UK Sport CEO Sally Munday today opened PLx 2020, the annual conference which brings the high-performance sporting community together for a week of insight, learning, collective challenge and reflection.
In her opening remarks, Munday acknowledged that 2020 has been a year of uncertainty, disruption and change for high performance sport and welcomed delegates by saying:
“This conference is so special because it brings so many of our community together and I am so sorry we can’t be together in person… the plus side is that we have unprecedented turn-out this year as we venture into our first ever virtual PLx. I’m am so pleased that you have committed your time to share what promises to be an engaging and inspiring week together. I hope you too are looking forward to learning from and connecting with the best of the best, across our high-performance sporting community and beyond.”
She went on to applaud the scale of collaboration, resilience and agility sport has shown in the face of the uncertainty caused by the Covid-19 pandemic before outlining her belief that continued Olympic and Paralympic success is possible by further focusing on ‘how’ we win medals, saying “morally, it is the right thing to do but I also believe that “how” we do it is a performance imperative if we are to continue to be successful.”
The theme for PLx 2020, which has gone online for the first time, is adaptability, agility and learning faster. The theme reflects our competitive advantage as we seek to stay ahead of the rest of the world and maintain our global leadership position in Olympic and Paralympic sport.
The 750 delegates will have access to a range of engaging and thought provoking sessions throughout the week as well as opportunities for connection and collaboration. There will also be the chance to hear from a series of keynote speakers including:
- Margaret Heffernan who will be sharing leadership insights from her experience as CEO, professor, mentor, TED speaker, business writer and author.
- Allister Frost, former Head of Digital Marketing at Microsoft, who will be speaking about the parallels between dual strategies and technology cycles in sport and how the technology industry manages multiple core products whilst exploring new and innovative ideas.
- Terence Mauri, a future trends and disruption expert, who will be speaking about disruption as an opportunity and highlighting the importance of growth and reinvention.
- Tony Hoggett, Tesco’s Chief Operating Officer, will be sharing some compelling tales regarding Tesco's agility, planning and scalability to help the nation through a pandemic.
And on Tuesday evening, delegates will come together to celebrate the best of the best in the high-performance sporting community. The PLx Awards evening will provide a chance to celebrate the significant contributions individuals and teams have made during this period of extraordinary challenge and change with winners being announced across seven categories. Here is a reminder of the 2019 winners.
PLx runs throughout the week before UK Sport Chair Dame Katherine Grainger closes the conference on Friday afternoon.