1. Welcome & apologies for absence.

Apologies: Ewan McCarthy (EM), Terry O’Brien (TOB), Rachel Wilson (RW)

2. Register of interests – check & update.

All present checked and signed the register of interests.

3. Approval of the Minutes of the Meeting of Directors on 21 November 2018

Approved subject to a correction to item 12. Sarah Dunn remains an SOA Development Officer but her Leader funded project has finished.

4. Matters arising from previous meetings (not covered in the agenda below)

New Marketing Director. Despite the publication of an article on the Website, no-one has come forward. A possible name was suggested. ​Action: DK

All directors should continue to think of suitable people. ​Action: All

5. Finance report (KR)

Company – cash at bank currently totals £175,000.

Strathearn has a separate operating account which is adequately funded. The event treasurerhas repatriated advances to Strathearn 2019 (£25k) and prepaid the event’s SOA contribution (£78k) following the first main entry deadline. He assures me that he has sufficient cash on hand to meet the event’s obligations over the coming months. It was felt prudent to have the cash in our business deposit account with Bank of Scotland for both control and interest receivable purposes, especially as we will have some outgoings on WOC 2022 this year.

No significant unpaid invoices at the moment – we are up to date with expense claims, SOA and WOC 2022 invoices received. There are no notable income amounts – the usual small equipment rentals / replacements from clubs.

LIDAR investment – cost of £8,000 will be due in the near future. Bad weather prevented the LIDAR flight

The tax return was submitted on 27 February 2019 for the 2018 year end. We have a tax exempt status as documented by HMRC in 2004.

KR / DK / Bob Dredge (WOC Finance Director) had a useful discussion in February 2019regarding the governance of financial matters. KR will make WOC payments for time beingand a WOC bank account will be opened in due course. The timing of cash inflows and key early outflows are being considered to ensure we have some form of matching (and that the Company does not have to pre-fund too much and eat into our “reserves” of cash). A particular issue to be addressed is the initial IOF fee (50% or €30,000) and the contract with Event Scotland/ Edinburgh City. Bob is developing a budget and in discussion with key parties to develop sound cost estimates and sensible contingencies as well as income streams,also exploring with IOF the required form of reporting at the conclusion of event. With regard to processes and polices KR will contact AH regarding soft copies of documents.​Action: KR

6. Risk Register

In the absence of RW, detailed discussion was postponed.

CM suggested that we need to consider cyber security and the risks involved in loss of data. It was noted that Scottish Swimming have an expert in this area.​Action: RW

7. Strathearn 2019 – 28th July to 3rd August 2019

CM presented a report covering:

Budget and Entries

A break even situation is projected.

As of 3 March, there were 1,651 unique entrants with 252 non-UK. The total number of entrants is on par with previous events at this stage. (JM has subsequently found numbers for 2013 & 2017. At the first closing date, entries per day were approx. 2100 and 1800) One of EventScotland’s performance indicators, the proportion of foreign entries, is down.

Areas and Mapping

All satisfactory at this stage

World Ranking Events

Bulletin 1 due for release by end March. ​​​​​​Action: CM

Race Arenas

All starts and finishes confirmed and arena plans to be completed ​Action: CM

Technical

Final Technical Manual released by ToB.  Course planning and course checking largely in hand.

Event Centre

Fiona Downie appointed as Event Centre Manager. Costs from Morrison’s Academy (registration and event centre) came in during the meeting and were higher than expected. ​Action: CM

Event Campsite

Comrie Croft will provide event campsite and taking bookings directly. Uptake currently low

Bussing

Current uptake 150 users but anticipate 240

Infrastructure

• Hardcore Events Ltd contracted to provide event services including tentage, crowd barriers, HERAS results display etc.  No equipment team so recommend sub-contracting additional elements to Hardcore. Hardcore will hire in tentage as required but will carry out inventory of usable tents at Glenmore (awaiting weather window) ​Action: CM
• British Red Cross still to quote.  Competitive quote received from F1Training Services (did BOC 2018) so recommend their use. ​Action: CM
• Scotloo chemical toilets agreed
• Trackway requirements to be finalised. Sand and gravel agreed Day 4 ​Action: CM

Traffic Management

In hand

Marketing and promotion

Adverts in CompassSport and Swedish/Danish magazines.  Contact with local BID CrieffSucceeds and listing on VisitCrieff website (extend to Comrie and Dunkeld) and with local press.

