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Anand (r) thinks sponsorship trends will
be more global in the future |
Name: Ishveen Anand
Position: OpenSponsorship Founder & CEO
Age: 30
Where I’m from: Manchester, U.K.
Where I call home: N.Y.
Focusing on right now: Bringing in bigger brands.
Best advice: No job is too small. My first job as a management consultant, my director used to dig deep and would do the stuff we were doing as well as the high-level stuff. That really stuck with me. The best way to get things done is to get involved. Delegation is great, but at some point if you can show your team that you are ready to do that same work, it can lead to great things.
A must for a new hire: The ability to think on your feet and work independently. We’re all too stretched to have someone who is a yes man and just does what we say. You need to be able to think and reply to users or questions yourself. The ability to be entrepreneurial.
Exec I admire the most: Mavericks Owner MARK CUBAN. Just from what I’ve seen on "SHARK TANK" and the way that he’s meshed business and sports, and his ability to know what he loves to get involved in. That’s really important.
Best book I’ve read this year: A friend gifted me "Blue Ocean Strategy" by RENEE MAUBORGNE and W. CHAN KIM -- it was an interesting read. It’s about how to not focus on your competitors and focus on your own space. It’s helpful. It’s good to turn around and make sure you know what you’re doing and what works for you.
First thing in the morning: I check my e-mails right off. Running a website -- it goes 24/7 -- so my most important time really is the morning to see who’s signed up. At that time Europe’s awake, India is awake, so that’s a big time for us -- those are two markets we focus on. I tend to click through CNN and BBC. I like to be in touch globally with what’s going on in sport.
Talking tech: I’m not the best, I have to admit, when it comes to social media. I go through phases where I use it a good bit and I understand the importance of it for work and myself personally. I use LinkedIn a lot and find it very valuable.
Must-have music: I grew up to U.K. garage and Bhangra/Bollywood. But over the years I have developed an eclectic taste, with a love for Buddha Bar albums, acoustic music, anything on BBC Radio 1’s Live Lounge, and R&B like RIHANNA.
Food for thought: We’re quite health conscious, so we try and eat at home two or three times a week. We’ll eat out, but it’s mostly due to social dinners and that type of thing. I love eating Mexican here in the city as well.
How I unwind: I love watching sports and going to the gym. Also, I love going out dancing at least once every couple weeks. I just picked up playing softball. I used to love rounders. I tried a bit of netball in Manhattan, but it’s hard because it’s not a big game here.
Day in the life: The idea came about to start my own company because I was formerly a traditional sports agent. I had worked in an agency in India, that’s where I started my sports sponsorship career. I used to sell rights for teams, leagues and federations. We moved to N.Y. and I carried on my relationship with a lot of my clients, especially those in India, and it often tasked me with finding opportunities for them in South America and Europe, in different sports. Going forward, I think sponsorship trends will be more global in the next five years. At the moment, the big American sports are sponsored by American companies, but it will become a lot more global. Soccer has already done that.
