.g., quantitative, qualitative and mixed−methods) in order to develop an appreciation of diverse approaches to research in sport, exercise, physical activity and health.
• Ethical issues: The key ethical issues associated with research in sport, exercise, physical activity and health.
• Practical skill development: Develop practical research skills in your chosen discipline area.

Brief description

The challenges facing contemporary business organisations in an operating context in which they are expected not only to demonstrate an economic contribution and shareholder value, but increasingly, are expected to do so in a manner that reflects the interests of a range of stakeholder groups and being sustainable.

Indicative content:

• The changing context of business: The changing nature of organisations from industrial to post-industrial society; globalisation structures, processes and arguments.
• Sustainable business practice: Corporate social responsibility and The Business and Society Relationship; Corporate Citizenship: Social Responsibility, Responsiveness, and Business Performance.
• Employee wellbeing at work: Employees as stakeholders: issues relating to privacy, safety and employee well-being.
• The role of third sector organisations: Social and economic exclusion and business; understanding the conditions of inequality and social exclusion; factors influencing social mobility, The social contribution of third sector organisations.

Brief description

Apply the knowledge and skills you have developed during study to a real business problem, including diplomacy and negotiation when interacting with the business.

Indicative content:

• Project briefing: Responsibilities of all parties involved; expectations of the module; requirements of professional conduct.
• Managing your project: Project management techniques to schedule and control your project.
• Business Investigation: Research the client-defined project management issue, making effective use of current and professional literature and providing short to long term recommendations.
• Client Management: Acting in a professional manner e.g. being diplomatic, using negotiation skills, understanding the needs of the company may be different from idealised situations described in literature.
• Team working: How to work in a self-managing team; team expectations; peer review.
• Project debriefing: Self-reflection. Structured debriefing focused on student’s project learning, and on learning through experience.

Year 3 Option Modules

You must study and pass two option modules of your choosing, one from Group [A] and one from Group [B].  (You must do a Work Placement module in either Year 3 or Year 4.)

Brief description

Key areas of the subject from existing literature and from a set of example cases that illustrate operations and supply chains in many different settings and markets.

Indicative content:

• Operations Management in its Organisational Context: The operations function within the organisation and its relationship with other functional areas; The role of the operations manager.
• Introduction to Supply Chain Management: The supply network; designing the supply chain (make or buy); supply chain stages; uncertainly and risk factors, value chain.
• Capacity Management: Demand v. production, models of capacity planning, measuring capacity (utilisation and efficiency calculations).
• Inventory Management: Why hold stock? Costs of inventory, ABC analysis, economic order quantity, inventory management strategies.
• Technology in Operations processes: E-supply chain, IT application in supply chain system, enterprise resource planning, technology strategies.
• The end-to-end supply chain: Purchasing and supply, materials and distribution management, logistics, balancing flow within a supply chain, managing bottlenecks and restrictions.
• Outsourcing: Make or buy decisions in sourcing strategy; supplier selection; outsourcing supply chain management; co- ordinating supply and managing supplier relationships & partnerships, supply chain risks management.
• The customer interface: Meeting customer requirements, forecasting demand, lean operations and JIT, lean principles, reducing waste.
• Contemporary supply chain dynamics: Supply chain measures, six sigma, strategic alliances and collaborative partnerships, characteristics of supply chains in the contemporary global economy.

Brief description

The concepts of coaching and learning and how to apply these to physical activity environments. Move beyond a reductionist view of coaching simply as a systematic procedure and consider the influence of the social aspects of coaching such as leadership, relationships, and social environments.

Indicative content:

• Coaching and learning: The definition and purpose of coaching and learning. The purpose and definition of coaching, what it has to do with pedagogy and education.
• The role of the coach: The role of the coach, what their purpose is, and what they are trying to achieve. The level of participation, demands placed on coaches by external bodies, and coaches own philosophies towards the instruction of athletes.
• The coaching process: The key characteristics of coaching. Various leadership and relationship models and how these fit into the idea of coaching as a systematic process.
• Skill development: The principles that underpin the creation on an efficient learning environment. Modern theories of skill acquisition and how they relate to effective education.
• Participant Groups: Different categorisations of participants and the impact on the planning and delivery of the coaching process.

Brief description

Contemporary issues in sport and exercise, particularly those you are likely to encounter and have to navigate in future employment.

