Courtesy of Julia Galan / SwimSpire
When U.S. Masters Swimming Executive President Rob Butcher first started swimming for his summer league YMCA as a youth, he never imagined how much the sport would ultimately shape his life. Initially starting out as a talented and avid soccer player, Rob hung up the cleats for good at age 15, joined his high school swim team, and embarked on a journey that continues to this day. From high school to college to the Olympic Trials and onward to Masters, swimming has always been an important part of Rob’s life. And in 2008, when Rob was hired as the Executive Director for USMS, his passion became a full-time career.
Rob has undeniably earned his share of the credit for what USMS has become today. For example, the number of locations offering a Masters Swimming program has nearly doubled since Rob’s hiring to 1,500. In 2011, Rob and his legal counsel filed for and received the Masters Swimming trademark, which had never before been owned by USMS despite the organization owning more than 10 trademarks. USMS membership has increased from 44,000 in 2007 to around 65,000 members in 2015. Its employees have grown from 2 in 2007 to 16 full-time employees at the USMS headquarters today. The annual budget has increased from $1MM to a budget of $3.6MM approved by the House of Delegates for 2016. Further, as a testament to financial discipline, USMS maintains approximately $2MM in reserve, with no debt.
This January, Rob will be embarking on his next swimming journey as the new President and CEO of Swim Across America, the most successful swimming-related non-profit that raises money for cancer research, prevention and treatment. Leaving behind a very positive legacy at USMS, Rob will succeed Janel Jorgensen McArdle, who is stepping down to spend more time with family. We sat down with Rob in his last month with USMS to talk about his love for swimming, his leadership style, and his advice for the next USMS Executive Director.
JG: Swimming has given you some wonderful memories, and guided you through some difficult moments. Ultimately, your passion for the sport has become your career. Tell us about your swimming background and how it has shaped your life path.
RB: My parents divorced when I was 3 years old and both remarried within a year. I grew up in Florida with my mom, twin brothers John and Mike, and my stepdad. My stepdad was from Europe and mandated that my two brothers and I play soccer, which was his favorite sport. So, from the age of 4 until 15, soccer was the sport that I played pretty much year-round. My father and stepmother Jan had a daughter, my sister Susie, who is seven years younger than me. When we visited Dad during the summers, we would swim in the Y summer league program with Susie. I found summer league swimming to be fun and a nice break from soccer. That was my first introduction to swimming.
Back at home in Florida, life with my stepdad was difficult. He was a bricklayer and many of my childhood weekends were spent as a laborer working for him. As a bipolar alcoholic, my stepfather’s mood swings were unpredictable and almost always violent. He was emotionally and physically abusive. When I was 16, I attended a new high school. It was big, more than 2000 students, and it felt very lonely. I remember being on the soccer field the first week in the new school and just not wanting to be there. Soccer had been my identity up until then—actually, it had been my stepdad’s identity and forced upon me—and I had lost whatever love I had for soccer. With a hard home life and no longer wanting to play soccer, I was searching for something. I had seen and experienced what drugs and alcohol did to my stepdad, so that didn’t appeal to me.
About a week after quitting soccer, I was in homeroom and an announcement was made—the swim team needed swimmers. I knew how to swim. I liked it from summer league. So, I walked onto the pool deck that afternoon and asked the coach, Bob Hendren, if I could join in. He welcomed me. I made new friends. And I found a place where I felt safe. When high school season ended a few months later, I didn’t want to let go of what swimming had given me. So, I asked Coach Hendren, “…what happens next?” In reply, he invited me to swim with the Daytona Beach club program. I was on the team for my junior and senior year of high school. Quite literally, swimming became my life preserver. It saved my life.
JG: You swam at the 2000 Olympic Trials. What was that experience like and how did you turn your passion for swimming into a career?
