Serving An Ace
Tasked with managing the Wimbledon Championships during a pandemic , with a full capacity audience , in her first year as operations director , Michelle Dite drew on decades of experience in major sporting event operations to make it a success . She tells Access about the challenges involved .
Words : Christopher Barrett
A sports events industry veteran , Michelle Dite had first-hand experience of the impact of the pandemic on freelance event professionals when in March last year she found her diary of upcoming events being swiftly wiped clean .
Running her own business , ThinkCanDo , Dite provided event consultation services to clients including The Boat Race , Rugby League World Cup 2021 and Invictus Games Foundation . With the lights suddenly turned out on the events industry , she spent April 2020 working as a volunteer at the NHS Nightingale London hospital . The following month her career path made another interesting turn .
On 5 May she took over as operations director of the All England Lawn Tennis Club ( AELTC ) who annually stage the Wimbledon Championships . It would not only prove fortuitous timing but present her with the challenge of her career – bringing the oldest tennis tournament back to life and staging it safely with full capacity audiences during a pandemic .
Whether it was Andrew Murray ’ s battle to get to the third round after hip surgery or Emma Raducanu ’ s unexpected brilliance and equally unexpected departure from the tournament , there was no shortage of excitement to get the Wimbledon fans on their feet , but behind the scenes there had been an equally skilful and determined performance by the AELTC team to safely deliver it .
With it being Dite ’ s first Championships as operations director , she made full use of the existing knowledge and expertise available at AELTC but as a newcomer she says her fresh perspective proved beneficial as new ways of working had to be achieved
Maintaining flexibility “ Fresh thinking was needed , it was an unprecedented situation , but the really important thing was collaboration and teamwork ,” she says . “ Agility was key . We delayed a lot of decisions that in previous times AELTC would have made many months previously in order to provide the best possible guest experience for those at the Championships ; whether that be players , members , debenture holders , partners or all the members of the public who come along .”
During a planning cycle filled with unknowns and shifting time lines , Dite says that numerous possible eventualities had to be considered before the AELTC found out on 14 June that the 28 June event would be part of the Government ’ s Events Research Programme ( ERP ) and would therefore be able to welcome full capacity audiences on Centre Court for the semi-finals and finals .
Dite ’ s lengthy sports events industry career began when as a graduate from Loughborough University she joined Alan Pascoe at Fast Track Events in July 1998 to work on the UK Athletics televised events . In subsequent years she was involved in the creation of The School Games with Youth Sport Trust , the design and delivery of the Paralympic
Michelle Dite
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