Affiliations & Accreditations with Tom Cunningham

This week I welcome Tom Cunningham back to the podcast to talk all things affiliations and accreditations. 

For most of us we probably take for granted the fact that each of our teams require affiliation and that, without this, the children in our teams simply cannot play. With over teams at the club, the time and effort required is no mean feat. Thankfully, NLWFC have Tom on hand to ensure that all runs smoothly. 

Accreditations are also taken for granted but our 3 star sitting demonstrates the the standard expected at this amazing club as well as how those outside of the club view NWFC.

Come have a listen. Insightful and helpful and Tom is, once again, a fantastic guest.  

Transcript

Affiliation & Accreditation

[00:00:00] Hi, and welcome to the new, to the Willows FC podcast with me, Rob Flood. This week I'm delighted to welcome back to the pod Tom Ham. Tom, how are you? I'm good, thank you. How are you? Yeah, I'm good. Thank you, mate. Good, thank you. I know we're in February, but happy New Year and to you too. It's the first podcast of the New Year and we had a little break over the festive period.

 Very busy people. And we did say before recording last time we met and was doing a podcast. You was watching The Mighty Oxford? Yes. I was defeat that night and defeats ever since, unfortunately. So you've got the club colors on. Yes. And still proud of the fan, so you should be you should be, mate.

And I love that, that you're not just succumbeded to these MIT city teams. Never big city teams. No, not like me being an Arsenal fan, but damn. I don't mind that at the moment. We're sitting pretty at the top of League Champion League. Yeah. Yeah. I know. People keep saying we're going to bottle it maybe.

We'll, but I'm not going to listen to that. I'm trying to be optimistic. [00:01:00] But this week we're going to talk about affiliation and accreditation. Yeah. And I think it's important that. People understand at the club that these scenes are what are they? Why are they important? And the effort that goes into it.

Now we are at the club, it's live and I think some of the children had E numbers, as you may hear about. Yes, I think so. Yeah. I remember, I don’t know if you remember listening to the Halloween. Episode, but wow, that was absolute carnage. There had some e numbers that night, so this is tamed by it, so we should be fine.

We should be fine. But yeah, getting back to affiliation accreditation it's important for clubs such as Newton Willows to have, and we'll delve into that in a little bit. But firstly, can you just explain your role at the club and we'll get into the affiliation? Accreditation. I'm a trustee. I was brought in first of all to help with bringing money to the club for grants and commercial that's gone quite well.

And naturally their jobs evolved quite a bit since then, and he's got this knack of [00:02:00] giving you one job, then two jobs and three jobs and so forth. Mr. Tether, by any chance? Yeah. He's a right. Paying in the come, so yeah, I do grants commercial accreditation affiliation, and the Sunday fixtures for all the girls supporting.

 Like you just said you carry out numerous roles at the club, being a trustee as well affiliation, looking after that or being responsible or sort, can you just explain what is affiliation to those that are not too sure? Yeah. Affiliation is specific to each individual team. We have a hundred and, sorry, we have 40 teams at the club, and each team every year have to apply again for the ocean.

That's usually done during the close season, ahead of the new season starting, and each team has to ensure that all the volunteers in that team, every coach or helper, has a minimum of the [00:03:00] playmaker qualification, which helps 'em coach along with DBS checking. Safeguarding for first aid. Every team also in addition to that, has to have at least one coach who has a Level one coaching badge as well, right?

In addition to the playmaker. So most of those certificates, apart from Playmaker or Level one, have a certain lifespan last two or three years. And then they're immediately refreshed. And at the point of a plan, again, for affiliation, every season, add a check that all the people in the team volunteer have all those different criteria for fulfil.

Okay. So a lot goes into it. And why is it important for. That each team at the club to have affiliation. I think it's important for the people that come to the club. They know that if they're going to come here, they've got people that look after them that have the safeguarding so they're safe. [00:04:00] have the first aid, so they'll be safe again, and they'll get a level of coaching.

Minimum level of coaching or hire, again, depend on what the coach has gone through and done to help them on their football pathway, and that's really important. But I suppose. If you are a parent and you are going to bring your child to a team, right? First and foremost, you probably look at location as in how local and accessible it is.

