Talent Development & Excellence
Vol. 2, No. 1, 2010, 51-62
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
51
The Development and Skills of Expert Major Junior
Hockey Player Agents
David J. Hancock1*, Diane M. Ste-Marie1 and Robert J. Schinke2
Abstract: Sport scientists have examined expert athletes, coaches, and officials.
However, secondary sport participants, such as player agents, have been overlooked.
Examining secondary sport participants may provide a better understanding of the
development of expertise across all sport participants. The purpose of this study was
to examine the development and skills of player agents. Six expert Major Junior
hockey player agents were investigated using semi-structured interviews. An expert
panel assisted with the interview guide development and data analysis. Results
demonstrated that experts progressed through 4 developmental stages (pre-agency
years, early years, developmental years, and expert status years) and possessed 4
superior skill sets (recruiting skills, contract skills, player management skills, and
business management skills). The implications of the results for player agents and
athletes are discussed.
Keywords:
expertise, talent development, secondary sport participants, social support, player
agents
In most domains, only a small number of individuals attain expert status. The path to
expertise has been documented in a wide variety of domains including chess (Simon &
Chase, 1973), science (Ericsson, Krampe, & Tesch-Römer, 1993) and sport (Starkes &
Ericsson, 2003). Specific to sport, expert athletes (Abernethy, Baker, & Côté, 2005; Janelle
& Hillman, 2003), coaches (Bloom, Durand-Bush, Schinke, & Salmela, 1998; Côté, Salmela,
Trudel, Baria, & Russell, 1995), and officials (Ste-Marie, 2003) have been examined. Yet
secondary sport participants, such as team owners and player agents, have been
overlooked. We contend that understanding secondary sport participants is important for
a more complete picture of sport expertise. Understanding the differences or similarities
of expert development among different sport participants would provide useful
information for the expertise framework. More recently, these secondary sport
participants have been referred to as “persons in the shadow” (see Gruber, Lehtinen,
Palonen, & Degner, 2008) and have been demonstrated to have an influential effect on
experts. To this end, the population of interest in this research was player agents.
Athletes hire agents to act on their behalf for a number of duties that the athletes cannot
or will not perform including contract negotiations, endorsement deals, financial or
taxation advice, and to serve as a conduit between team management and their clients
(Mason & Slack, 2001). Agents advocate for team sport coaches as well as individual sport
athletes (e.g., track and field and swimming) and team sport athletes (e.g., soccer,
baseball, and hockey). Our population of interest was agents involved in the sport of
hockey.
Within hockey, player agents represent professional hockey players, such as those in the
National Hockey League (NHL), as well as elite amateur hockey players playing in leagues
such as the Canadian Hockey League (CHL). The CHL is comprised of 50 Canadian-based
teams with another nine teams in the United States. The CHL is considered an elite Major
1
University of Ottawa, Canada
Corresponding author: 125 University Private, MNT #205, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON,
Canada, K1N 6N5, Email: [email protected]
2
Laurentian University, Canada
*
ISSN 1869-0459 (print)/ ISSN 1869-2885 (online)
 2010 International Research Association for Talent Development and Excellence
http://www.iratde.org
52
D. Hancock et al.
Junior hockey league largely due to its high number of athletes drafted to the NHL. In fact,
of the first 60 draft picks of the 2005 and 2006 NHL entry draft, 33 and 28 of the players,
respectively, were drafted from the CHL (Dubé, Schinke, Hancock, & Dubuc, 2007). As a
result of the CHL’s elite status, many player agents target CHL players in hopes of
recruiting clients that will become NHL players. These agents are called Major Junior
player agents (MJPAs) and were the respondent group for this study. Two lines of
investigation were followed; first, we investigated how MJPAs became experts and second,
we examined the skill sets possessed by expert MJPAs.
Developing Expertise
To understand expertise for MJPAs, one must understand consistent patterns of expertise.
Ericsson and colleagues (1993) indicated that a scientific account of expert performance
in any domain must describe the development that led to expertise. To that end, Bloom
(1985) identified three critical stages of talent development in young people (early,
middle, and later years) and noted that social support was vital in each stage. Extending
Bloom’s work, Côté (1999) identified three stages of talent development (sampling,
specializing, and investment years) and indicated that familial support was crucial in each
stage. It is important to glean from these studies that expert development typically
progresses across distinct stages. Information concerning the developmental stages of
social support providers – in particular, player agents – is unknown; however, we
hypothesize that similar developmental stages may well emerge.
