Original article

Organizational Process Management at the Cuban National School of Volleyball. Need for a Strategic Change

0000-0002-5569-2978Rodolfo Yovanny Pérez Céspedes¹  , 0000-0001-5483-2847Ana María Morales Ferrer²  , 0000-0003-1491-7410Alfredo Quintana Díaz³ 

¹Escuela Nacional de Voleibol. La Habana, Cuba.

²Universidad de Ciencias de la Cultura Física y el Deporte "Manuel Fajardo". La Habana. Cuba.

³Centro de Investigaciones del Deporte Cubano. La Habana. Cuba.

ABSTRACT

Introduction:

The current demands of a sports organization do not always match the reality of significant process management aimed to produce the efficient outcomes expected and to meet the social goals.

Aim:

To determine the need for a strategic change in organizational process management at the Cuban National School of Volleyball.

Materials and methods:

Scientific techniques and methods were used, such as documentary review, interview, survey, brainstorming, SWOT matrix, Ishikawa diagram, MIC-MAC cross-impact matrix, statistical-mathematical methods, and methodological triangulation.

Results:

The shortcomings found were summarized as a premise evidencing the state of adverted need since the study variable constitutes the main key factor of success in the development of a sports organization.

Conclusions:

The study variable is the main key factor of success in organizational development, which proves the need for a strategic change in management.

Key words: Management; sports organization; organizational processes.

INTRODUCTION

Organizational process management is a topic studied by several scholars who are looking for methods and tools that help them perform more efficient managing work to achieve their goals. Their efforts are directed at converting their structures into highly competitive, efficient, effective, and sustainable organizations according to the demands of each moment.

^{Spinelli (2017)} said that management is art based on creativity, not repetitive or structured actions that trigger collective processes.

^{Martínez (2022)} interpreted management as a group of actions that must be executed to achieve a particular goal.

In this study, organizational process management not only entails transformation and optimization of every organization but also involves a broad and deep process of general training of human resources for new and more complex conditions. Training should be devised collectively, emphasizing strategy, in which planning, organization, management, and control are the main premises that would help build creative and innovative organizations.

The new challenge posed to sports organizations in the future will lie in the capacity of managing, grouping, incorporating, and selecting the high volumes of information generated by the different scenarios, at a higher speed, coherently and adaptatively.

The current demands of a sports organization do not always match the reality of significant process management aimed to produce the efficient outcomes expected and meet the aims of society. Hence, their criteria should be reviewed when planning, designing, and structuring within the sports organization.

In the future, a sports organization should rest on new managing trends and approaches toward individual commitment, teamwork, individual competencies, and excellence groups, including managing diversity.

In keeping with the above, the criteria of the directors of the National School of Volleyball of Cuba are aimed at managing the entity's key processes.

This sports institution is part of the system of the Cerro Pelado High-Performance Athlete Higher School (Esfaar), whose social mission is to contribute to comprehensive volleyball (including beach volleyball) athlete training. It was founded in 2002, as part of the Battle of Ideas led by Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz.

Considering the grounds from the above actors, and conscious of the need to promote actions in that direction, an exploratory fact-percentage was conducted. It engaged workers, athletes, teachers (coaches), executives, and officials, who provided their valuable opinions on their direct or indirect involvement in the current state of the institution's organizational management.

Accordingly, several shortcomings, needs, controversies, and unfavorable scenarios were observed, causing a manifested contradiction between the real and the desired states, according to management limitations and shortcomings in the entity's organizational management and the need to meet the social mission, with the expected results, which was described as the problem of this study consisting of the poor effectiveness in organizational management processes at the Cuban National Volleyball School.

An analysis of the facts, and the will to find a solution, led to the aim of this paper: To document a strategic change in organizational management at the Cuban National Volleyball School.

^{Pérez et al. (2023)} noted that one of the main challenges of sports organizations is the capacity to conduct proper organizational diagnostics to get a clearer and more objective vision of the inner and outer scenarios, and then, to recommend, advise, or redesign administrative processes and structures, which help accomplish organizational objectives, using managing sciences and technological complements.

Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to determine the need for a strategic change in organizational process management at the Cuban National School of Volleyball.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The selection of research techniques and methods was associated with targeting the validity and reliability of the research tools for data collection. Hence, the following methods and techniques were used.