Do you think that a lot of parents are fully aware of what goes into it and how safe their children are? I don't think they are. No. I think, but we do a good job of telling them yeah. Things like this help. I think also that. The WhatsApp groups that individual teams have as well. And I think more often than not, when you've got a player playing for your team, they've played somewhere else beforehand.

 And the feedback I got when I was a coach, I'm sure of the coaches get that play [00:05:00] for the club, is that they've moved the Newton new Willows and they enjoy it here because. They see the standard they're going to get when they come here. Yeah. And then obviously they compare to the previous place and say its better.

Absolutely. And we've used the word standard before, typically when we were celebrating a King's Award. And that we touched on accreditation then, and we'll come onto that in a little while. But I think standard is a, or standards is a really important word, and it's something that's got to be driven and consistent throughout any organization, but one that.

It's as big as Newton and Willows at in the grassroots game. For me, it sets it's the base of everything we do good and not so well. Agree. So how do we keep those standards? How do you. Ensure that people are upholding those standards. I think there's a lot of checking that's done by the club. [00:06:00] we also make sure that at the start of the season, we'll get all the coaches in, be their new coaches or pre-existing coaches.

And remind them of what the club expects from them. We have a coach's handbook, we have a volunteer’s handbook, we have a parents' handbook as well. And in those different documents, we tell the coaches, players, parents, everybody involved what they can expect from us and what we expect from them. And by regular reminders and refreshes of that, it gets the message through.

So all the tools are there for everybody that needs them, but I suppose for yourself the coaches, but you know yourself as a trustee, you have to really lead by example and make sure that you uphold those standards. Yeah. As well as policing them as well. Yeah. It comes from being proud of what you do and proud of who you do it for.

 I'm sure lots of the trustees have spoken to and the coaches and the volunteers have spoken [00:07:00] to. The passion for the club must come through and everyone you speak to when you have that passion and that enthusiasm, it makes it very easy and as well said, and I can only agree that the passion comes through in everyone, in, in what?

11, 12 episodes that we've done. I've been fortunate to listen to a number of people that associated with the club and people that may be outside. So we had a couple of coaches on previously yeah. That are in a professional game, but. They can feel it when they come to the club. And it was only September of 25 that I started doing this with the club.

As soon as I walked through the door, I could feel it. I was invited to a meeting. And you just, you can just tell. Yeah. And it, it's, it flows through like it is the lifeblood of the club. Yeah. It underpins everything. That must help keep coming back and keep that drive to make sure those 40 teams and the workload that you have to take on [00:08:00] it must help you do that, surely.

Oh, a hundred percent. And you always want to get better and strive to be better as well. I think you all know from our professional careers that if you don't evolve, if you don't make sure that put up lifestyle and extended. And being improved, but very eventually it will just die off. So you apply those same principles into anything in life and you'll do well.

I can agree more. That was really well said mate. And in terms of the affiliation, if we said. I don’t know, Tom's not about right. So sometimes we all do that. We're pigeonholes someone and you're the expert. But I don’t know, you, you win that euro millions on Friday and you decide Barbados or whatever is it?

100%. Yeah. Is a, maybe a better climate and you can't put all this into it. Could someone pick that up and run with it? Or is it, listen, you don't realize how much I grafted into this. No I'm in a lucky place because I had a very good [00:09:00] mentoring Dave Tires. And. He handed it over to me two, three seasons ago, and it wasn't dropped on from a big high.

There was a document given to me of his high, give it on. And also in the meantime, giving Dave a lot of credit there because he deserves it. The FA portal has improved quite a lot of the time as well, right? Where in the past there would be a lot of manual spreadsheets and whatnot to record.

When certificates were expiring and whatnot. Now the portal holds that more information for you. Okay. So the main part of the job really is making sure you're on top of expiring certificates and for one of the bear expression herding cats. Because you want that team to be affiliated, if not affiliated by the middle of the summer.

They can't play friendlies, they can't benefit for the new league season. So it's. And that's specific for the team. Accreditation we've gone to a bit [00:10:00] shortly is about the club, but the affiliations with the team. So if one team over here hasn't done it, the other team has, they can carry on playing, but the ones over here can't.

 Okay. So it's about making sure that they know it's not the club that's getting let down by them not doing their bit. It's their own team. It's their own coaches. It's their own players. And I want the kid to carry and play in. So if they want that as well. Get your stuff done. Absolutely. And I suppose you said earlier that a lot of its done preseason certificates may expire any part.

