Sport England

How we helped Sport England get more young people active

The challenge

Sport England wanted to find out why growth in sport and physical activity had stalled among young people, and how they could change this.

The organisation realised it needed to get closer to young people and get them more involved in the way it develops policy and decides where to invest. In particular, it needed to get through to those who were not already engaged with sport.

“This is a sector where a lot of people are passionate about sport. Sometimes there’s a gap between their experience and that of everyone else.”
Strategic Lead - Research, Evaluation and Analysis, Sport England

The solution

We worked with Sport England on a series of projects spanning three years.

First, an attitudinal segmentation of 14-25-year-olds identified six personas, including sport enthusiasts, cautious introverts and ambitious self-starters. A panel was recruited to represent these personas, that Sport England could tap into at any time.

We built on this with qualitative work to develop a set of principles for communicating with each of these segments, particularly those who were uninterested in or lukewarm about sport. This was shared with everyone from grass-roots clubs to the Football Association and the Lawn Tennis Association.

Out of that came an online co-creation project where young people helped to come up with new ways of getting active.

The last piece of research looked at transitions from school to college or university, and how this creates opportunities for young people to try out new activities.

Our approach

The outcome

The work we conducted helped contribute to a culture change at Sport England, grounding its work in a deeper, first-hand understanding of young people.

It fed into Sport England’s new Towards An Active Nation strategy, which focuses on giving young people “a voice and choice” when it comes to sport and physical activity, and includes a specific commitment to supporting people through the transition from secondary to higher education.