Documentary analysis: It was determined as the objective of the documentary study for interpreting information published in different documents, and using it in the research. The analysis criterion established was associated with aspects of organizational process management at the Cuban National Volleyball School.

Interview: A group of individuals (15 executives) engaged in comprehensive athlete training were interviewed because of their knowledge of the school and its operation. It aimed to evaluate the population's knowledge and training about this topic.

Athlete survey: The questionnaire consisted of closed questions. It was conducted to evaluate the athlete's vision of sports organization and their perception of how organizational processes at school are managed. The sample was made up of 30 senior students during the 2021-2022 course.

Both the interview and the survey were considered opinion-based methods for empirical queries.

Brainstorming: This participatory technique is recommended for problems requiring a creative collective approach. It was used at different moments to gather more reliable results from the group's criteria about the research problem.

SWOT matrix: It is an empirical technique to determine weaknesses, threats, strengths, and opportunities. It was used to determine the state of organizational management at the Cuban National School of Volleyball in internal and external analysis. Every member of the Board of Directors took part in the SWOT matrix exercise.

Ishikawa diaphragm: The fishbone-like graph links dialectic pair cause-effect to a central axis representing the scientific problem. Accordingly, brainstorming was used to perform an analysis of the causes originating the problem, and its possible solution.

The MIC-MAC crossed-impact matrix: It consists of overlapping the impact between internal and external variables, and multiplication applied to classification. It permits consensual participation in determining crossings, and then determining the link variables for key success factor detection, and the construction of possible scenarios like prospective methodology.

Statistical-mathematical methods: Descriptive statistics was used to determine the questionnaire's response values (survey and interview), along with stat graphs showing the relation between SWOT and MIC-MAC.

Methodological triangulation: It was helpful for cross-control of the many different results, using scientific methods and techniques, and checking coinciding opinions as potentialities and shortcomings.

Selection of the ample population

The samples consisted of sports teachers (coaches), athletes, staff, executives, and officials at the Cuban National Volleyball School, confirming the intentionality of the sample, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 - Characterization of the population and the sample  

Methods and techniques	Description		Population	Sample	%
Surveys	Senior athletes		70	30	42.8
	Sports teachers		17	14	82,4
Interview Ishikawa diagram SWOT MIC - MAC	Executives	Deputy technical director	1	3	100
		National Commissioner	1
		Deputy logistics director	1
	Officials	Methodologists	4	12	100
		Internal control facilitator	1
		Educative work instructors	4
		Specialists	3

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Documentary analysis revealed the existence of documents required for the entity's operation.

Overall, 57.1 % of athletes surveyed said the executives' skills and knowledge to manage principal processes, whereas 14.2 % said it was deficient, and 3.6 % said it was ineligible.

A total of 14 sports teachers (100 %) with over 20 years of work experience, all having a Bachelor's Degree in Physical Culture, noted that the executives have the skills and knowledge needed to manage principal processes at the institution.

However, they stated that on occasions, they are not free to make decisions, and about the administrative office, they value the limited knowledge and experience in terms of administrative management, which hinders coherence and proper sequence of the results in their work.

A participatory meeting for planning was held with executives and officials, to design the Ishikawa diagram and analyze the causes and effects. Brainstorming was useful to achieve that objective.

The Ishikawa diagram is visualized through the research problem, particularly, the poor effectiveness of organizational processes at the Cuban National Volleyball School, an essential effect to determine the possible origins by deriving them into a satisfactory solution to the problem. Accordingly, four first-order causes were determined: poor mastery of organizational process management, lack of discipline and control by executives and officials, subordination to the Cerro Pelado Main Office, and lack of knowledge about goal-based management.

The second-order causes were related to the lack of knowledge of legal standards, little scientific research, shallow analyses, short payrolls, little autonomy, and lack of knowledge of guidelines from the Headquarters (National Institute of Sports, Physical Education, and Recreation).

The third-order causes were the following: no use of norms and procedures, lack of interest and motivation of some executives, unqualified staff for their posts, bureaucratic styles in the structure, and the lack of observation of the norms and procedures as working tools.

The analysis revealed that the second and third-order causes determine the existence of the research problem, and the organization should focus on them to create conditions to work on the first-order causes. Therefore, the proposal for actions should deal with addressing these causes, and therefore facilitate the solution to the research problem.