 If I did a coaching badge and I did that in December. My expiry will be in December of Yes. Wherever that is. So I bet there's a lot of reminders that go out to people. There's a lot of reminders. I say herding cats. And I feel a little bit, I'm a bit more empathy. Me as my wife when that DIY job's not been in at home, and I've been told over and over again, and I'm a bit like that.

 But we [00:11:00] start early in the process. So rather than leaving until the start of the summer, we'll do it well before then and give people enough notice that in four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks, times, whatever, your badge is expiring. Getting your diary fitting with your own busy health, busy, hectic lifestyle, and we'll get it done now.

 That, that sounds logical, but what about when people come and go, does that cause you a headache? Because I know that a lot of the coaches have been here a good number of years, but you have a lot of new people come in through, they love them. And naturally there'll be some kind of turnover because of life and whatever comes.

Does that cause you problems? The turnover is mainly, again, during the close season, but when a new coach starts, we do rely upon the existing coaching team from that team to help out a little bit and explain. What the requirements are, but more often not, it'll be, here's Tom's phone [00:12:00] number, give him a call.

But there's plenty of other people that help me as well. And say, part of the affiliation process is also that DBS part as well. Yeah. And when I take a download from the port standing, I can rely knowing it's in very safe hands of Rebecca. And that's the one bit that never goes. A strain because before those expire, Rebecca's on it, Rebecca's done it.

So it's more about keeping control of those certificates and making people aware of the consequences of not doing their stuff on time. It's symptomatic of the club where whenever I interview someone. And I say, well done, or you are doing this. And I try to add some kudos to the role you are undertaking.

Someone always says, yeah, but I've got help. There's always someone else. And that runs through the club as well. Yeah, [00:13:00] someone's always there to help. Someone's always there to support. And I honestly, I don’t know, that wasn't planned to say that just I just heard you say about Rebecca's name and you go, someone always says that at this club.

It's amazing. We're a close group. Yeah. And I think that's what helps drive it all forward with the fact we were a close group and we respect each other so much. That's that's evident every time people come down. But, the affiliation part. Do you think the coaches fully appreciate the process that goes into it?

 I suppose maybe some of the longer serving might, even though they forget, but they probably know the importance but not realize the effort that goes into it. Yeah. And. I think we've all been on training courses and the night before thinking tomorrow's gonna be really boring. I've got this training course tomorrow, what am I doing?

And then when you've done the training course, you think I've actually learned something today. Something that I didn't think I knew I know, after yesterday. Yeah. [00:14:00] So I think that's the same with the FA courses as well. If you do it correctly, there's always be something you're gonna learn. You can take in your training sessions, take in your approach to the kids.

And make their pet a goat going forward. Amazing. So affiliation we've boxed that off. You. We know the process, we know the importance, we know the consequences. If we don't kids can't play. And ultimately that's a disaster down at the club because that's what the club stands for. Accreditation.

So just give us a, an overview what is, what accreditation does a club currently hold, or accreditations should I say, and what, why are they important? Accreditation aimed at the club. So where affiliation is done in the summer, accreditation is done November time, and there's a window from November.

January, February time for to do it. I like to get it done. Very rarely at those, I think the last two years we've been the first club to be accredited and we've also got three stars. Okay? [00:15:00] So fantastic news. It's broken down into four different areas. The club. Officials documents and players pathway.

 On the club side of it, we need to make sure that every team's been affiliated by the fa. Also that every team's playing in the league, the club has a bank account and that the club has regular meetings and all minutes of all those meetings, and they're available to the fa if required. On the official side, it's quite like affiliation again, so it's a recheck about DBS.

It's a check that your club has gotten appointed welfare officer back to Rebecca again. A check about the safeguarding policy that's been adopted by the club or they've got their own one that's takes in as a minimum the FA requirements. Also checking that you've got an adult team with the same requirements [00:16:00] as the junior teams with the first aid as well.

And then all your youth teams with that same criteria. So that's for officials and it's on documents as well. So making sure that you've adopted or following the FA Club rules you've. Adopted and you've got evidence of adopting to the safeguarding policies of the fa. You've got an equality policy, you've got a grassroots code that you follow, and it again, matches the FA criteria.