RB: Coach Hendren was a Georgia Southern graduate. He knew the GSU college swim coach and made a call for me. I swam four years for GSU, and it was a very fun chapter in my life. My best times from college were decent but wouldn’t have qualified for senior nationals. After earning my graduate degree, I did a one-year internship in the Auburn University Athletic Department. It was there that I met David Marsh and Rowdy Gaines. Both encouraged me to swim Masters and just have fun with it. So I did, and started recording times that were faster than I had gone in college. I was 26 at the time and for the next two years, I began to chase a dream – qualifying for the 2000 Olympic Trials. With perspective, I’m very glad to have embarked on that journey – a journey that included plenty of failures and tested my resolve to persevere despite the challenges. Over that two-year period, I shaved and tapered probably a dozen times, coming anywhere within a tenth to a second of qualifying in my best event, the 100 breaststroke. Finally, at a last chance meet in 2000, I made the time by a tenth of a second. At the Trials, I was in heat 2 lane 1 but I didn’t care. I’d made it to the Trials dance. The two-year sacrifice of time and money was 100% worth it.
Rob Butcher (courtesy of Mike Lewis)
A chance meeting sparked my transition to a professional career in sports marketing. In 1999, I was at a practice with Charlie Lydecker, a fellow Masters swimmer and successful businessman. After practice, Charlie asked me what I wanted to do when I was done with swimming. Without missing a beat, I told Charlie that I hoped to land a job in sports marketing. A couple of weeks later, Charlie arranged a lunch meeting for me with some executives at NASCAR. That introduction, thanks to Charlie, lead to an entry-level job four months after the 2000 Olympic Trials. The message for young people is this—you will have a long life after your pro swimming career so come up with an answer for what you want to do when that journey ends. You never know who is in the lane next to you.
JG: What was it like coming in as USMS executive director in 2008?
RB: From the start of my tenure with USMS, I had been warned that the executive director position was not for the faint of heart. Todd Smith, USMS’ first executive director and whom I followed, resigned after only six months because it wasn’t a fit. Only four months into my tenure, I proposed a 5-year $2 per year dues increase with a purpose of investing the money into hiring professional staff so existing programs could be improved and new ones developed. It was the first House of Delegates convention I had ever attended and someone publicly quizzed me, “…what if we give you this money and you quit like the last guy?” As anyone who has ever attended a House of Delegates Convention knows, the 300 delegate volunteers are a passionate group considered to be the core of U.S. Masters Swimming. Delegates write the rules, pass legislation, approve the budget and only they can run for elected office. Because of healthy debate, it can sometimes take years to approve new initiatives (example: it took three years for the House of Delegates to accept the 18-24 age group). However, I wanted to sell a vision at that first convention, a vision that USMS would raise its expectations and realize its potential as the leading Masters Swimming organization in the world. The dues increase passed and has been reaffirmed every year since.
JG: What were your goals for the organization and how did those goals change over the years?
RB: I had two immediate goals when I was hired. First, I wanted to listen and understand. I wanted to know the history of USMS. How was it started? What did those who had given so much to the organization envision for its future? I went on a road tour where I visited with longtime Masters contributors such as Mel Goldstein, Tom Boak, Nancy Ridout, John Spannuth, Jim Miller and Kerry O’Brien to learn. My second goal was to articulate the message that we were going to improve our existing programs and add new ones so we could become a more welcoming and inclusive USMS.
JG: You’ve had some crisis moments during your tenure. The Maui Channel Swim and Lance Armstrong entering a USMS event are two such moments. How have you handled crisis moments?
RB: Crisis times are defining moments for a leader. Prior to the Maui Channel accident in 2011, we had no event strategy. If you had water and were over the age of 18, you could pretty much get a sanction and access to tens of millions of insurance coverage from USMS. That accident spurred intense and prolonged debate. It led us to redefine which events we were comfortable with USMS having an association and which were outside of our risk tolerance. Thankfully, the prior year decisions to increase our dues allowed us to have a financial reserve so that we could absorb the tremendous increase in insurance costs without compounding the crisis by having to drastically increase dues and sacrifice other programs.