Expert Sport Participants
We not only were interested in the development of expertise in player agents, but also in
identifying the specific skills or behaviors that are important in this role. Ericsson and
colleagues’ (1993) described expertise as the end result of individuals prolonged efforts
to improve performance while negotiating motivational and external constraints. The
authors’ work was conducted on musicians, yet it is quite evident that the outlined
principles of expertise (e.g., deliberate practice, social support, resources) can be readily
applied to other domains, including sport. Extending Ericsson and colleagues’ framework,
Janelle and Hillman (2003) defined expert sport performance as consistent superior
performance in the physical, technical, cognitive, and emotional domains and noted that
deliberate practice is required in order for an athlete to improve in each of these domains.
Janelle and Hillman’s framework is an excellent context from which to study athletes,
though there are limitations when transferring the framework to secondary sport
participants. MJPAs, for example, do not require physical (superior physiology) or
technical (sensorimotor coordination of movement patterns) expertise. Furthermore,
defining and measuring what constitutes deliberate practice in secondary sport
participants has yet to be achieved. Thus, the framework from which the authors reviewed
the literature was limited to the cognitive and emotional domains and as such, they did not
focus on the amount of deliberate practice in which the participants were engaged.
Despite this delimitation, we believed that rich and important sources of information
would emerge from the data.
In terms of cognitive skills, included were tactical skills and decision-making abilities
(Janelle & Hillman, 2003). In order to assess the cognitive skills of MJPAs, interview
questions revolved around the declarative and procedural knowledge framework outlined
by Thomas and Thomas (1994) in the sport officials’ literature. Declarative knowledge
refers to the rules or facts of a given event whereas procedural knowledge reflects how to
perform a certain task. Thus, respondents were asked about the rules and facts of
recruiting meetings and contract negotiations, for example, and how they incorporated
these items within their practice.
Emotional skills refer to exerting control over emotions (Janelle & Hillman, 2003). In the
context of expert MJPAs, emotional skill was how the respondents could assist their
athletes in reaching or maintaining a proper mental state. For example, agents were asked
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
53
about their role as a confidant for their players, as well as whether they had confidants or
mentors who assisted them when they entered the business. Indeed, mentoring was found
to be important in another sport participant, expert coaches (Bloom et al., 1998; Schinke,
Bloom, & Salmela, 1995).
The literature on expert development and sport participants provided an excellent
foundation for two lines of inquiry: (a) how did MJPAs develop expertise, and (b) what
specific skills do expert MJPAs possess? How these research questions were ultimately
shaped, refined, and directed toward participants is discussed in the following section.
Method
Expert Panel
An expert panel consisting of a former agent and two former NHL players was involved
throughout this study. The former player agent represented athletes in several sports
including the NHL, the Canadian Football League, and the National Football League over
his 15-year career. Combined, the former NHL players played 20 NHL seasons, but more
importantly, they had direct experience with player agents. The former NHL players were
well aware of the context surrounding MJPAs and provided valued input into the project.
The expert panel assisted in (a) determining selection criteria for agents, (b) providing
interview guide feedback, and (c) assisting with final code verification. As a group, the
expert panel brought knowledge, experience, and credibility to the project. An example
of this was seen with the interview guide. The expert panel reviewed the interview guide
and based on their own knowledge and experience with player agents, made
recommendations to alter the interview guide. This had a two-pronged effect. First, it
made the interview guide crisp, succinct, and relevant. Second, during recruitment,
respondents were informed that the interview guide was developed with the expert
panel, which brought credibility to the study and assisted recruitment.
Bracketing Interview
Prior to data collection, the principal investigator participated in a bracketing interview
with an experienced qualitative researcher, to expose biases that could influence the data
(see also Roper, Fisher, & Wrisberg, 2005). Seven guidelines were derived from Roper and
colleagues and the researchers’ experience, namely: (a) researcher’s relevant history, (b)
reason for the project, (c) project benefits, (d) purpose of the interview questions, (e)
theoretical questions to be answered, (f) researcher’s assumptions regarding main
themes, and (g) methods taken to couch biases. Only those not yet discussed will be
presented in more detail.