 And you've got a diversity policy as well. So all those need to be evidence of the fa And then finally, you've. Done accounts, and those accounts are freely available up to the fas. That's where Chris Walker comes in. Yeah. And he excels in that somebody else appraising. And then finally on the pathway bit, it's having [00:17:00] a certain number of teams in each different age group.

 And then a new one they brought in about two or three years ago was a disability football team. Yep. And make sure you've got that as well. You can pull all the evidence together since the fa and they come back and tell you how many stars you get out of that submission. So it's quite a big piece of work.

Yeah it sounds very similar to that of a business. It's like running a business with policies with, equality and diversity as well. Accounts safeguarding it's not just a tick in the box. You have to evidence doing these important things. Again, even though the window opens in November, you've gotta have your ducks in a row a long time before that to make sure that.

You can actually achieve that window period. Absolutely. We want to be able to do it as soon as the window opens [00:18:00] so that the FA can say Neither will those, they're accredited and they've got free stars. And is free. Free stars the maximum you can get. Yes. Yeah. The last time I checked with the. FA in Liverpool, they're around eight 50 different clubs that were flee accredited into the Liverpool.

FA 13 have got three stars. 13. Wow. That's that's a decent, that's a decent return, isn't it? That shows you, you'd be first to do that. That's too fast. Yeah, again, it's that standard, isn't it? Setting a standard that we've got three stars, three stars is what we aim for. We look to do it within the start of the window because it's really important.

We've got all of our ducks in order. It's that standard. We will have everything at top order, and we won't allow ourselves to drop below that. Yeah we're in a very busy space. There's lots of junior football teams in [00:19:00] this area. Yeah. Everybody's obsessed with going online and buying things. And when you do buy things online, the first thing you do on Amazon is how many stars are you?

Yeah. If people from the outside of looking for their children to start playing football, they can look at. How many stars they've got and we'll be betting everybody else around here 'cause they've got freedom. Absolutely. No, that, that's a really good way of looking at it as well. 'cause that links in nicely.

'cause it could say, how important is accreditation? Because some people will understand that trustees for sure, maybe some of them members at the club, but others will go, yeah, all right, but. Why bother

opens doors for you as well? With the fa I'm sure they give more kudos to people. With free stars, more doors are open, more. We've got free tickets to, I know, to women's games with Liverpool, I've been to themself. Because we're a free staff [00:20:00] club, we get access to equipment for the teams 'cause of the free stars.

 Yeah, opens doors. So other than just being a good standard, it's, there's an incentive. And for the club in those I'd say maybe softer. Softer benefits. But then when you are applying for grants, and I know we spoke about that before, showing that you are an accredited club and you do things properly.

If I'm gonna part with some money and offer it to someone, I want to know that it's going gonna be handled right and dealt with correctly. Done. You do. Yeah. And lots of the grants that we're applying for you have to have accounts, you have to be able to show that to the people you're applying to. And that makes the application process so much easier for me, knowing that one quick message to Chris, within 15, 20 minutes I've received it and the application will go off.

 Again, [00:21:00] and when I'm sure when these people are reviewing the applications they receive, it sets us above from the rest because we've got, we've ticked all the boxes. Absolutely. And fundraising as well. If I want, so you said there's a a lot of football clubs, grassroots football clubs around the local area in Newton or Willows.

There's a number of businesses, but along the high street, not hundreds. I'm sure we're all trying to tap up the same people. Yeah. For shirt sponsors, board sponsors for footballs, whatever the case may be. Yeah. Yeah. We show we've got free stars. Yeah. That goes a long way for them as well. Yeah. You wanna be a, so you want your brand.

To be associated a successful brand. And I see NEW has been a successful brand. So if I own the business locally, I want my brand to be associated with Newtonville Football Club. And I know I'm quite biased, but when you look at our Facebook profile and. And how that looks. It, [00:22:00] I think anybody that was just browsing the net and came across football club would not realize unless you did here how big we are.

Yeah. I think people from elsewhere might look at and go, they must be up big club. We're a junior grassroots football team. But we know we want to do and haven't achieved it. I couldn't agree more. And I think Craig does a lot for the socials at the moment and he's he's taken it to a new dimension, but he's never short of content because of the amount of teams that we've got, the amount of players, coaches.

 I know some of the first team games have been called off the ladies and the guys open age recently, but there's always a game somewhere and a picture to be had and a score to put a headline on an event and a, an award that they just keep flowing for a period of time at the back end of last year.