Indicative content:

• Social theory: Key aspects of social theory that can be/ have been used to explain phenomena in sport and exercise.
• Inequality and discrimination: The main sources of inequality and discrimination in sport and exercise (e.g., gender, social class, ethnicity, LGBTI).
• Sport and politics: How various political systems/ ideologies and governing bodies use sport/athletes as a vehicle for social control.
• Ethics and sport: Moral and ethical issues in sport and exercise (e.g., child protection). Sport and exercise cultures provide a unique environment for moral and ethical issues.

Brief description

How the complexities, dynamics and uncertainties of the contemporary business environment impacts on the organisation of work and the contemporary employment relationship.

Indicative content:

• The future working context: The changing context of work, post bureaucratic society, millenial, and high performance contexts.
• The new employment relationship and new forms of control: Flexible work and the precariat, the changing nature of capital - emotional and aesthetic labour, the psychological contract.
• Conflict in the workplace: The changing nature of power and politics in organisational decision-making and management practice. The changing nature of contemporary employee relations; organisational misbehaviour and counter-productive work behaviours.
• Human capital development: The learning organisation and organisational learning, technology mediated work processes, talent sourcing and human capability and knowledge management; career planning and development, rewards and recognition.
• Outcomes: Learning from high performance organisations; Engaging employees, employee engagement and discretionary effort; building organisational resilience.

Brief description

Structured and practical experience in your own partiular area of the sports industry.

Indicative content:

• Career pathways: refelct on your proespective career path. Identify strengths and limitations that can be addressed to enhance career progression.
• Understand the prospective work environment and organisation: Identify appropriate organisations and opportunities to enhance professional development. Engage with the organisation of an appropriate work placement. Self led but guided by staff.
• Work placement: Undergo an appropriate work placement in a prospective work environment which enhances your ability to progress in your selected career pathway.

Year 4 Core Modules

You must study and pass all three core modules

Brief description

Design and carry out an independent research project in an area of sport, health or physical activity.

Indicative content:

• Research project topics: Select your research project topic with staff. Each student is allocated a supervisory tutor within the Division.
• Supervisory sessions: Sessions will cover the identification of a research question; necessary elements of research design; the approach needed to prepare for and complete the research project; a range of appropriate research methods; appropriate statistical analyses; the structure of the research report; the interpretation of the research results; possible or probable conclusions; and the writing of the report.

Brief description

Examine organisational change and transformation in time of uncertainty.

Module content:

• Analysing change context and drivers: The change context: globalisation, technology and changing market dynamics; change management and sustainability.
• Theories of change and approaches to change management: Models of change and change management; transformational change and organisations; critical discourse in change management.
• Human resources issues in change management: Participative change; managing psychological contracts, social identity, stakeholder positioning and dynamics in times of radical change; voice dialogue and rethinking resistances in radical change; culture habits and unlearning.
• Change in context: This will change each year and form the basis of guest lectures.
• Leading and managing change: Transactional and transformational leadership; a competency framework for transitional leadership; values and value-based systems in transformational change.

Brief description

The way sport can be used to address social issues, some of the problems with this approach, and how these issues can be overcome.

Indicative content:

• Community development: A community development approach to sport delivery.
• Community Practice: The community practice approach to sporting provision.
• Sport for development and peace: The use of sport as a tool of international development.
• Sport, globalisation and development: Recent changes in societies and their implications for sport and development.
• Liberating education and critical consciousness: The notion of liberating education and how it can be applied to sport development work.
• The politics of development: The political nature of development work and the utility of social movements for development.

Brief description

Fundamentals of how a business form can create and sustain a competitive advantage, and what strategic options are available in the public sector.

Indicative content:

• Introduction to strategic management: What is strategy? Strategic analysis, classical and emergent schools, strategic thinking, levels of strategy.
• Strategy context - competitive advantage of a firm: defining the business environment. Industry analysis: turbulences and dynamics. Porter's five forces; new dynamics in the 21st century.
• Business level strategy - sources of competitive advantage: Competitive stance, business level strategy, corporate level strategy; generic strategies; hybrid strategy; value chains.
• Beyond competition: The nature of competition; cooperation; co-opetition; strategic alliances and joint ventures; mergers and acquisitions.
• Strategy in the public sector: Public-private partnership as a strategic tool of public sector management.

Year 4 Option Modules

You must study and pass two option modules of your choosing, one from Group [A] and one from Group [B].  (If you didn’t take the Work Placement module in year 3, you must take the Career Placement module in Group A.)

Brief description

The opportunity to expand your knowledge and understanding of your subject and its applications within a real−life setting.

