Strong year for Golf Consultants Association

As the year draws to a close, members of the Golf Consultants Association (GCA) can look back on a busy and prosperous 2015 – with many of them busier than ever.

Golf sector trainer Frank Newberry will start the new year with a bang after being selected to deliver three two-hour sessions as part of the BIGGA Turf Management Exhibition (BTME) ‘Continue to Learn’ programme, to be held at the Harrogate International Centre, from January 17-21.

He will be speaking on ‘Stop telling your team, start transforming your team’; ‘Appraising your mates at work’; and ‘Problem solving and decision making in work teams’.

Meanwhile, Andrew Harris, co-founder and director of Harris Kalinka, a visualisation studio creating images and animation for the golf and architectural industries, reports that his client list now includes one of the most famous names in golf.

He explained: “Harris Kalinka has recently created some images for a Robert Trent Jones II course, in France, and is currently working on a Tiger Woods-designed project in Mexico, and a golf resort development in Cuba.”

Rod Park, principal of Park Consulting Services, has recently completed business reviews and business options for distressed golf clubs for leading tax and advisory specialist Grant Thornton on behalf of AIB bank in Ireland. This has been a full review, covering all aspects of the golf operation and benchmarking against industry standards.

Howard Swan, chairman of the GCA and a member of the family-owned professional architectural practice Swan Golf Designs, is expanding his role as a safety consultant to increasing num-bers of golf clubs in the United Kingdom as well as acting as an expert witness in a number of cases relating safety and accidents on golf courses.

He begins phase two of the 36-hole renovation of the King’s and Queen’s courses at Bled in Slovenia this month with further phases to follow in 2016 and 2017, when the resort will likely become Royal Bled.

Swan said: “This year has been hugely successful for the GCA – not just in terms of increased membership, but, importantly, in the growing number of successful projects with which our members are involved. All the signs are that 2016 will continue the association’s growth and sphere of influence.”

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