 That doesn't happen by accident. You could have the best branded social [00:23:00] media, but if you've got nothing to put on it. Yeah. And people that don't offer information to go into it, to contribute to it, then Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And we are associated with some big businesses in the local area, and I think you are so right when you say.

You are brand. If I owned a business and I was fortunate and or generous enough to want to sponsor a local football club or any sports club, I want it to be one that's doing the right thing. Not necessarily don't have to win the most trophies, but doing the right thing. I want to know that people think a bit class down there.

Yeah. And ESG is the big buzzword, isn't it? Nowadays your Yeah. Business and lots of. And it's a good tax break as well. So I think people want to try and get into that to try and help with associate themselves with a charity that's trying to do the right thing. Absolutely. And I no doubt I'm just going back to that application sorry, the the process the window [00:24:00] and getting it done at the start of the window and being the first club and all that.

From an FA point of view, it's a bit like in my. Industry. We have a transport arm and we have earned recognition with the DVSA. So basically they go, you do things right, we'll just let you, we won't pick on you too much. 'cause we actually know when we do everything's clean, the FA would go. Oh, they just do it all right.

It's nice and easy with those guys and if they come knocking for anything, we know it's important. Yeah, Friendly's and the summer are good example of that because obviously lots of the teams wanna carry on playing during the summer. And that means that each individual friendly has to be individually approved by the fa, and there could be 10, 15, 20 games a weekend.

Sometimes a coach is giving you that request. 24 hours of they wanna play it is because of our relationship with the FA that we can put that request through and know that it will be [00:25:00] approved before the game kicks off. 'cause without that fa approval, the game can't go ahead. So it's because of that relationship with the FA and them knowing we've done the right thing before the game starts, the game gets approved.

Again, these are some of the quieter benefits, softer. People don't see that actually the coaches don't realize that by putting that request in all the hard work that's gone in beforehand. Makes their life a little bit easier 'cause they have got a tough job, right? Or role within, I say job, they've got a tough role at times.

They love it, but they need a little bit of help along the way. And if that's just a little bit of help, that can take a headache away and a bit of stress so that the kids can have a game, a run about how nice is that? And all because ducks in a row and EFA, you go. Yeah, it's a good club there. Yeah. One of the things I hear most from coaches that I'm nagging them about their certificates and what might as well, my previous club didn't [00:26:00] do that.

I don't care what your previous club did. Yeah. This is what we do and by doing that, pitching that goodwill from the cafe, that makes tricky decision's. A lot easier for them. A lot easier for us. Yeah. And nice one, your previous club didn't do it, but you've stepped up now, so Yeah. When you realize you do it the right way yeah.

There's a reason they don't do it. And we do. Yes. And that's no disrespect. It just is. And I think if we look at the last. 12 months lots happened at the club. A lot of good things. If you on the pitch the guys are going well in, in their league. New leagues opened up hand disability, football social media growing.

The podcast, the King's Ward. It there's lots and lots of things that are improving still. For you, doing what you do in this capacity, what does the future look like? Or is it now a case of being stable and consistent? [00:27:00] I wanna be stable. I don't wanna be consistent. You've always gotta be a thing to make your next target.

 The big one for us has been KGV. Yep. And that's a big project and take up an awful lot of time with an awful lot of people. There's still some work to be done there to put the first spade in the ground, if you will. But that'll take a lot of time. So get, get cage gry, make that our new home, our new form.

 That's gonna be a big one. Absolutely. It's a bit of a longer project. But one that. People can get a bit of fire under their belly. Yeah. Maybe just take a breather, do the normal day to day for a bit. 'cause it's gonna be, like you said, a bit of hard graft and a bit of time taken out. But one that I think everybody will get the iron and get very excited for.

Totally. Absolutely. Tom, you've really. Explain accreditation affiliation really well to me. I didn't know the [00:28:00] full ins and outs, so I'm sure the listeners are having the same experience. Is there anything you'd like to finish up on? Yeah. Affiliation, even though it's February now.

Affiliation will start again very soon. So if you're a coach and you listen to this in the next week or two, you begin a message from me saying, get your badges done. I know there's one coach in particular that listens to it when he is driving to Rexi at times for work norm Keen. And if there isn't an episode every week, I do get a text to say where are we?

 Yeah, pass the message on them. I will do. Tom, thank you very much for coming back on the pod. Cheers.