The first and second-order SWOT results considered the effects of the analysis of impact intensity by quadrant and helped determine the strategy to follow as more offensive (MAXI-MAXI) so that the Cuban National Volleyball School is capable of relying on its strengths and take advantage of opportunities to solve the strategic problem resulting from flaws observed in organizational process management: Table 2 and Table 3.

Table 2.  - First-level SWOT analysis 

-	Strengths	-	Opportunities
S1	Alliances between the School and the National Commission	O1	Hiring athletes from foreign leagues
S2	Experienced technical staff	O2	Human Resources management
S3	Alliances with the teaching structure	O3	Commitment to the people over the main activity
S4	Labor legislation regulating Human Resources management	O4	Approved enrollment policies for athletes, coaches, specialists, and sports veterans
S5	Insertion of athletes from foreign leagues	O5	Work ties with the Center for Cuban Sports Research
-	-	O6	Support from the national government
-	Weaknesses	-	Threats
W1	Observation of labor functions	T1	Current migratory scenario
W2	Experience in managing posts	T2	Cadre reserve
W3	Subordination to the main offices	T3	Salaries that match the established job requirements
W4	Payroll	T4	Relation between athlete income and a public servant (coach, teacher, or service worker).
W5	Scientific research	-	-
W6	Resources and means for proper administrative management	-	-
W7	Objective-based management	-	-
W8	Comprehensive educational work	-	-

Table 3.  -Analysis of impact intensity 

The MIC-MAC analysis for determining the key success factor for change management and scenario design led to the establishment of six link variables necessary for this procedure.

Link variables:

F1. Alliances between the School and the National Commission; S2. Experienced technical staff; S4 Labor legislation regulating Human Resources management; W1 Observation of labor functions; W8. Comprehensive educational work; O4 Approved enrollment policies for athletes, coaches, specialists, and sports veterans

Data processing revealed that the variables obtained in the sports factor are the most dependent on the other variables, whereas the variables within the managing factor have the highest influence on all the other variables.

It was also found that the behavior of management will have a proportional repercussion on sports performance. In that sense, the predominant organizational setting of the entity will be more or less relevant, as described by ^{Pedraza and Bernal (2018)}.

Based on these results, a desirable and feasible scenario was designed for the organization, which was assumed as the main agent of management change.

Desirable and feasible scenario (change management):

The Cuban National Volleyball School as a sports organization will deal with relevant processes through an offensive strategy (MAXI-MAXI), with growing autonomy levels based on the compliance of guidelines by the National Institute of Physical Education and Recreation (INDER), and the Cerro Pelado Higher School for High-Performance Athlete Training, according to the labor regulations approved.

It will enhance the potentialities derived from the alliances between the institution and the National Volleyball Commission, relying on the enrollment policy approved and designed for athletes, coaches, and specialists, as well as the experience of technical staff, thus leading to a more demanding attitude toward work functions that will entail higher comprehensive educative actions from staff.

The results provided by the various techniques and methods used were checked for coinciding potentialities and shortcomings. The methodological triangulation concluded that the variable studied, organizational process management at the Cuban National Volleyball School is the main key success factor in the organization, particularly quality management, as described by ^{Díaz and León (2019)}, ^{Sánchez et al. (2022)}, and ^{Pérez et al. (2023)}.

Naturally, the diagnostic of the the current state of the problem justified the need for this research, and document a strategic change in organizational process management at the Cuban National Volleyball School, in keeping with the objective set by ^{Fierro (2020)}, and ^{Cassetti and Paredes (2020)}, using an organizational change perspective, the theory of change, and the system of government management based on science and innovation for sustainable development in Cuba, looking to project and make transformation more dynamic.

CONCLUSIONS

The inclusion of scientific methods and techniques unveiled the existing flaws in key organizational process management at the Cuban National Volleyball School; this study found that the strategy to follow should be offensive (MAXI-MAXI).

A feasible and desirable scenario was built for this particular sports organization, whose main agent is management change. Meanwhile, a transversal analysis revealed the potentialities and shortcomings of the problem. It was concluded that the variable used for change is the main key success factor in an organization, thus calling for a strategic change of management.

REFERENCIAS BIBLIOGRÁFICAS

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Received: August 04, 2023; Accepted: September 24, 2023

^*Autor para la correspondencia: [e-mail]

Los autores declaran no tener conflictos de intereses.

Los autores han participado en la redacción del original (primera versión) y la revisión y versión final del artículo.