Brian Roe
MY personal journey in sports administration over nearly 40 years has coincided with massive changes in technology, amateur/professional status, policies and expectations.
In the early 1970s, there were few tools available to any volunteer starting out - with much emphasis on volunteers, as there were few professionals operating in the area.
Apart from a constitution, rule and minute books, there was little documentation to assist in acquiring the craft.
The majority of the learning was from those who had gone before or who were still in control and were prepared to share what they knew with others.
Even by the time Australian sport had finally understood that its failure to win a gold medal at the 1976 Montreal Olympics required more than a little luck and a replacement group of athletes and was dragged screaming into some degree of professional administration, nothing much had changed.
We were still years away from fax machines, mobile phones and computers.
Email, the internet and on-line learning were probably not even concepts in the minds of their inventors.
On the other hand, we had the genesis of the Australian Institute of Sport, and national sporting bodies, at least, were receiving encouragement and financial support to take their administration off the kitchen tables at least into the backrooms of sporting facilities.
But essentially, things were still pretty simple.
Australians loved sport to participate in it from their school days in house carnivals and team rosters, to their local club, and - if they were good enough - to represent their country or play at the highest level within it.
No one was making a buck out of it - even in the professional codes, pay packets were minuscule.
But the harsh reality that other countries had found ways to overcome the natural advantages that Australia had previously enjoyed in preparing for international competition had been driven home.
If we wanted gold medals from major games, the Davis Cup final to be played on home soil more often than not, and more Aussies to rank number one once again - changes had to be made.
A new breed of administrators started to make a difference - many of them paid and able to devote the time necessary to so just that.
As they began to sing from a markedly different hymn sheet, massive change occurred swiftly - aided and abetted by the technical revolution, pots of money from an enthusiastic sponsorship industry and eventually in 1993 by the success of Sydney's bid for the 2000 Olympic Games.
Both the professional codes and Olympic sport prospered, and success returned on the field.
With the exception of the odd doping case here and there, there was little scandal especially compared with the general community and the situation in sport in other countries.
It is quite extraordinary that it has taken until 2013 for that to change as momentously as it now has.
Many are happy to debate whether February 7 was in fact the darkest day in Australian sport to date.
But they will be hard-pressed to deny that it was the day in which expectations on those governing sport changed irrevocably.
Ethics and integrity were previously givens in sport - assumed and never questioned.
The difficulty with which the country's usually astute and informed sports media have had in reporting and commentating on these matters is reflective of just how much the scene has altered so quickly.
They simply don't understand many of the issues because they have never had, or wanted, to consider them in an Australian context at least.
Now they are buzz words and more importantly imperatives with remarkable connotations and expectations for all involved in sport.
And it means that my own journey takes off along another new path with myriad options as to where it might end up.