Making football accessible globally and launching a multi-national agency in a pandemic with Co-Founder of Topodium Group, Chris Sharman #12
The style of football exhibited by England’s teams has undoubtedly evolved, in part due to a shift in the types of training offered to our rising stars. One man whose contributions to introducing samba-style futsal to the masses have likely shaped some of our current sporting talents is Chris Sharman.
Throughout his decades of sports and leisure experience, Chris has made incredible efforts to professionalise working with kids, and demonstrated remarkable resilience dealing with vastly different management scenarios.
Now the Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer of Topodium Group, a new sports, health and leisure agency that’s weathered the storm of 2020, Chris has had an incredible journey, into which we delve on this episode of the Extrology podcast.
Lee & Chris discuss:
Introducing a new football style to upcoming young talent
Heading up an internationally successful business division
The skills learned from hosting kids at leisure centres
Professionalising childcare
Handling challenging business politics
Starting a business in exceedingly challenging conditions
Links & references:
Lee Cooper: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leecooperrecruiter/
Chris Sharman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-sharman/
Topodium Group: https://www.linkedin.com/company/topodiumgroup/
Get in touch: lee@extrology.com
Episode highlights:
“I've always said that I connect dots. I see things, and then I look at how I could integrate that into what I do. I used to love reading comics, so I thought of doing that.” - 5:15 - Chris Sharman
“I went, did the interview, got the job, and became a party host doing sports parties, bouncy castle parties and swim parties at the local leisure centre for kids. I started when I was 15 and wasn't sure to start off with, but I got into it, I loved it, and I literally never left the industry from that point forward.” - 11:10 - Chris Sharman
“England's always had a view that 5-a-side is an indoor, leisure centre, bouncing-off-the-wall style of football, with grown men kicking a ball around for an hour. Whereas within Europe, within South America, futsal is how you learn football. So I just bought into the branding element of it, the fact that it gave a point of difference, and technically it developed better players.” - 20:35 - Chris Sharman
“Speaking to, and working with, lots of different people, training up hundreds of coaches and helping them on their journey was probably what that I took away most from my experience. ” - 23:47 - Chris Sharman
“I want to control my own destiny, I don't want to be told what I can and can't do. I want to seize that and go ‘Actually, I can go back into football if I want to. Because I can control it.’” - 28:04 - Chris Sharman
“There are people that need supporting in different ways and that's the job of a leader. That's the job of someone who runs a business, to be open to any person with any background with any skill set. So the way that I try and run the businesses that I do, I do it with a very different pair of eyes now because of the prejudices that I had when I was working within someone's independent business.” - 34:52 - Chris Sharman
“In childcare you are being given someone’s prized possession, the responsibility is second to none.” - 37:12 - Chris Sharman
“If you harness technology for good, it can be positive for kids. There was this train of thought of needing to decrease screen time for kids. We know that if you tell a kid not to do something, they will want to do it even more. So I'm a big advocate of encouraging kids to utilise technology if it's used positively.” - 47:37 - Chris Sharman
“Where my business partner Taylor and I get the biggest kick is seeing the development of the people within the team, and I think that's almost a herd mentality that we've started together. We act as one, we enjoy working with each other, and we love the sector that we work in. ” - 59:49 - Chris Sharman
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