Regarding relevant history, the principal investigator played and refereed hockey for 13
years. Referring to main themes, the first author expected MJPAs would possess hard and
tangible skills and did not address personal or emotional skills. Thus, during interviews
the first author wrote “personal skills” on a piece of paper so that he did not overlook
these skills when probing into respondents’ answers. To couch biases, the expert panel
reviewed the interview guide and removed irrelevant questions, while adding overlooked
questions.
Participants
The respondent group consisted of 6 current expert MJPAs. Participants were English
speaking, North American based agents that specialized in Major Junior hockey. All
participants met the following minimum criteria: (a) 10 years experience, (b) 25 total
clients, and (c) five NHL draft picks in the agent’s career. The criterion of 10 years
experience was derived from the framework outlined by Ericsson and colleagues (1993).
The expert panel conjectured that the remaining two criteria would delineate between
expert and non-expert MJPAs
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D. Hancock et al.
Recruiting
There are approximately 160 agents that represent NHL and amateur hockey players. NonNorth American agents were not targeted, as they did not recruit Major Junior players.
Agents that did not meet the selection criteria were also eliminated from the study. This
left 40 player agents, all of whom were contacted. Six agents agreed to participate in the
study. The small sample size was disappointing and it is possible that targeted MJPAs were
unwilling to participate in the study for fear of divulging business secrets. Specifically, if a
highly successful agent participated in the study, his anonymity would be guaranteed. His
responses regarding how he became successful, however, would become public
knowledge. Such knowledge would then allow competitors to incorporate new methods in
order to improve their player agent skills. Therefore, it was entirely reasonable that some
targeted MJPAs were unwilling to participate. Despite the small sample, it is important to
note that the expert panel ranked 3 of the respondents in the top 5 of all MJPAs based on
their quality and quantity of clients. Indeed, having the most elite individuals within a
specific domain providing information with the purpose of gaining an understanding of
the development of expertise is advantageous in order to truly understand what
characteristics constitute expert performance (Ericsson & Smith, 1991).
Procedure
MJPAs were contacted by telephone and interested agents were faxed a consent form and
questionnaire, confirming the criteria needed to participate in the study. Once the criteria
were established, a telephone interview lasting 45 to 90 minutes was conducted.
Interviews were taped and transcribed verbatim. During interviews, the principal
investigator adhered to Charmaz’s (2006) instructions for gathering rich data, which
included initial open-ended questions, intermediate questions, and ending questions. An
example of initial questioning was: “How much success is derived from having good
contacts within hockey?” One agent referred to the importance of relationship
management for building contacts. Given this response, an intermediate question was,
“What would be an example of something that might ruin or help relationship
management?” A good ending question was: “So there must be quite a bit of relationship
management that goes along with those contacts to build credibility and
trustworthiness?”
Data Analysis
Initial, focused, and theoretical codes were used to analyze the data (Charmaz, 2006).
Initial coding was accomplished through analyzing each line of text and applying
meaning units to segments of data. Each meaning unit was labeled using a respondentbased method (e.g., Agent 1, 2…) and was assigned a provisional tab. For example, the
statement: “It’s a communication business so you’re busy building relationships with
people and gathering information” was coded as ‘A2: building relationships’. Focused
coding involved grouping similar initial codes into distinctive categories with clearly
defined boundaries. As an example, all the codes that referred to the agent having to
establish a good rapport and getting to know team management were placed into one
sub-category entitled ‘building relationships’. Theoretical coding involves grouping
related focused codes into one category. However, theoretical codes are very broad and
thus only initial and focused codes, which were more tangible, are presented in the results
section.
Validity
Within qualitative research, it is imperative that the researchers provide measures of
validity so that the quality of their work can be assessed. The present study incorporated
three types of validity, as outlined by Maxwell (2002) including descriptive, interpretive,
and theoretical validity.
