Sports Business Management
Once she sets a goal, she puts her head down and starts working, allowing herself to see only the possibilities and not the obstacles. But breaking into a male-dominated business field wasn’t easy.
FAMILY BACKGROUND
The father of Valerie Camillo (VC) worked in the defense industry. Her mother was a homemaker. Her maternal grandfather turned VC into a baseball fan, specifically of the New York Yankees.
CHILDHOOD MEMORIES LATER INFLUENCE AN ADULT CAREER PATH
VC was drawn to sports after attending a Baltimore Orioles’ home baseball game (against the Yankees) and seeing the green grass field after she emerged from the tunnel of the stadium located in the middle of that large city. She recalls as a child, “being hit by the sense of grandeur, joy and community” which, when she turned 30 while working in the business world, she wanted to find a way to bring that childhood ballgame experience to others. So, she wanted to work in sports.
Always a ‘junkie’ for sports statistics, VC recalls the surprised looks she’d get at high school lunch tables and college bars when she’d “drop some knowledge” into men’s sports conversations.
EDUCATION
While in high school, VC competed in basketball, softball, and lacrosse. During college, she continued playing intramural sports while earning her degrees: Bachelor of Science in Commerce from the University of Virginia’s McIntire School of Commerce, followed by her Masters of Business Administration (MBA), also from UVA.
FIRST ADULT CAREER
VC’s first jobs involved business and marketing, initially at IBM and later with a large management consulting firm, Booz Allen. But she never forgot her childhood fascination with sports and wanted to find a career within the sports business, where she could bring her childhood ballgame experience to others.
TRANSITIONING TO A DIFFERENT BUT RELATED BUSINESS CAREER
VC had the self-confidence from her business consulting experience, where you go from industry to industry, applying your knowledge and judgment, to succeed in any business world despite it being male dominated but at first, she had no experience with special issues within professional sports management. So, she “hit the books” studying everything which she could find about the business of sports. During interviews, she needed to impress only one prospective employer with her business background and eagerness to learn and succeed in their sports business, which eventually she did.
Coincidentally, the NBA’s league office was open to increasing its diversity of perspectives by hiring females who didn’t necessarily have professional sports management experience. She stayed for four years with the league office, providing the opportunity to network with business representatives of the individual teams. While moving to the business side of one baseball team (Washington Nationals), VC impressed her more experienced administrators with the way she faced down rooms full of older, established, mostly white males, with humor and toughness.
VC’s advice: “Find your confidence and lead with that. It’s not about acting like you belong, it’s finding the belief that you do. To assess whether a prospective employer is truly committed to gender diversity, look at their staff, specifically whether females not only exist as employees, but whether any have been promoted.”
CAREER SATISFACTION
While learning the nuances of a new type of business and building trust in her judgment along the way, VC moved from baseball business to the world of professional hockey administration, where she has been promoted from entry level management to the President of the Philadelphia Flyers’ business side, which expanded her role from just dealing with the team, to leading a $350 million transition of the Wells Fargo Center, where the team plays its home games.
VC has now proved to herself that she could bring her education and prior business experience to a different business format
BUSINESS CREDIBILITY PROVIDES OPPORTUNITY TO HELP OTHERS
While focusing on her main responsibilities for her employer, VC encouraged her employer to support the creation and development of ‘Hometown Assist’ to help local businesses, a program that other pro hockey teams have since adopted. She also has strengthened the team’s commitment to new charitable initiatives and made a major impact on the league’s Executive Inclusion Council.
As important as those business initiatives have been, VC is also credited by many females who have since been hired by an expanding group of professional sports teams, with encouraging them to seek employment within a world which had been traditionally limited to males and once inside, to work hard to succeed and bring others along.
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Editor’s note – As the reader of other career stories within this collection will note, actual names of the individual and their business are usually avoided to preserve privacy and avoid distraction by reference to names, schools or businesses which are not relevant to the reason for including the story: why someone chose that career, its requirements, any challenges, and career satisfaction. However, Valerie Camillo’s story is an exception because she has helped so many others to date and might be willing to be a resource for others.
This story is based on an article in the 10/3/22 Philadelphia Inquirer, by Giana Han.