When I received notice that Lance had entered a regional Masters meet in Austin, I was in constant communication with our President, legal counsel, USAS and FINA representatives. While USMS does not have drug testing, and we are not a signatory to the World Anti-Doping Agency code, we were bound to WADAs banning of Lance from Masters competition through our membership in United States Aquatic Sports, which in turn is recognized by FINA. Once the facts became known to me – which took several days given time zone changes and need for clarification from multiple parties – I made the decision to ban Lance. I also attended the regional event that Lance was registered in, since it was not the responsibility of our volunteers to respond to media inquiries. For about a five-day period, my exclusive focus was on this issue as we had every major news organization in the world calling us.
JG: USMS has come a long way since your first year and much has been accomplished, from increasing membership, to rebranding the entire organization, to forging partnerships with Fortune 500 companies that have supported Masters Swimming and its goals. But from a personal standpoint, what has been your proudest moment as USMS Executive Director?
RB: There are two programs we’ve developed that are creating a more inclusive and welcoming USMS. The first is our Masters Coach Education Program. USMS keeps minutes from all of its conventions and during the 1990s, there was a repeated call to invest in Masters coaches. In 2010, we launched our Masters coaching certification program. Since then, we’ve taught in over 300 locations with nearly 2,000 Masters coaches receiving access to education, resources, and networking with like-minded adult swimming coaches. These coaches—many of them volunteers—represent the frontline in delivering the Masters Swimming experience. This year, in response to their desire for more education, we created and are administering our Adult Learn-to-Swim Instructor certification program.
The second initiative I am particularly proud of is our Swimming Saves Lives Foundation. SSLF provides funding for Masters programs that are teaching other adults to learn how to swim. Prior to establishing SSLF, our charitable arm would grant $5,000 to $10,000 per year towards a broad range of initiatives. One year it might be a study on yoga and its correlation to swimming. The next, it might go towards a club that needs a new pool heater. Our giving lacked focus. Since launching SSLF in 2013, we have awarded more than $150,000 to nearly 100 programs that directly help thousands of adults learn to swim.
JG: You have often mentioned your family’s role in supporting your passion. How do you balance a demanding career with your personal life?
RB: It may be a cliché to say, but it’s fundamentally true that without the support of my wife Alli and my in-laws, I would be in an industry that requires a lot less travel and has more traditional working hours. Since my hiring I haven’t missed a SCY Nationals, LCM Nationals or Convention. This is in addition to other USMS-related travel obligations such as the ASCA World Clinic, ISHOF Induction, USAS meetings, our LMSC Leadership Summit, and sponsor and industry meetings. Even when I’m not traveling, USMS has 20+ volunteer committees and task forces that are doing business throughout the year. I participate in many of the calls, which often are in the evening hours during family time. Some of those conference calls, when serious business is being discussed, have been interesting because our toddler twins are banging on my home office door or falling asleep in my lap. When traveling, I take the first available flight back home, even if it is a redeye, so I can be home to help Alli and take the twins to school. And if I’ve been gone a week or so with USMS work, I take a full day or two off to be with the family, even if that falls on a weekday.
JG: How did you and Swim Across America come together? And were you looking to leave USMS?
RB: Janel McArdle (aka Janel Jorgensen) became Swim Across America’s CEO in 2006, while I started with USMS in 2008. Janel has transformed SAA from a volunteer run organization to a professionally managed one, and I did the same with USMS. In 2010, Janel and I explored opportunities for collaboration between our two organizations and – few people know this – we discussed whether a merger might make sense. During that process, we developed a trust and respect for each other as leaders of our respective organizations. This summer, Janel called me to share that she was going to step down from Swim Across America at the end of the year so that she could spend more time with her husband, Pete, and their two-year-old twin boys. She knew that I would understand as my wife Alli and I have five-year-old twin boys—the parallels between Janel and I are remarkably similar!