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
55
Descriptive validity was adhered to through the verification that the participants’ words
were transcribed accurately. As such, interviews were tape-recorded and transcribed
verbatim. Next, the text and audio versions were compared for accuracy and any
inconsistencies were corrected. Through interpretive validity the objective was to ensure
that the researchers were unbiased in their interpretation of the data. To achieve
interpretive validity, the first author reviewed the coded transcripts and created focused
codes. Afterward, the former player agent reviewed the codes with the first author, and
consensus was reached regarding the coding interpretations, which included proper
labels, definitions, and placement of initial codes within the focus codes. Furthermore,
participants were sent their coded transcriptions and asked to verify the accuracy of the
interpretation of the data whilst considering the coded data in relation to their verbatim
responses. The respondents made no comments regarding the coding scheme.
Theoretical validity included the validity of the proposed relationships between the
concepts. The principal investigator expected to find categories that were similar to those
previously discovered in the expertise framework (i.e., expert development occurs across
stages). To enhance theoretical validity, the former player agent reviewed all categories
created by the researcher and reviewed each meaning unit within the categories to
ensure proper designation of all the codes. Additionally, the codes and categories were
sent to another qualitative researcher conducting a study in Major Junior hockey so that
someone familiar with Major Junior hockey context from a sport science background
could vet the codes and verify the proposed relationships between the codes.
Results
It is important to note that while the principal investigator created the labels used in the
results section, the labels were not pre-determined. Rather, they were produced based on
the participants’ responses. Within each interview, participants discussed up to 20
discernable categories. To delineate the most relevant themes, we only present the initial
codes that 4 or more agents (more than half the respondents) discussed. Again, in order to
guarantee the validity and distinctiveness among the categories, both the former player
agent and fellow researcher reviewed all the created categories. The first section
describes the stages of becoming an expert MJPA while the second section explicitly
details the skills possessed and implemented by expert MJPAs.
Becoming an Expert Major Junior Player Agent
Four stages of becoming an expert MJPA emerged from the interviews: (a) pre-agency
years, (b) early years, (c) developmental years, and (d) expert status years (see Table 1).
The Pre-Agency Years. During the pre-agency years, expert MJPAs accumulated nonagent experiences and acquired specific knowledge prior to beginning careers in player
agency.
All respondents noted that non-agent experience included legal and hockey experience,
as well as contextual hockey knowledge. One agent’s reflection represented the type of
legal experiences gained prior to entering player agency:
I was in charge of issues such as constructing a standard player contract, all kinds of union, club ownership
negotiations on that matter, insurance policies for the players and wages and all of those en route to
forming an actual collective bargaining agreement that’s in place today over in [country]. (A3)
Four agents discussed experiences as athletes, as depicted by the following agent’s
quote: “I played five years university hockey, played Tier II hockey and played a little bit
of senior after that” (A5). Contextual hockey knowledge was specific knowledge related
to Major Junior hockey and recruiting classes (players that are about to be drafted by CHL
teams). One agent’s excerpt encapsulated Major Junior hockey knowledge: “There’s
contract areas of it, there’s arbitration aspects of it, there’s marketing aspects, there’s
personal development areas and skill development areas and an agent who’s right in the
center” (A1).
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D. Hancock et al.
Table 1. The Process of Becoming an Expert MJPA
Respondents' meaning units
Categorization
A1
A2
A3
A4
A5
A6
Non-agent experience
7
15
20
10
2
8
Total
7
15
20
10
2
8
Incentives to become an agent
2
2
2
3
1
2
Getting started in the business
3
2
12
5
3
2
Resourcing experts
2
8
2
3
2
3
Total
7
12
16
11
6
7
Player agent skills
3
2
6
3
1
3
Becoming competent
2
2
4
3
3
3
Establishing credibility
4
4
4
0
2
4
Total
9
8
14
6
6
10
Focus total
The pre-agency years
62
The early years
59
The developmental years
53
Note. Focused codes are listed followed by the initial codes. Numbers indicate individuals’ total
meaning units for the initial codes.
Agents’ acquired legal and hockey experiences as well as their contextual hockey
knowledge in the pre-agency years and these skills ultimately led them toward the early
years en route to becoming experts in the field.
The Early Years. The early years represented a time during which the individual was
engaged in the player agent business, but focused more on their current career line. The
specific aspects identified by respondents during this stage were incentives to become an
agent, getting started in the business, and resourcing experts (see Table 1).
