Roles and Tasks of the Senior Woman Administrator (SWA) in Intercollegiate Athletics: A Role Congruity Perspective

Abstract

Using role congruity theory as a guiding framework, this study analyzed a set of roles and tasks for senior woman administrators (SWA) at all levels of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). An analysis of the responses of 574 SWAs and 542 athletic directors (AD) indicated a general agreement that the SWA performs roles and tasks defined by the NCAA primarily on behalf of gender-neutral programs (i.e., both men's and women's) as opposed to gender-focused programs (i.e., women only). Further, this study supported previous research suggesting that the SWA performs communal roles (i.e., serving as a role model) to a much greater extent than agentic roles (i.e., budget management). There is also evidence that Division I SWAs are performing agentic roles to a much greater extent than Division II and Division III SWAs, and that they are more apt to have an accompanying title as an athletics administrator (93%) as compared to SWAs in the lower divisions (DII = 44% and DIII = 53%). This study found clear perceptual differences between the AD and SWA (<i>p</i> < .05) regarding the extent to which SWAs performed roles related to core management team participation—a finding which raises the question as to whether the SWA truly has a meaningful role in the athletics department. Implications and recommendations for theory and practice are advanced.