To break into the sports industry, it’s helpful for students to know the latest trends—and the right people. Tom Stallings attends the National Sports Forum to give students a head start on both.
First created in 1996 to break down siloes between sports leagues, the National Sports Forum (NSF) has grown into one of the largest gatherings of sport business professionals in the country. The forum celebrated its 30th anniversary this year in St. Louis, Missouri, with more than 1,000 sports professionals spanning teams, leagues, agencies, and brands.
Stallings, a Professor in the Practice of Sport Management at Rice University, has been attending the NSF for the past 13 years. He sits in on workshops, presentations, and panels to keep Rice’s Sport Management courses up to date, and he has even judged the forum’s case cup competition. The fast-paced, 24-hour competition challenges teams of graduate students to present solutions to real issues faced by sports organizations. In this year’s competition, Stallings says, students devised plans to use a $100,000 budget to drive attention to the Los Angeles Kings in a crowded entertainment market.
Though he enjoys the friendships he’s built over the years with many of the forum “regulars,” Stallings says his main reasons for attending center on his students: “I bring back information and trends to incorporate into our courses and programming, and I network with attendees so I can continue to open doors for our students,” he says.
You could say Stallings’ reputation in the Department of Sport Management is that of a door-opener. He is known for his vast network of connections—if a student is curious about a specific company, team, or area of expertise in the sports industry, Stallings usually knows someone (or knows someone who knows someone) who can help. The connections he’s made at NSF over the years, for example, have led to company information sessions, informational interviews, and even internship opportunities for Rice students.
It’s clear that the impact of these types of gatherings extends past the event itself. After 13 years of the NSF, Stallings understands that the forum isn’t an opportunity just to learn about the future of the sports industry, but also to help Rice students find their place in it.