Incentives to become an agent were identified by the 6 respondents and included helping
people and the desire to stay involved in hockey. The following quote demonstrates the
incentive to help people:
I always had an interest in working with athletes and representing athletes during my undergraduate
studies at [university] and through law school at [university] …And I always thought that combining my
love of sports, in particular hockey, with my law degree would be a benefit to assisting young players. (A4)
All respondents also discussed how they got started in the business, and indicated that
there was initial involvement agent work:
I ended up doing some work for a number of people who I knew, who were at that time playing
professionally in the NHL, and that started to develop toward doing some miscellaneous things for them as
part of the law practice and as a result of that, started me into doing other work for other players. (A1)
Early in their careers, all respondents resourced experts within hockey to assist their
development. Interestingly, only 2 of the agents described these experts as mentors. One
agent discussed a conversation he had with an expert:
I went to see [agent name] who at the time was the premier agent in hockey, he represented [names of the
NHL players]… he was very gracious and spent a couple of hours with me… He talked about the
competitive nature of the business, the fickle heart of the hockey player, problems in electing your fees,
you know, quite a number of different things. (A2)
In sum, MJPAs’ incentives to become agents, how they got started in the business, and
their abilities to resource experts constituted the early years. These experiences enabled
the MJPAs to progress to the developmental years.
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
57
The Developmental Years. Respondents entered the developmental years when they
reduced their involvement in other careers and made a commitment to player agency.
During the developmental years, MJPAs learned player agent skills, became competent
using their skills, and established credibility (see Table 1).
Player agent skills were mastered early in the developmental years. Six respondents
spoke of two skills they needed to learn quickly: (a) people skills and (b) agent business
skills. The following citation provides a clear indication of people skills:
Having the ability to communicate with people and have them trust you was something that was very
helpful because you really had to access unusual sources in terms of getting information in terms of
contracts and the like… (A4)
Agents believed they had become competent when they perceived themselves capable of
completing all requisite duties at the Major Junior level. Two agents provided an excellent
synopsis of becoming competent. First was the length of time to achieve competence:
“That really takes about three to five years and I think that’s endemic in any organization”
(A1). Second were the signs of becoming competent:
It’s just an accumulation of the knowledge base and feeling that rather than being at a disadvantage in
terms of communicating with somebody that might have more knowledge in the industry than you, that you
felt comfortable that you were at least on an even keel with that person, if not at a higher level. (A4)
Establishing credibility referred to being accepted by important people in the Major
Junior hockey community such as team managers, which 5 respondents indicated was
important. One agent identified how the business of being a player agent was challenging
if one did not have credibility: “Hockey’s a pretty small club and until you establish your
credibility amongst people, generally it’s hard to get in the door” (A1). However, as
demonstrated by the subsequent quote, once an agent established credibility, it became
easier to recruit clients and achieve success:
I think, without question, the further you go and more experience you have the easier that [recruiting] is
because you have some credibility, you have an existing clientele. When you start out, you don’t have any
clients, so you know, you say to someone, “I don’t have any clients, I want you to be the first one.” That’s not
going to give them a high degree of comfort. So the further you go and the more established you become
there’s no doubt that that part of it becomes easier. (A6)
The processes that were engaged in during the developmental years, including learning
basic player agent skills, becoming competent, and establishing credibility, were likely
what allowed future-expert MJPAs to transition into the expert status years.
The Expert Status Years. According to the expert panel, all participants were experts
(minimum of 10 years experience, 25 clients, and five NHL draft picks). The following
section explicitly outlines the skills used by these experts during their expert status
years.
Skill Sets of Expert Major Junior Player Agents
MJPAs regularly utilized four skills: (a) recruiting skills, (b) contract skills, (c) player
management skills, and (d) business management skills (see Table 2).
Recruiting Skills. Recruiting skills referred to the abilities that enabled the expert MJPAs
to enlist Major Junior hockey players as their clients. Recruiting skills included receiving
referrals and recruiting abilities. The 6 respondents indicated that recruiting skills
assisted them in building their clientele. One response specified how doing good work
for a current client leads to that client making referrals:
[Regarding] a referral, it just is a natural course that you’ll gain clients because first of all, players talk big
time and if you’re always getting the money for guys you’d be surprised how quick these guys [nonclients] say, “Oh yeah, well my guy didn’t get me that. ”Working hard, getting the job done…because these
guys [clients] are talking to their peers every day. (A3)
Recruiting abilities included scouting talent and researching the clients. An example of
scouting talent was: “[I] have a very good ability to scout talent, to rate players, and to
assess a player’s prospects in terms of going on to professional hockey. I think that’s
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D. Hancock et al.
