The general manager of a club has a wide range of responsibilities and the expectations of members and visitors are growing and changing constantly. Because of this, the CMAE believes the components of successful club management can be defined by the following core competencies of a club manager:

Conceptual skills

Club Governance

  • Board best practice
  • GM Performance reviews
  • Board self-evaluation
  • Strategic planning
  • Club mission and vision
  • Governance Succession plan
  • Board and committee orientation
  • Roles and responsibilities
  • Board goals and objectives
  • Meeting management
  • Club industry challenges

Inter-Personal Skills 

  • Communication skills
  • The dynamics of teams
  • Responding to conflict
  • Evaluate and accept responsibilities
  • Working harmoniously with others
  • Transparancy
  • Listening skills
  • Effective presenter
  • Speed reads
  • negotiation

Leadership

  • Professional image and dress
  • Effective negotiation
  • Member contact skills
  • The manager as a leader
  • Personal Strategic plan
  • Self-improvement
  • Time Management
  • Ethics
  • Critical Thinking skills
  • Change Management
  • Innovation
  • Coaches
  • Mentorship
  • Delegation
  • Empower others
  • core values
  • Motivation
  • Empathetics
  • Represent club brand

Administrative skills

Accounting, Finance and Data Analytics

  • Principles of club accounting
  • Understands financial standards
  • data analytics
  • Financing capital projects
  • Audits
  • Budgeting and financial analysis
  • Tax for clubs
  • Computing and software systems
  • Cash flow forecasting
  • Office administration
  • Salaries and benefits administration
  • Data collection systems
  • Variance analysis
  • Benchmarking
  • Lease vs buy

Human and Professional Resources

  • Employee relations, policies, recruitment, selection, orientation and onboarding
  • Employee culture
  • Performance reviews
  • Management styles
  • Stress management
  • Organisational development
  • Work-life balance
  • Club job descriptions
  • Human resource strategy
  • Confidentiality
  • Compliant

External and Governmental Influences

  • Legislation
  • Data protection
  • Regulatory agencies
  • Club law
  • Economic theory
  • Alcohol regulation
  • Independent contractors
  • Copyright
  • Health & Safety Law
  • Safe and secure working environment

Membership and Marketing 

  • In-house publications
  • Media relations
  • Membership acquisition and retention
  • Marketing strategies for clubs
  • Marketing planning
  • Traditional and digital media
  • Societal trends
  • Publicity
  • Public relations
  • Situation analysis
  • Marketing research

Technical skills

Golf, Sports, Recreation and Wellness

  • Golf
  • Wellness
  • Tennis / health & fitness
  • Sport
  • Recreation
  • Spa
  • Fitness
  • Aquatics
  • Family and youth programming
  • Trends
  • Retail offerings
  • Financail planning and operating budgets
  • Sports emergency protocol
  • Sport etiquette

Facilities Management 

  • Preventative maintenance
  • Housekeeping
  • Insurance & risk management
  • Security
  • Business continuity
  • Project management
  • Managing contractors
  • Energy and resource management
  • Renovation
  • Captial projects

Food and Beverage Management

  • Service standards
  • Menu development
  • Functions and themed events
  • Nutrition and food science
  • Equipment
  • Pricing concepts
  • F & B personnel
  • Ordering / receiving / controls / inventory
  • Wine list development
  • F & B trends
  • Understand competitors
  • F & B laws

Information Technology

  • Integrated technology
  • technology strategy
  • technology management
  • cybersecurity
  • back up and disaster recovery plans
  • member data management
  • reservation systems
  • software selection
  • planning for technology