Module content:

• Career pathways: The student will be expected to reflect on their prospective career path and evaluate their subject− based and transferable skills, identifying strengths and limitations that can be addressed to enhance career progression.
• Understanding the prospective work environment and organisation: The student will identify appropriate organisations and opportunities for enhancing their own continued professional development. They will engage in the organisation of an appropriate work placement. This will be guided by staff but self−led to enhance the students’ abilities to find and apply for appropriate employment.
• Work placement: The student will undergo an appropriate programme within a prospective work environment which enhances their ability to progress within their selected career pathway.

Brief description

The challenges of managing in complex international business environments.

Indicative content:

• Introduction: The theoretical background: Globalisation and international business; Analysis of international external business environment; political factors; economical factors; social factors; technological factors and implications for international managers; International trade theories and practices.
• International Business Strategies: Strategy and international business; Country evaluation and selection; Export and Import strategies; Direct investments and collaborative strategies.
• International and cross-cultural management: International Dimensions of Culture: Understanding various dimensions of culture; Hofstede’s (1980) National Culture Approach and Trompenaars (1993) Cultural Dimensions. Implications for International Managers.
• Managing in international contexts: Culture and Communications: Understanding of cultural characteristics and how they influence patterns of communications; communication process and important considerations; issues arising from cross-cultural and intercultural communication. Culture and Negotiations: Understanding the relationship between culture and negotiations; how to reconcile possible conflicts regarding differences in culture and negotiations.
• Contemporary issues in managing international business: Managing international human resources; Managing diversity in international business; Environmental issues and international business; the use of IT in international business and management.

Brief description

Knowledge and understanding relating to duty of care in sport.

Indicative content:

• Safeguarding: What more could be done to strengthen sport’s position in relation to the protection of young people and adults at all levels of sport.
• Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: Specific aspects of duty of care with relevance to equality, diversity and inclusion.
• Injuries: How the likelihood of injury can be lessened and whether improvements can be made to how sporting injuries are treated in the short and long term.
• Career transitions: The support people receive as they transition through the sport system, including entering and leaving top-level sport.
• Mental health: Issues relating to the prevention, identification and management of mental health issues in sportspeople.
• Education: How sportspeople can be supported to help them balance education with their sporting activities.
• Representation of the participant’s voice: How the views of sportspeople are considered in decisions affecting them in sport.

Brief description

Organisational change and transformation in times of uncertainty.

Module content:

• Analysing change contexts and drivers: The change context: globalisation, technology, and changing market dynamics; change management and sustainability.
• Theories of change and approaches to change management: Models of change and change management; trans- formational change and organisations; Critical discourse in change management.
• Human resources issues in trans-formative change: Participative change ; managing psychological contracts, social identity, stakeholder positioning and dynamics in times of radical change ; voice, dialogue and rethinking resistances in radical change; Culture, habits and unlearning.
• Trans-formative change in context: (this will change each year and will form the basis of the guest lectures * 3 see teaching learning and assessment note): Transforming public sector services in times of resources uncertainty (as an example).
• Leading and managing transformational change: Transactional and transformational leadership; a competency framework for transformational leadership; values and value-based systems in transformational change.

Brief description

The main concepts, approaches and tools of strategic management in the contemporary business environment. Tools of strategic analysis, strategic choices available to a firm, and elements and complexities involved in strategy formulation and implementation.

Module content:

• Introduction to strategic management: What is strategy; strategic analysis; classical and emergent schools; strategic thinking; levels of strategy.
• Strategy context. Competitive advantage of a firm: Defining the business environment. Industry analysis: turbulences and dynamics. Porter’s five forces; new dynamics in the 21st century.
• Business level strategy: Sources of competitive advantage: Competitive stance, business level strategy, corporate level strategy; generic strategies; hybrid strategy; value chains.
• Beyond competition: The nature of competition; co-operation; co-opetition; strategic alliances and joint ventures; mergers and acquisitions.
• Managing change through effective leadership: Leadership - values and ethics. Managing stakeholders, change and uncertainty. Change management approaches.
• Individual as a leader: Overview of trait, behavioural and situational theories. Moral aspects of leadership.
• Leading as a team: Leader’s role, coaching, conflict.
• Organisational leadership: Charismatic and transformational leadership, crisis leadership.
• Global and cross-cultural leadership: Leadership in multinational business environment and in the cross-cultural context.
• Leadership and value creation: The role of leadership in creating value for a competitive advantage, strategy formulation and implementation.