Table 2. Skill Sets of Expert MJPAs
Respondents' meaning units
Categorization
A1
A2
A3
A4
A5
A6
Receiving referrals
2
2
8
1
1
1
Recruiting abilities
1
8
3
9
5
7
Total
3
10
11
10
6
8
Requisite knowledge
3
4
8
13
3
5
Total
3
4
8
13
3
5
Managing player expectations
10
1
2
2
2
1
Being a confidant
9
7
5
6
1
4
Total
19
8
7
8
3
5
Outsourcing tasks
6
7
4
6
2
3
Total
6
7
4
6
2
3
Focus total
Recruiting skills
48
Contract skills
36
Player management skills
50
Business management skills
28
Note. Focused codes are listed followed by the initial codes. Numbers indicate individuals’ total
meaning units for the initial codes.
reflected in the success we’ve had in the draft” (A4). A good example of researching
clients was how respondents examined the personality characteristics of the player:
“Athletic ability, mental toughness, it’s a sport that requires a very high degree of mental
toughness. Commitment, it’s very difficult to get to the NHL…If he’s not committed in
pursuing that, then his chances are extremely low” (A6).
The respondents in this study explained that without superior recruiting skills they would
not have achieved expert performance. This was an understandable concept, as MJPAs
must be able to retain talented clients in order to have clients progress to the professional
level. It is only at this point that the agents attain financial success.
Contract Skills. Contract skills were the talents that expert MJPAs implemented to obtain
the best possible contracts for their clients. All the respondents discussed essential
contract knowledge (see Table 2) and indicated that it included knowledge of their
players and knowledge of the general managers they were negotiating with. The following
demonstrates how knowledge of their players influenced contract negotiations:
If you have a client that was not good in school…you know that deep down, they’re not [going to] the
NCAA. You have to protect that because if teams get to know he isn’t good in school…they know then
you’re just bluffing [when you say he’ll go to the NCAA instead of the CHL]. So you have to know what
you’ve got on the table with a particular player and then you’re sort of going to try and use whatever
strengths you can and hide the weaknesses. (A3)
Knowledge of the general managers that agents were negotiating with was also important:
You have to know the team that he’s going to be playing for or wants to play for, or wants to sign with in
terms of the range of values that they have given in terms of education contracts to players in the past and
where your player fits into that mix. (A4)
Justifiably, all respondents described that there were requisite contract skills that must be
understood prior to and during contract negotiations. Specific legal knowledge of
contracts did not emerge as a theme. This was likely due to the fact that Major Junior
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
59
contracts are standard contracts, with few clauses. MJPAs simply negotiate dollar amounts
to insert in the contracts. Also plausible was that agents lacking legal knowledge of
contracts might not have progressed to expert status.
Player Management Skills. Player management referred to skills that respondents
employed to guide their players through the challenges of Major Junior hockey. Player
management skills were particularly interesting as respondents digressed from the hard
skills that they possessed (i.e., contract skills) and focused on emotional skills including
managing players’ expectations and being a confidant for clients (see Table 2).
Often times, players enter Major Junior hockey with high expectations of making the NHL.
However, many players do not develop enough to move into professional hockey. The 6
agents stated that managing a player’s expectations was important and entailed being
realistic with the player about his chances to move on to professional hockey:
Sometimes you have to talk [with players] about the fact that as good as Major Junior hockey is, there’s
usually only one player, maybe two off a team that are going to make any money at it and you can’t get into
a situation where you’re doing everything the same as the other 17 guys on the team. (A5)
All respondents also discussed being a confidant, which referred to situations where
respondents served as sounding boards to their players when their players faced any
number of challenges. The respondents identified several sport-specific issues that they
dealt with as confidants, “Inter-team issues in the dressing room…a player would confide
in the agent” (A2). Another issue was pressure from fans, “Support when fans are being
hard on you when the team is not doing as well” (A5). Respondents also identified
personal issues that they were challenged with as confidants. A common personal issue
was relationships: “There’s girlfriend issues [that we deal with]” (A2). Respondents also
noted that loneliness and schooling were concerns they dealt with as confidants, “They
confide in you about relationships, about loneliness, about schooling and you just work
out with them the best that you can” (A3).
