IU Alumna places workers in sports industry careers

It’s in the name: Buffy.

That’s all anyone in the sports industry really needs to know.

It’s the name that helps college students answer the questions their parents are asking: What are you going to do with your degree?

Buffy Filippell will help answer that question.

She was the first female agent for global sports company IMG, a recruiter who has placed 40,000 people into jobs and, luckily for Hoosier students, an IU graduate.

And she’s offering a program that IU and 17 other colleges have access to for free, along with hundreds of front offices in the sports industry.

It’s called Teamworkonline.com. It’s like a match-making site for candidate and front office jobs in the sports industry.

It started in her undergraduate days in Bloomington.

Filippell has come a long way since a 15-minute tennis match in 1974, when she was the only player on the IU women’s tennis team to play in the national collegiate championships.

She had never played a tournament and her opponent was the tournament’s No. 13 seed.

“I mean, honest to God, it had to be the fastest match ever,” Filippell said. “She probably beat me before we walked on the court because, of course, she asked me what were my tournament results, and ... I said this is the first one I’ve ever played in my life.”

After graduation, Filippell got a job with Wilson Sporting Goods, eventually distributing tennis rackets to players such as Jimmy Connors, Chris Evert and John McEnroe.
Through dealing with the sport’s top athletes, she met the sport’s top program of tennis talent: IMG Academies. They hired her as an agent.

She then joined a search firm as a recruiter, starting in tennis due to her already prominent connections, before eventually starting her own search firm.

Then came the recommendation from NBA Commissioner David Stern for Filippell to fill a marketing job for the Minnesota Timberwolves.

In 1999, Filippell realized she could recruit and fill positions in the sports industry online.

“You knew that the world was going to become matching people through a digital space, so instead of waiting for someone else to do it, I thought I would lead the charge,” Filippell said.

Tens of thousands of placements later, Filippell said there’s nobody in the sports business who has connected as many candidates to employers as she has with her company TeamWork Consulting.

“In reality, the company is what it does, in that it networks people together,” Filippell said. “It takes teamwork to do things together, and everybody’s working together to help people find candidates.”

Susan Simmons, IU’s Coordinator of Career Placement for Kinesiology, said the program is also different in that it caters to a single industry: sports.

“If a student were to go to a large, major job board like Monster.com or Careerbuilder.com, they’re going to find thousands of positions,” Simmons said, “But only a small fraction of those would only be truly related to what they wanted to do, whereas here all the positions posted are in the sport industry, and the student who is truly interested in that area, then they’re really looking at a job board that is unique to their career path.”

Simmons said approximately 200 sports marketing and management majors and another 250 sport communication majors utilize Teamworkonline.com.

The website helps place job candidates with front offices and also gives tips on how to set a candidate apart from the rest when the digital platform makes all applications look similar.

Buffy said a candidate can help set themselves apart by starting with a cover letter.

“That’s where the creativity comes in, and a lot of times people use the same cover letter time and time again,” Buffy said. “Well, if the employer keeps reading the same thing, they’ll think you’re as boring as the first time they read it.”

Buffy also helps students “see the numbers” in sports jobs.

“I try to look at other places where people aren’t looking and provide an idea to take a look at these jobs,” Buffy said.

“Say here’s a job with not a lot of candidates and it pays $100,000 and this one that pays $50,000 but there are a lot of candidates. I find those jobs. There’s this mistaken identity that there aren’t jobs available. There are.”