Webmaster Karen Lowe on board and making progress on additional content and social media.

Sponsorship and Event Enhancements

Silva providing 300 branded control flags.

EventScotland has agreed 100% of requested sum towards live streaming, commentary and PA, GPS tracker hire and display, event branding and promotional video (Lochaber 2021 and WOC 2022). GPS tracking preferred option SEDS (to source and run) but require commitment.  Use of S6D/SOA satellite broadband essential.

8. 2021 Six Days

After considering competing foreign events the dates were fixed as 1st to 7th August

No clubs have volunteered to be the central organisation or individuals to be overall coordinator. There is a volunteer for the day co-ordinator position.

CM presented a description of a number of areas, but there are no final decisions yet.

9. Edinburgh WOC Sprints 2022

CM presented his report highlighting the following:

Organisation

Colin Matheson currently Acting Event Director but advert now out for Event Director (posted on Orienteering and other websites.  Graham Gristwood is Technical Director. Bob Dredge has taken on the role of Finance Director. Tony Thornley has taken on the appointment of National Controller.

IOF Senior Event Advisor/Project Manager

The November visit was successful though there was an unresolved issue about the dates /race schedule.  All areas were visited and assessed. An embargo open house meeting was held in Edinburgh and following on from this new embargo rules will be put in place.

Budget

Balanced budget submitted to Dave Kershaw by Bob Dredge (income/expenditure £710,000)

Mapping Tender

Four responses received for mapping services.  Steve Smirthwaite has agreed to help evaluate tenders and will potentially be involved as adviser/QA.

JM left the meeting while the tenders were discussed

High Level Event Seminar, Prague

A TV seminar was held a day in advance and was attended by Lorna Eades and CM.  Graham Gristwood attended the HLES.  Some excellent content and lots of changes from the IOF (who have a new website) including more on-line reference material for event organisation.  Useful networking – met Jari Kymalainen (Finnish) who is the Assistant Senior Event Advisor and the main technical lead.  Good working relationship and he is supportive of our scheduling.

SEA/ASEA Visit

Edinburgh visit booked over the weekend (and either side) 13-14 July.  Tony Thornley is hoping to attend and an Event Director should be in place to join us.

Logo, branding and website

Hillside Agency has now developed the logo and a holding page is now live http://www.woc2022.org/  Content is being worked on and will be circulated for comment.

Spectator Races

5 days – format and coordinator to be decided on (subsequently appointed).

Euromeeting

CM presented several suggestions, although noting that Euromeeting is not a responsibility of S6D.

Other matters

Entry for the Spectator events could be invited to make a donation to nominated charities.

10. SOA Events Manager

The 2019 web master wants to spend some money on Google ads and analytics. CM to investigate.​Action: CM

11. SOA business relevant to 6-Day Company (RO)

The SOA is aiming to create a balanced budget from 2020 onwards. This will require more funding – a proposal will be made at the AGM in June. Reserves will be held at a level which allows 6 months’ of operation. Income from the 6 Day Company will continue to be very important for the SOA.

We are experiencing difficulty recruiting volunteers for SOA roles which may be a sign of volunteer overload in the sport. We are considering how to deal with this but it is one of the reasons for employing professional staff for some roles (e.g. communications and marketing)

We have a strategic review with Sportscotland in September this year which will provide the basis for the next 4 years of funding from them.

We are putting a contract in place between SOA and S6D (WOC 2022) to cover Colin Matheson’s time spent on WOC 2022.

We have identified IT (including cybersecurity) as an additional risk on the SOA risk register which may be common to S6D.

We have clarified that organisers, planners and controllers of events in Scotland must be members of British Orienteering to be covered by BO Insurance. We have additional SOA insurance but it is essentially an addendum to the BO insurance and does not cover main event officials. This also applies to the S6D and probably WOC 2022. We recommend S6D checks the status of its main event officials to ensure compliance. Insurance covers events (e.g. S6D events), whoever has registered them, but not additional activities. We will follow this up by doing a gap analysis and then discussion with the insurers. WOC 2022 may carry an extra level of risk which we will need to investigate further.

12. AOB

RS expressed concern at the level of support available from Fabian4 at Strathearn 2019.

13. Future meeting dates

Wednesday 12 June 2019.

The meeting closed at 8:30 pm