First, I suggest you to read ECA research on Youth academies available on https://lnkd.in/eQh69vNt. Here are a few tips on how to use this publication:
1. Go through the list of working processes used in the survey and see if you find any working process on the list interesting for you and are willing to work on its implementation (feel free to contact me for a list of working processes if you haven’t saved them from survey)
2. Go through lists of most used working processes and see if you have all of them (pages 60-61)
3. Go through the list of least used working processes and see which you don’t have (pages 62-63)
4. Go through the list of most correlated processes and try to identify causality for correlation and see how those working processes are relevant in your academy (pages 64-67)
5. If you find a specific working process especially interesting to you, feel free to contact me to reach out for the list of working processes it is correlated with.
6. Go through the list of most recognized indicators of successful transition from academy to the first team and cross-check it with your club (pages 70-73).
Looking forward to hearing (reading) your opinion, ideas, and comments!
What are we doing re “digital life” of kids in an academy?
So, what are we taking doing re “digital life” of kids in an academy? What are challenges to kids and how they use it.
One of least used processes in the academies based on research done by LTTsports for ECA is “The club does employ anyone to take care of players personal brand” and it is truth in 16% of clubs.
Based on an article made by Ofcom (Great Britain regulator for the communications services that we use and rely on each day; https://www.linkedin.com/company/ofcom/ ) available on link https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2022/one-in-three-internet-users-fail-to-question-misinformation. Based on an article, usage of social network is huge, based on source used in an article (World Economic Forum, August 2021, Here’s what happens every minute on the internet in 2021; https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/08/one-minute-internet-web-social-media-technology-online/ ), every minute sees 500 hours of content uploaded to YouTube, 5,000 videos viewed on TikTok and 695,000 stories shared on Instagram. Furter on among older children aged 12-17, 74% of them are confident that they can correctly estimate if content on social network is fake but only 11% are able.
Despite being under the minimum age requirement (13 for most social media sites), 33% of parents of 5-7s and twice as many 8-11s (60%) said they have a social media profile. Older children are most likely to have a profile on Instagram (55% of 12-15s), while younger children aged 8-11 were more likely to have profiles on TikTok (34%) and YouTube (27%). TikTok is growing in popularity, even among the youngest age groups; 16% of 3–4-year-olds and 29% of 5-7s use the platform (Ofcom).
Still, it seems it might influence on kids focus based on same article. Children reported being unable to watch films, or other long-form content, without being on multiple devices at the same time. In fact, only 4% of children aged 3-17 say they never do anything else while watching TV (data from The Insights Family).
More than a third of children (35%) reported engaging in potentially risky behaviours, which could hinder a parent or guardian keeping proper checks on their online use. A fifth surfed in incognito mode (21%), or deleted their browsing history (19%), and one in 20 circumvented parental controls put in place to stop them visiting certain apps and sites (6%). Of those profile lot of them are fake. Based on Ofcom research, two-thirds of 8-11-year-olds had multiple accounts or profiles (64%). Among these, almost half (46%) have an account just for their family to see. A fifth of 16-17 years-olds (20%) choose to have separate profiles dedicated to a hobby such as skateboarding, gaming or photography.
Still, some kids are recognizing positive side of social networks, using it for wellbeing. Based on an article, over half (53%) of 13–17-year-olds feel that being online is good for their mental health, compared with 17% who disagreed.
From sport and wellbeing perspective in Ofcom article could be found that eight in ten 13–17-year-olds are using online services to support their personal wellbeing. A quarter said they have learnt about healthy eating online or have found help with ‘growing-up issues’ like relationships and puberty. A fifth used the internet to follow fitness programmes and health trackers, or to get help when feeling sad, anxious, or worried. Similarly, about one in 10 went online to help with sleep issues, to meditate, or to help them feel energized, with Calm (34%) and Headspace for Kids (29%) the most popular apps used (Ofcom).
Finally, kids are using almost regularly social networks from very young ages (despite minimum age requirements), they are aware that they are engaged in potentially risky behavior, their focus on long term content is regularly disturbed by using other devices and big majority of kids are having multiple profiles on social networks. On the other side big majority use online services to support their wellbeing and some are using it for fitness programmes and health trackers. They also learn about relationship on social services content. Also, based on kids’ presence it could also be used in talent identification process. So, it is important part of their life, and they find it credible in significant percent of kids population. Still, I would say, just 16% of clubs are employing somebody to care about players’ personal brand.
If we see that, based on an article “‘Social Media Manager’ is One of the Most Popular Jobs in the US. It’s a Lot Harder than it Sounds” by Greta Rainbow from 2020 (https://money.com/social-media-jobs/), social media manager is most wanted jobs, topic of having working process related to kids “digital” life or life’s might be on the table within football youth academies as well. They are using and providing content available on social networks forever. Once on internet, always on internet. Also, important part of their identity is their “digital” identity, and it influences on their mood, on their focus on daily tasks related to school but also trainings and match played. Teaching them how to use it and helping them express their content is not just exercise related to social network but much more, it helps them deal with spectrum of situations which they will benefit as human beings in their life.
If you want to implement this process within your club, the process could be:
- Identify most common treats on social networks for kids.
- Identify most useful, recommended content on social services for kids.
- Educate kids how to provide content in safe and sustainable perspective from content side.
- Educate kids how to deal with conflict situation on social networks.
- Introduce to kids’ communication channel and expert whom they can address to related to any question related to dealing with the content on the social services.
- Help them make development plan for social network profiles.
- Take care about kids’ privacy.
- Regularly follow their publicly available social networks profiles.
- Measure and report on development of their profile.
- Educate parents and managers about all prior steps.
*It is recommended to have an expert in social network communication and expert in psychology included in this process.
Additional reading:
“The German Young Olympic Athletes’ Lifestyle and Health Management Study (GOAL Study): design of a mixed-method study” byA. Thiel, K. Diehl, K. E. Giel, A. Schnell, A. M. Schubring, J. Mayer, S. Zipfel & S. Schneider https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1471-2458-11-410
“The Pros and Cons of Athletes using Social Media” by Sarah Daren https://www.coachesclipboard.net/athletes-and-social-media.html
“The Impact of Social Media on Youth Athletes” by Luke Smith https://www.stack.com/a/the-impact-of-social-media-on-youth-athletes/
“Social Talent Scouting: A New Opportunity for the Identification of Football Players?”, by Elena Radicchi, Michele Mozzachiodi,
https://sciendo.com/downloadpdf/journals/pcssr/70/1/article-p28.pdf“Beyond recreation: Personal social networks and social capital in the transition of young players from recreational football to formal football clubs”, by Edoardo GF Rosso and Richard McGrath, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1012690212444409