Though not the stereotypical skills associated with player agents, it is clear that player
management skills constituted an important part of the expert MJPAs’ skill sets.
Business Management Skills. Business management skills included those skills that
permitted the agents to run their businesses effectively. Interestingly, a dominant theme
concerned awareness of their limitations and the practice of outsourcing tasks (see Table
2). Outsourcing a task was defined as when an agent would resource a company outside of
their agency, which specialized in a particular task. Five agents indicated that they
outsourced duties. One agent spoke of the importance of outsourcing: “What an agent has
to do is realize the transitions that players go through and then identify what their needs
are and be positioned in such a way as to offer or refer that out to a player” (A1). One
common outsourced task is financial matters: “I’m not an accountant for instance, but we
employ professional accountants both in Canada and the U.S. to handle financial affairs for
our players” (A2). Other resourced duties include athletic training:
We have an off-ice training program. I don’t run them through their paces on that, I have someone who is
skilled and is an expert in those areas that I refer the players to so that their off-ice training in the summer
is taken care of. (A6)
The agent that disagreed with the other agents indicated that he does all of his own work
for his clients and suggested a benefit to this: “I guess you know the player; you’re on top
of things. [If] I delegate a file to someone, I really don’t have the same knowledge of the
file. As much as I want, I don’t have the same knowledge” (A5).
It was evident that most expert MJPAs agreed on outsourcing duties as the main aspect of
business management skills. This professional skill was the final component of the expert
MJPAs’ skill sets.
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Discussion
The goal through the present study was to identify the developmental stages and skills
possessed by expert MJPAs. Several similarities with previous literature are discussed in
the following sections along with the limitations and implications of the current study.
Becoming an Expert Major Junior Player Agent
Similar to Bloom’s (1985) and Côté’s (1999) representation of sport expertise progressing
through stages of development, expert MJPAs progressed through stages: (a) pre-agency
years, (b) early years, (c) developmental years, and (d) expert status years. Interestingly,
however, the concept of pre-agency years is a stage not noted by Bloom (1985) and Côté
(1999). Nonetheless, one can draw a parallel to the pre-agency years from within the
coaching expertise literature. Bloom and colleagues (1998) and Schinke and colleagues
(1995), as examples, noted that prior to becoming coaches, participants were mentored
by other coaches, thus laying the foundation to become coaches later in life. Expert
athletes typically begin their athletic endeavors at young ages while those that become
social support providers tend to enter their respective domains at a later age. Thus, their
previous experiences are of importance – a conclusion supported by the current study.
From the current results, it can be postulated that expert development in sport is a
pervasive process, as MJPAs developed expertise similarly to other expert sport
participants.
Skill Sets of Expert Major Junior Player Agents
Expert sport participants have been shown to have advantages in cognitive and emotional
domains (Janelle & Hillman, 2003). Expert MJPAs identified several cognitive skills that
they possessed and implemented regularly that reflected Thomas and Thomas’ (1994)
framework of declarative and procedural knowledge. Declarative knowledge was
comparable to how MJPAs understood contract negotiation limits based on the general
managers they were dealing with and their clients’ strengths and weaknesses. Expert
MJPAs demonstrated procedural knowledge when they adjusted their recruiting and
contract plans based on their acquired declarative knowledge. Another cognitive skill
possessed by expert MJPAs was understanding their own limits and the need for
outsourcing. Côté and colleagues (1995) discovered that expert coaches stayed organized
by structuring and coordinating certain tasks. Similarly, MJPAs accomplished this structure
and coordination by outsourcing certain tasks, which made them more proficient.
Regarding emotional skills, expert MJPAs indicated that they assisted their athletes by
serving as confidants. Without corroboration by athletes, definite conclusions cannot be
drawn; however, the detailed examples provided by the respondents indicated that this
was how expert MJPAs assisted their athletes emotionally. Furthermore, Bloom and
colleagues (1998) and Schinke and colleagues (1995) noted that expert coaches had
mentors that helped them progress within coaching. Similarly, respondents in the present
study indicated that they were able to resource mentors or experts within player agency
who assisted them early in their careers. Thus, MJPAs possessed cognitive and emotional
skills similar to expert athletes and coaches.
