A familiar operational failure looks like this: a temporary team is assembled, completed work comes back for revision, people are pulled back into tasks they thought were finished, and last-minute changes push everyone into overtime.
The obvious response is often, “We need more people.”
Sometimes that is true. But when the real causes are unclear decisions, duplicated checks, missing handoffs, late changes, and approval delays, adding people does not remove the problem.
It can simply make the same disorder more expensive.
The most frustrating outcome is when the athlete at the center of the event receives almost none of the value created by that extra spending.
Athletes compete. Staff stay late. Contractors bill more. Coordination meetings multiply.
If the main things that grow are overtime bills and meeting time, the operating model is broken.
Before hiring more people, ask why work is being done again
The important question is what happened hours, days, or weeks before the overtime.
Common causes include:
- production starting before requirements are stable;
- no clear final decision-maker;
- several groups checking the same issue separately;
- changes not reaching everyone at the same time;
- finished work being reopened;
- last-minute requests carrying no visible cost.
Research on construction projects repeatedly identifies poor coordination, weak communication, errors and omissions, and stakeholder-driven changes as important causes of rework.[1][2]
Construction is not sports operations. The evidence should not be copied mechanically across industries.
If work starts before decisions are settled, or a change is not passed on, the people making it have to do it again later. That is worth checking at sports events too.
More people can do more work, but someone also has to explain the decisions, answer their questions and check their work.
Going from 5 people to 10 does not necessarily mean twice as much work gets done.
Temporary staff, people who do not know the earlier decisions, and returning staff need someone to explain what has happened so far.
Those explanations and checks take time too.
The bad loop is simple:
busy
→ add people
→ add explanations and checks
→ become even busier.
Longer hours do not always mean more work done
There is another trap: if the job is not finished in 8 hours, work 10; if 10 is not enough, work 12. But those extra hours do not always mean equally more work gets done.
In Pencavel’s study of old factory records, working longer did not always increase production at the same rate. Beyond a certain range, adding more hours brought smaller increases in production.[3]
The data came from wartime munitions production, not modern sports events, so there is no universal hour threshold to import.
The transferable point is narrower:
One hour of overtime does not necessarily mean an extra hour’s work gets done.
If tired staff make decisions at night that must be corrected the next morning, some overtime is simply tomorrow’s rework purchased in advance.
Decide before starting, and count the cost of changes
Before asking the people doing the work to hurry, make sure someone decides what to do and tells them clearly.
1. Set a change cutoff
Changes after the cutoff should be limited to genuine emergencies, safety issues, legal requirements, or serious quality problems.
2. Create one final decision point
Many people can provide input. Final approval should have one clear owner.
3. Put a cost on late changes
Record added hours, contractor costs, and schedule effects.
This is not about punishing the requester. It makes the trade-off visible.
4. Track rework causes
Do not record only overtime. Record why work had to be repeated.
5. Standardize handoffs
Keep decisions, open issues, owners, deadlines, and change history in one place.
6. Protect contingency time
Keep spare time for real trouble at the event, not for decisions that should have been made earlier.
Use some of the savings for athletes
Suppose an event saves ¥1,000,000 by avoiding repeated work. If that only adds ¥1,000,000 to company profit, the athletes’ conditions do not change. This is an example, not a claim that every event can save that amount.
Decide in advance that some of the money actually saved will be spent on helping athletes.
That can mean:
- prize money or appearance fees;
- performance bonuses;
- better travel and accommodation;
- recovery time;
- medical and rehabilitation support;
- training environments;
- coaching, analysis, or equipment;
- athlete-controlled support budgets.
Research on work and pay in sport also discusses how the rules and negotiations affect how money is shared between athletes and owners or organizers.[4][5]
So growth in revenue alone does not answer the important question.
Who receives the value created by the system?
Sports do not happen through athletes alone.
Operations, production, officiating, medical teams, security, broadcasting, sales, communications, venues, and logistics all create real value.
The problem is not that surrounding organizations earn money.
The problem is when work keeps being redone because decisions or messages were missed, and everyone gets used to paying extra for it.
Pay for necessary work.
Pay necessary people.
Reduce repeated work caused by poor decisions or missed messages.
Those principles are compatible.
How much time and money went into doing work again?
Useful measures include:
- total labor hours;
- overtime hours;
- rework hours;
- number of late changes;
- number of reopened tasks;
- incremental contractor cost;
- unresolved issues close to event time;
- direct athlete-support spending;
- verified savings from reduced rework;
- share of those savings returned to athletes.
A simple model is:
Rework cost = repeated labor hours × actual hourly labor cost + incremental external costs + change-related costs
Then:
Money for athlete support = verified savings × pre-agreed share
This creates a direct connection between better operations and better athlete support.
Then return part of the savings to athletes.
That produces a healthier cycle: athletes perform, support staff do necessary work, rework shrinks, and part of the economic benefit flows back into the sport itself.