Under Janel’s leadership, SAA has become the leading fundraising organization in swimming and has been having a banner year with 14 events and a growing pool fundraising model. Janel wanted a forward-thinking successor who would keep the momentum going, and asked me to consider succeeding her. I was intrigued by the idea because it would be a great move for my family; SAA is allowing me to establish the SAA headquarters in Charlotte, where I live. But at the same time I needed to make sure that there was alignment in fundamental areas such as values, expectations, decision-making, and conflict resolution.
JG: What will you miss the most about USMS and what are you looking forward to with Swim Across America?
RB: I will miss leading the talented USMS staff and being part of the national office culture we developed. With respect to SAA, my 2014 convention address was themed “raising expectations.” I suppose professionally I took my own message to heart. I’ve enjoyed the challenges of working for a membership-operated national governing body but leading a fundraising business—that just happens to be swimming-focused—is a new challenge that is going to stretch me. Fundraising is ultra-competitive. Americans have unlimited choices of where to donate their dollars. And the most successful fundraising organizations are the ones that innovate with an entrepreneurial spirit and can tell great stories, and do so transparently – showing where donor money is spent to improve and benefit society. SAA has these qualities and so I’m excited to embrace this professional opportunity.
JG: What advice would you give to your successor at USMS?
RB: USMS has a passionate volunteer base that existed for nearly four decades before the first executive director was hired. This, combined with the House of Delegates structure—in which board members are elected, policies adopted, and budgets approved—creates leadership challenges. To avoid blind spots, the new CEO will need high-wire interpersonal and communications skills, and know how to build consensus among the diverse volunteer leaders. He or she will need to know when to be bold, when to challenge the status quo, and when to just listen. USMS now also has 16 full-time professional staff members, so solid management skills are needed to lead and support them in delivering programs and services. Fortunately, the new CEO will have the benefit of working in partnership with the new board president, Patty Miller. Patty was our volunteer legal counsel for over a decade and she has a deep knowledge of the organization. She’ll do everything in her power to ensure that the next CEO has a platform on which to perform and continue fulfillment of the USMS vision.
JG: Can you tell us some of your plans for Swim Across America and what you will be hoping to achieve as President and CEO of this company?
RB: More than 1,500 people die from cancer every single day. SAA provides funding to 27 hospital partners that are conducting early-stage cancer research with the ultimate goal of finding a cure for the disease. SAA acts as an angel funder to doctors and researchers who are the frontline pioneers in finding a cure for cancer. Without SAA funding, these doctors likely wouldn’t be able to conduct such extensive research and make breakthroughs that are saving so many lives. With the help of thousands of participants and hundreds of Olympians, we will generate nearly $6.4MM this year and provide $5MM to our beneficiaries.
My immediate focus will be two fold. First, developing relationships with our event directors, key supporters and beneficiaries. I want to hear their thoughts and ideas so we can update our strategic plan to serve our mission. Second, we are transitioning operations from Boston to Charlotte and will make some key hires in the areas of event support and marketing.
There are markets hungry for an SAA open water event and we are going to take a measured approach to adding new events. It’s important our potential partners know that our events exist to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for our beneficiary hospitals, not to serve as a competitive outlet. We’ve heard from many clubs and pool programs that want to participate and support the SAA mission through pool events so that is an avenue we will be pursuing. We will also evaluate opportunities to expand our fundraising capabilities through increased licensing and events outside of the US.
Thanks for taking the time to speak with us, Rob, and we wish you all the best of luck in your newest role!
SAA President and CEO Rob Butcher (Photo courtesy of Mike Lewis / U.S. Masters Swimming)
ABOUT JULIA GALAN
Julia Galan headshot, PhotoJulia Galan is a lifelong competitive swimmer and a USA Swimming and U.S. Masters Swimming coach. Julia’s passion for the sport, for coaching and for writing led to the creation of Swimspire, a coaching and swimming inspiration source geared towards athletes of all levels and goals.
