Vicky ELEFTHERIADE (CYP) takes the vacant Competitions Director position and Matt POUND (AUS) will become Marketing Director, taking over from Steve DAINTON who was promoted to CEO last year.
ELEFTHERIADE has been working at the ITTF since 2009 in the position of Equipment Coordinator, later promoted to Equipment Manager. In 2014 the Cypriot national started becoming involved in ITTF Competition Management and was appointed at the start of 2018 to the Head of World Tour and Competition Services. She will now lead the Competition Department in the new era of the ITTF.
ELEFTHERIADE, in her new role as ITTF Competition Director, will be tasked with playing a major role in developing the new World Table Tennis Championships structure, further professionalizing all of ITTF’s core competition platforms and creating a strong competition team to achieve all the goals outlined in ITTF’s strategic plan.
The 34-year-old who has a Bachelor’s Degree in Physical Education and Sport Science, as well as a Master’s Degree in Sports Management stated: This is an exciting opportunity and at the same time motivating to be part of a professional team all working to support the vision of table tennis being one of the world’s biggest sports. The Competition Department will play a key role in creating successful and meaningful international events; to do that we need to first re-evaluate all our current products, create new and develop existing events to ensure they are appealing to different stakeholders and have events organized in as many parts of the world as possible.”
POUND, the new ITTF Marketing Director, started at the ITTF back in 2013 as the Promotions Manager and has been promoted from his position of Head of Media. During the 32-year old’s time managing ITTF’s digital/social media platforms, they rose to over 2.7 million social fans across all platforms which places ITTF amongst the biggest of all international sports federations.
The Australian who has a Bachelor’s Degree in Sports Management will be tasked with continuing the momentum that has been created since the ITTF took back the commercial rights at the beginning of 2017. The move has seen the ITTF receive record commercial income since.
POUND stated on his new position: “I am thrilled about this new challenge leading ITTF’s Marketing and Commercial team. The new ITTF Management has big, bold ideas about the future of our commercial products, so there is an unbelievable potential for growth in all facets of ITTF’s marketing activities, especially with all our commercial rights becoming available in 2021. The ITTF will now be expanding its marketing and media team to achieve our commercial and promotional goals linked to ITTF’s new strategic plan.”
As part of the continued professionalization, the Competition and Marketing departments will work ever more closely together to ensure the success of the events from all aspects.
The other change sees Zena SIM (SGP) stepping into the role as Head of World Cup and ITTF Challenge, the new ITTF staff chart can be found here.
These three appointments are a part of a strong recruitment drive from the ITTF, which sees a record number of job postings in the new era of ITTF: https://www.ittf.com/job-opportunities/.