Buckeye business stays afloat
By Sarah Wilcox
[email protected]
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Even without multi-million dollar contracts and corporate sponsorships for players, collegiate athletics is a business ? just ask Gene Smith.
?The challenge you have to keep in mind is we?re not producing a quantifiable manufactured product that people buy, take home and deal with,? said Smith, associate vice president and director of athletics at Ohio State. ?Because we?re an auxiliary, we?re required to be self-supporting. Customer service, pricing, start times, television, all of the contracts we get ? all of that is a part of the business.?
And just like businesses nationwide, the business of college sports
has taken a hit, with many teams cutting back on travel and personnel, and some even eliminating sports programs to stay afloat.
But Smith has crafted a game plan that kept the Buckeyes out of the red and split projected job cuts in two.
?In November of 2008, we had projected a $2.2 million deficit in our budget. So we began a process of reducing everybody?s budget to try and make up that gap,? Smith said.
His strategy helped trim the projected deficit down to $148,000, with 50 job cuts rather than the projected 100.
?We went into business mode, just like every other small business out there,? Smith said.
In addition to directing athletics, Smith?s duties as associate vice president include overseeing the Blackwell, Fawcett Center, Schottenstein Center and the Drake Union. He looks to make the Blackwell profitable in three years and to bring new types of events to the Schottenstein Center.
Construction heroes
Smith has been at OSU for five years, but he started preparing for the job while growing up in Cleveland. Working with his father from his early youth until he was 12, Smith idolized the construction workers at his father?s business.
?Those guys are my heroes,? Smith said. ?What they meant to me was hard work; they didn?t always know what their next job was. I learned work ethic [from them].?
Even though his career goals didn?t always include a college education, Smith attended the University of Notre Dame on a football scholarship and graduated with a degree in business administration.
He worked at Eastern Michigan for 10 years, was the athletic director at Iowa State University for seven years and worked as athletic director at Arizona State University for five years.
His resume also includes a four-year stint coaching under Dan Devine at Notre Dame, as well as a year of work at IBM.
?Gene?s background as a student athlete, coach, tenure in corporate America and administrative experience at [top universities] has allowed Gene to develop a unique skill set making [him] one of the most effective athletics administrators in the country,? said Bob Vecchione, deputy executive director of the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics.
