Football fan Declan Boylan and his company wanted their sponsorship of the Westfield Matildas to go beyond just a financial arrangement.
And with that in mind, his company Seven Consulting (Seven was named after Liverpool great Kenny Dalglish) has put in place an innovative layered deal with the Australian national team.
What’s so inventive about Seven Consulting's arrangement is the fact that some big name Matildas will be interning in the company’s offices, gaining crucial training and corporate experience with Seven Consulting clients to help them transition into life after football.
On top of the normal sponsorship deal and supporting the Matildas bid for the 2023 World Cup being held in Australia, Seven Consulting offered paid internships for the Matilda’s squad in Seven Consulting.
The deal will assist some Matildas transition into life after football.
Seven Consulting were keen to support the team as much as possible and make the sponsorship as “useful” as possible to the individual players.
“We’re very happy that Lydia Williams and Tameka Butt have, at this stage, taken up those internships. Both ladies in question have degrees and Tameka is finishing her masters. This may help the transition to corporate life over the next few years," Boylan explained.
The internships are structured around the players’ busy schedule and are expected to be around 10-15 days in the first year and then grow in scale as they learn project management and start to focus more on their post-game careers.
“This all doubles down on our support for these ladies, as we feel that they are the best football team in Australia of any strip or description,” Declan Boylan still an enthusiastic Over 45s player, told https://matildas.footballaustralia.com.au.
The company has transitioned into a staff profit share this year, so the idea of sponsoring the Westfield Matildas went to a vote as it potentially could impact the bottom line for staff.
The idea of sponsorship was put to a staff vote with an emphatic 95% of staff in favour of the deal.
“We’re a relatively small company. We’ve about 100 staff, so sponsoring national teams is not something we’d looked at previously," Boylan added.
“But there seemed to be a huge mismatch in the quality and potential of the Matildas and the amount of support and sponsorship they were getting. We saw the opportunity to help.
“So there’s an overwhelming amount of support from our staff for the sponsorship,” he added.
“The whole company has put its hand in its pocket to support the best team in Australia.”
“There’s going to be some pretty exciting times ahead for the team. The future for the Westfield Matildas does look incredibly bright," he added.
The next three years, potentially, could be very special.
On Sunday morning, the Asian Cup 2018 kicks off in Jordan with Australia facing South Korea in Amman.
A World Cup in mid-2019 and Olympics in 2020 round out this exciting period ahead.
Who is Seven Consulting?
Seven Consulting was founded in 2002 and delivers organisational transformations worth over $2.5bn each year for some of Australia’s largest organisations, using only permanent resources. They have a customer satisfaction level of over 99% and a team satisfaction level of over 97% for 2017.