Limitations of the Research
Recruitment. Despite contacting the community of player agents, only 6 respondents
were involved. As with all research that relies on convenience sampling, the extent to
which these participants represent the entire population of MJPAs is unknown. It is
possible that had other MJPAs been recruited, alternate skills might have added to the
expertise framework for MJPAs.
Interviewing. It was possible that participants felt uneasy about divulging “trade secrets”
during the interviews, as these secrets were likely what made them successful. To attempt
to minimize this limitation, the principal investigator assured anonymity prior to the
Expert Major Junior Player Agents
61
interview. Additionally, if a participant was hesitant about answering a question, they were
reminded of the anonymity agreement. That said there appeared to be times when
respondents did not provide full answers to certain questions. A potential method of
avoiding this in the future would be to interview retired player agents who would have no
motive for hiding trade secrets.
Implications
This study has implications for current and aspiring MJPAs, players in the CHL, and their
parents. Regarding current and aspiring MJPAs, the present study outlines the process of
developing as a player agent and the skills required to succeed in the business. This
includes gaining requisite knowledge prior to contract negotiations, learning recruiting
techniques, and understanding the support that MJPAs provide for their clients. To the
authors’ knowledge, no previous literature has provided this information.
In regard to players in the CHL and their parents, the authors have identified the skills
and characteristics that expert MJPAs possess. Most Major Junior players cannot legally
consent to having a player agent; therefore, agents are retained on their behalf by the
parents. It becomes the parents’ responsibility to interview potential player agents and be
informed regarding which skills are important to seek in MJPAs. The present results will
assist parents in this endeavor.
From an expertise perspective, this research is important as it provides scholars with
another domain in which expert performers have been studied. It would appear, at least
in sport, that primary and secondary sport participants progress through similar stages of
development and possess similar types of skills such as cognitive and emotional skills.
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The Authors
David Hancock is a doctoral student at the University
University of Ottawa (Canada) where
he is studying expertise. He is currently working on his doctoral thesis
regarding the perceptual and visual behaviors of expert ice hockey referees.
David completed his undergraduate and Master’s degrees at Laurentian
University
iversity (Canada) where he examined expert ice hockey player agents. His
research topics include expertise, sport officials’ biases, observational learning,
and relative age effects.
Diane Ste--Marie,
Marie, now a Full Professor at the University of Ottawa (Canada),
completed her B. Ed. at McGill University (Canada) and moved on to do her
graduate studies at McMaster University (Canada). Both her Master's (M. Sc.:
Human Biodynamics) and doctoral
doctoral studies (Ph.D.: Cognitive psychology)
concentrated on the cognitive processes of memory and perception. The
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada supported her
research on memory biases in sport judgments. Most recently, continued
research funding through the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
has allowed her to investigate the importance of self-regulatory
self regulatory processes
associated with observational learning, specifically observation of the self.
Within her observational learning research, Diane also explores the functions of
observational learning used by athletes, coaches and sport officials. She was
awarded the Excellence in Education Prize in 2005 at the University of Ottawa to
recognize her exemplary contributions in research and teaching. Diane has
served as President of the Canadian Society for Psychomotor Learning and
Sport Psychology, as well as Communications Director for the North American
Society for the Psychology of Sport and Physical Activity and has been on the
editorial board for the Journal of Motor Behavior.
Robert Schinke holds a Doctorate in Educational Policy with a Specialization in
Administrative Leadership from the University of Alberta (Canada) and a PostPost
doctoral year in Positive Psychology from
from the University of Pennsylvania (United
States). Located within the School of Human Kinetics at Laurentian University
(Canada), Robert is an Associate Tenured Professor, and he is also the Chair of
the Laurentian University Research Ethics Board. Robert’s
Robert’s research interests are
at the intersection of sport and physical activity motivation and cultural safety.
An editor of six published books and also of Athletic Insight,
Insight a peer-reviewed
journal in sport and exercise psychology, Schinke's co-applied
co applied research
resear has
been funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of
Canada, the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, and the Indigenous Health
Research Development Program. Finally Robert was the 2008 recipient of the
Canadian Sport Science Research
Research Award in Community Research. In terms of
hobbies, Robert was formerly a member of the Canadian Equestrian Team and a
former Pan-American
Pan
Games Team Silver Medallist.