Sport Integrity Australia welcomes new National Integrity Managers
The sports of Water Polo, Golf, Cycling, Squash, Skate and Hockey have welcomed new National Integrity Managers (NIMs) to undertake the important work of embedding integrity within their respective sports, from the grass roots to the high performance space.
Our National Integrity Managers are a dedicated group of people who are committed to embedding integrity within their respective sports to ensure their members can thrive in sporting communities that are safe, clean and promote fairness.
At a recent NIM induction at our offices in Canberra we spoke with the new NIMs for Water Polo and Golf Australia about what brings them to the role and what makes them passionate about integrity in sport.
New Water Polo Australia NIM, Simon Devine, comes to the role as a former CEO of Water Polo Victoria. He hopes his knowledge of the sport and its operations will be advantageous in the role.
“I’m hopeful that with my introduction to this role and my learnings that I’m able to bring to it, we can streamline the process and make it easier for people to understand what integrity is about, and how they need to go about it,” he said.
One of Simon’s goals is to encourage buy-in from his membership to deliver meaningful change that delivers strong integrity, from safeguarding of children and young people to anti-doping within the water polo community.
“I think the biggest thing we can do as NIMs is to get people to see the benefit of integrity; and the benefit is a better experience for members,” Simon said.
“A better experience for members means more people want to play the sport, which means you build your base level, have better competition and achieve higher performance.”
Brooke Irvine is no stranger to the NIM role having previously been a NIM for Equestrian Australia and National Child Safety Manager at Gymnastics Australia. Brooke is also currently the NIM for Biathlon Australia and is now adding Golf Australia to her integrity kit bag.
It was the challenges within an individual sport that attracted Brooke to the new role.
“It's the challenge of reaching that social golfer versus the elite golfer in the pathways as well.
“It's this challenging structure that drew me to this role; how do we have consistency across all of those facets of golf and to try and make it a better experience for everyone.
“I'm passionate about educating; there's a lot of education in a NIM role and working across the organisation so that I get to the grass roots right through to high performance.
“Policies and process, I love it…trying to find the easy way to put in place the important things that need to be there…finding a way to work together for the betterment of the participants and the sport’s growth.
“The NIM role is extremely important for sports to have that additional knowledge and expertise in this area so they can work across, and help out, with every other aspect of the sport.”
Last year, the National Integrity Program was extended through to 2026.
SIA Sport Partnerships Manager, Linda Muir, said the NIM program, now in its third year, was vital to embedding integrity in sport across the nation, particularly at the state/territory and club/association level.
“We really need to support our NIMs so that they can educate their members; it’s a big education piece.
“It’s one thing to have a policy and send it out to clubs and associations and say, ‘you’re all now bound by this’, but it’s that awareness campaign and education piece that is so important.
“We’re working with our NIMs to support them with that education and awareness so they can foster environments where athletes play well and win well in a safe, clean and fair environment.”
Hear more from newly inducted NIMs Simon and Brooke on our YouTube channel:
