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INTERVIEW


MARK SESNAN


The London 2012 Aquatics Centre and Multi-Use Arena saw history being made during the Olympics and Paralympics. GLL's managing director talks to Ian Freeman about the challenges of operating the venues in legacy mode


M


ark Sesnan, the charismatic managing director of GLL, has come a long way since I first interviewed him in 2005


for Sports Management. GLL (formerly Greenwich Leisure) has grown into the UK’s leading operator of local authority leisure facilities, with a turno- ver of £111m and management of more than 100 facilities. A lot has been happening at GLL’s


late-Georgian, Grade II-listed headquar- ters in London’s Woolwich Arsenal. As well as growing the number of leisure centres the team manages in London – the company’s traditional heartland – a carefully-judged growth plan has taken them as far north as York and into the Chilterns and Surrey. Add to this expansion into library and


play-centre management and whol- ly-owned businesses such as budget gyms, the creation of local operating


partnerships and winning the contract to run two London 2012 venues post- Olympics, and you can see why it may have been a considerable challenge for Sesnan to maintain his deceptively laid-back persona. “As a charitable social enterprise, we’re


showing that it isn’t all about profit – we’re on a mission,” Sesnan says. “Cur- rently, about a third of UK leisure centres are still run by the public sector, even in big cities like Liverpool, Newcastle and Leeds.” When I ask why, he pauses. “I could be provocative and say it’s about self-interest or trade-union influence, but I’m much more generous than that – I think it’s just local choice,” he says.


WORKING IN PARTNERSHIP The way forward for GLL’s core leisure centre business includes forming op- erating partnerships with smaller local leisure trusts, such as Freedom Leisure


in southern England and the Hereford- based Halo Leisure Trust. Sesnan says: “Local authorities outside


London were asking us to bid to oper- ate their centres. We said that if we could find a way of doing it and help other trusts to get business it’d make sense. We work with the trusts to win the business, but they deliver the services and staff the centres themselves, which provides a local feel. We give councils security that they wouldn’t get from a smaller organi- sation and we can influence what goes on in the centres. “We’re open to discussion with any-


one once contracts go to market,” he continues. “Because of our reputation, we can get on shortlists, which smaller trusts often can’t. We do the bid work for them, which we charge for, but the bigger game – and my vision – is to have an affinity community of customers, a block that has some muscle with sponsors and suppliers. But that’s some years away yet.” With expansion usually comes the


thirst to branch out, and Sesnan has his heart set firmly on organic growth. “We need to diversify so we’re not reliant on any one particular income source”, he says. He has a desire to own, as well as operate, leisure facilities, with budget gyms top of the list – their first, at Bex- leyheath, Kent, is, says Sesnan, “flying”. “Our plan is to extend the whol-


The London 2012 Aquatics Centre will open to the public in 2014 16 Read Sports Management online sportsmanagement.co.uk/digital


ly-owned estate and, as a charitable operator rather than a commercial one, we would be looking to see where there are socio-demographic reasons for putting in a gym,” he says. “We can do rich and poor areas so there’s a much wider matrix of sites that we’d consid- er. We want our gyms to be accessible and have the right look and feel for all


Issue 4 2012 © cybertrek 2012


PHOTO: WWW.GETTYIMAGES.COM


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