An Important Announcement to All NSBC Members

Dear NSBC Members - I am writing to you today to provide you with an important update regarding North Shore Bridge Club.

As you know the past year has been tumultuous for the bridge community and our bridge club.  During this time, the way we have operated has changed significantly and my fellow committee members and I believe that things will never return to be the same as they were before.

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The changes are clearly not limited to property which was the subject of my previous letter.  With the introduction of online bridge as a delivery platform for NSBC in 2020 we have seen a huge opportunity to expand our bridge sessions and lessons to players and students beyond the North Shore and Sydney.  Based on its popularity and the feedback you provided in the survey we conducted at the end of last year, we see the need to maintain online offerings.

In considering how to concurrently provide online bridge and face-to-face bridge at both of our venues the committee has decided to restructure the club’s operations.  Going forward we will split the running of the club into five distinct elements:

  • Face-to-Face Bridge
  • Online Bridge
  • Bridge Teaching & Training
  • Club Administration
  • Tournament Committee

By separating the face-to-face and online bridge operations we believe both will be well placed to develop further.  These will be the two core operating functions for NSBC going forward and they will be managed independently.

Teaching and training requires specialist skills and can be delivered face-to-face and online.  Also, as players develop their skills they will potentially feed into both forms of the game.  We therefore believe it is better for Teaching & Training to operate independently of the playing functions. 

The administration functions of our club are needed by both of the playing functions and Teaching & Training and it makes good business sense to provide these services from a centralised function.

Finally, as we move to a world where we have a mixture of major events (tournaments) some running online and some running face-to-face, it will be beneficial to have an independent Tournament Committee overseeing them all.

For you, our members, we are confident these changes will have minimal day to day impact.  What you should see is continued enhancements in all areas of the club’s operations.

What will change is our management structure.  As the club’s operations have grown and become more complex the task load has become too great for a single person to manage.  We have therefore decided to separate the responsibility for managing the Face-to-Face bridge club from the Online bridge club.

At the same time, you would know that our Club Manager, Mike Prescott, had bypass heart surgery late last year. Mike has proceeded to recover well and everything with the surgery has gone well.  But there have been some health issues that are stopping Mike from his normal duties.  After speaking to Mike regarding the changes we are implementing at the club he has decided he can no longer continue as our Manager and I regret to inform you that he is standing down as of 19 March.

Mike would like to thank all members during his almost five years with the club for all the help and support, it has been very much appreciated and he has asked me to let you know he will miss you all dearly.

Mike will be helping out getting North Ryde up and running over the next few weeks so those of you who play there will most likely get to see him then.

Mike’s departure naturally creates a gap that will be hard to fill but we are now focussed on doing so.  In the interim we will continue to operate as we have been since Mike took ill with the help and support of not only all of our wonderful staff but others around the club including my fellow committee members to whom I am most grateful.

Gary Barwick will continue to manage our online bridge club.  Gary has some great ideas about how we can continue to position NSBC as the premier online Bridge Club in Australia and I am excited about the prospects.

Les Grewcock, as our Treasurer will oversee the Administration functions and Committee Member David Hudson will be working with the existing teaching and training team to ensure they have all the support they need.

I will make another announcement regarding the ongoing management of our face-to-face operations before Mike finishes up on 19 March.  In the meantime, Sue Crompton continues to manage the games at East Lindfield.

One particularly important point I would like to make is that we will continue to function as one bridge club with multiple product offerings.  Your membership will entitle you to access all that we offer both online and in our club rooms.  As members you should all expect to receive amazing and enjoyable bridge (although we cannot prevent your partner from putting you in unmakeable contracts!)

I hope that you are all as excited as I am about the future of bridge at NSBC.  No doubt many of you will have questions you would like to ask or thoughts to share about these changes.  Feel free to provide this feedback via the form on the club’s website under the Contact Us menu or you can send me or any of the other committee members an email.

Regards

David Fryda
President