Graduate employability remains an issue of concern for government, industry, higher education providers and students. This study aims to determine employer needs of the Australian sport management job market and discusses the findings of a six-month occupational audit of sport management positions in Australia. The findings present an employer perspective of the nature and published expectations of sport management opportunities. In particular, the most frequently demanded management and leadership expectations were found to be achieving results, working with people, using resources and providing direction. Entry-level recruitment demanded a skill-set that included excellent communication, planning/organization and problem-solving skills, and the selection criteria emphasized experience, qualifications and an appropriate work ethic/passion. This research provides a benchmarking profile of Australian sport management opportunities from which fitness of purpose and curricular development can be further researched and developed.

In an increasingly complex and demanding sport event environment, spectators expect to fulfill their insatiable hedonistic needs through engaging in memorable customer experiences. However, experience creation and management suffer poor conceptualization and contextualization. Using the case study of London 2012 Olympic spectator experiences and applying a range of mixed-methods tools, this exploratory study advances the emerging research agenda on understanding the nature of critical incidents and accompanying emotions, as well as the value-added moments of a memorable hedonistic sport spectator experience. The study findings reveal the valence of critical incidents and emotions, identify when and where they occur, and suggest that spectators want to engage with a series of highly interactive and multimoments that include building, watching, being in, capturing, and sharing the moment. Determining the value-added and value-destructive drivers of memorable consumption encounters can help event managers exceed desired levels of service expectation, and facilitate the delivery of superior customer experiences.

The speed of change and the constant transformation within and beyond sports has meant that any organization associated with the global sport industry must constantly evaluate and horizon scan for pertinent changes that may impact upon its organizational performance and marketing strategies. Strategic sport marketing consists of identifying the needs and wants of potential customers and satisfying those needs through the exchange of products and services.The role of strategic marketing planning is vital to the success of many sport organizations that are relying on the articulated vision and well-thought-out road map to ensure that they are well positioned to deal with changes and challenges, and to effectively deliver high quality products and services to customers. This leading chapter outlines the purpose of this book aimed to examine strategic sport marketing and identifies some of the current changes occurring within the global sport industry that may potentially impact upon successful marketing initiatives.

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From an economic and political perspective, the sports sector is of particular importance and provides many opportunities for sports education. The general transformation of the education sector in European countries represents likewise challenges and opportunities for sport. This book chapter aims to systematise the qualification landscape in sport and to discuss the challenges and opportunities of the sports qualification systems with the focus on sport management and coaching. The authors identified three dimensions for systematising the sport qualification landscape: (1) job category, (2) occupational level and (3) qualification provider.Following this approach, they discuss the challenges and opportunities for the sports qualification systems. The book chapter also deals with the employability of sport managers and coaches and concludes with future developments and challenges for providing high quality qualifications in sport.