I
t’s a nice coincidence that both USA Track & Field and its chief operating officer are making up for lost time.
Renee
Washington
USA Track & Field // Chief operating officer
Renee Washington manages a staff of 71 for the national governing body, which in her tenure has set a new benchmark in the Olympics world for sponsorship revenue, built a modern media distribution strategy and rebuilt relationships with track groups domestically and abroad.
Managing all those fronts is an intense affair, especially at an organization that was slow to join the modern sports business world. But for Washington, a heavy workload is welcome after she took a decade off, midcareer, to care for her daughter.
“Everybody has their own journey they go through, but I have 10 years in which I didn’t get to do this,” Washington said. “While I got to do something else that was meaningful in a way, there was this reluctance about it. It was something that weighed on me. I appreciate the opportunity.”
It’s been an uphill battle in some respects. Neither she nor CEO Max Siegel are “track people,” making for tough sledding when they proposed big changes. Five years after they arrived, the sometimes insular NGB world is coming to embrace the notion of outside business expertise, but it wasn’t like that in 2012.
That’s why Washington’s a game changer. She is hitting her targets and gets points for degree of difficulty. Speaking of the organization she and Siegel inherited, she said: “You couldn’t necessarily call it successful. Some might say it was dysfunctional, and I helped change that culture. And I don’t mean just with respect to the field of play, the things you notice. I’m talking about the other aspects of the sport that we as an NGB are responsible for.”
— Ben Fischer
