Track & Field: Reform

Following the success of the FCN | Track & Field: UK project 2020 – 2023, this year sees the launch of the FCN | Track and Field: Reform project.

Whilst there has been recent progress towards creating gender equal leadership on the World Athletics Council in 2023, there remains one key area of the sport which continues to stagnant; high performance coaching. It is estimated that less than 5% of all Member Federations have a female Performance Director or Head Coach, on average only 10% of all coaching accreditations at Major Championships are handed out to women and between 1-2% of athletes at Major Championships are coached by women. Whilst there have been numerous programmes implemented with the goal of developing female coaches, there remains a large gap in the pathways and opportunities for these highly skilled and knowledgable women.

This project aims to tackle the lack of female high performance coaches from a different angle, and address the cultures and systems in place which prevent women from progressing up the coaching chain. The approach will be to create the foundations of transparent and fair staff selection processes and ensure coaching teams are built around the needs of the athletes. Member Federations will be provided with guidelines to understand the needs and wants of their female coaches and be supported in creating a safer, more efficient and equitable high performance coaching environment. The outcome will be an increase of female coaches at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo 2025, and the creation of stable foundations to create sustainable change Globally for all women who coach.

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Progress So Far…

FCN to deliver online workshop to the European Athletics High Performance Conference presented by Hannah England (November 2024)

November 2024 will see FCN Founder Vicky Huyton present an online workshop for European Athletics about the barriers for elite female track and field coaches and the potential solutions to creating real change.

More details to follow.

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FCN Founder Presents Alongside Professor Leanne Norman to Highlight Barriers in Track & Field (September 2024)

On September 13, 2024, the 9th European Athletics Endurance Conference was held at Leeds Beckett University, focusing for the first time on female athletes in endurance sports. This pivotal event highlighted the need to support women in athletics, addressing their unique challenges. Vicky Huyton, founder of the Female Coaching Network (FCN), and Professor Leanne Norman led a workshop on achieving gender equity in high-performance coaching. This session explored barriers faced by female coaches, including inadequate selection practices for teams, a shortage of female personal coaches, and unsafe working environments.

Participants reflected on their roles in addressing these issues, informed by research co-authored by Huyton and Norman. The workshop also discussed progress made since the UK Athletics Gender Equity in Coaching Action Plan, noting increased representation of female coaches in major events and the regular inclusion of gender equity discussions in UK Athletics Board meetings. Huyton and Norman urged attendees to drive positive change within their coaching practices to combat gender inequality. This conference was a significant step toward advancing gender equity in athletics coaching, aligning with the FCN’s mission to empower female coaches globally.

READ MORE HERE

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Formation of the Women’s Athletics Coaching Forum 2024

Athletics legend Valerie Adams, and Vicky Huyton, founder of the Female Coaching Network, have teamed up to create the Women’s Athletics Coaching Forum; an independent group created for and run by high performance female coaches in Athletics / Track & Field.   

The aim of this group is to influence and drive change in high performance athletics coaching across the Globe in order to create more equitable, efficient and safe environments for female coaches and athletes across our sport.

More details coming soon…

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World Athletics Gender Leadership Conference (August 2023)

In August 2023, FCN Founder Vicky Huyton was invited to speak at the World Athletics Championships in Budapest at the Gender Leadership Conference. Vicky was asked about what changes she has seen so far and what else is left to be achieved:

“The one that stands out for me the most is the conversation around gender leadership,” said Huyton, discussing what has changed. “Sometimes, the conversation around gender, as with many other topics, can be polarised, but I think now people are realising that we do need more women at the top, whether that be leaders or coaches, it’s just that they don’t necessarily know how to get the women at the top.

“I think the biggest opportunity is actually changing the narrative. We hear all the time ‘there are a lack of women’, ‘there’s a lack of female coaches’, ‘a lack of female leaders’. But especially when we are talking about the elite end, and the conversations we are having now, there are a lot of skilled women that are more than capable of being CEOs, head coaches, performance directors. If we can flip it around, to rather than trying to find more women, actually look at the women that we already have, and give them the roles.

“What is happening in different countries is that those incredible talented women are having to create their own opportunities. It’s about saying, we do have the women – let’s now give them the opportunities they deserve.”

For more information on the conference CLICK HERE

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World Athletics Gender Leadership Taskforce Presentation (May 2022)

As part of the World Athletics Gender Leadership Taskforce programme of webinars, the FCN has been invited to speak to an audience of leaders and coaches from around the Globe about the challenges to progression for women coaches and leaders in athletics. Throughout the World Athletics presentation titled Why Current Attempts of Gender Equity in Coaching are Not Working, Vicky will be sharing insights into the work the FCN has undertaken in the previous 14 months and encouraging discussion about the lack of progress of gender equity across the sport.

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European Athletics High Performance Conference (March 2019)

The conference brought together over 60 delegates from the majority of European Athletics Member Federations, all with the aim of learning, supporting and networking.

Following welcome messages on Friday from European Athletics first Vice President Dobromir Karamarinov and Poland’s two-time Olympic shot put champion Tomasz Majewski, who is now a Vice President of the Polish athletics federation, the first day sessions for the coaches, coaching managers and federation officials focussed on creating a successful high performance environment and preparing athletes in the coming 18 months ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

The FCN founder Vicky, was invited to discuss how to achieve gender equality in high performance coaching in athletics in Europe.  Using the “Ecological Model of the Barriers and supports for female coaches” paper written by Nicole M. LaVoi and Julia K. Dutove and published in 2012, Vicky facilitated the discussion of what  the perceived barriers to women coaching at the higher levels within each country and what could each federation do to make changes to a lack of women coaches.

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European Athletics Coaching Club (August 2018)

As part of the first ever European Athletics Coaches Club being held at the European Athletics Championships in Berlin this summer, the founder of the FCN spend some time speaking with coaches from across Europe about the impact of a diverse coaching community and the need for more female coaches.

Throughout the week, coaches heard from the likes of Frank Dick, Martin Bingisser and Marco Cardinale including a keynote speech with Head of GB Paralympic Team Paula Dunn. The FCN presentation titled “The Strength of Female Coaches, Low in Numbers, High in Success Rate”, addressed that whilst there are indeed a lack of women coaches in sport, the success rate of these coaches can be incredibly high. During the presentation, the FCN shared a number of stats from the world of sport and business of instances in which a female head coach has led to a huge success rate.