8848 Sport Mentoring is the world’s first sport mentoring company, a spinoff of Mentors & Partners Group, the award-winning multinational consulting firm. The company’s first sport mental performance programme was launched in 2007. In the 16 years since then, we have provided complex personality, behavioural, generational, and sociological analyses of 72,000 elite athletes across 1,500+ real crisis situations.

After many years of business success, the founders’ first private mentoring partner became a major sponsor of a football team in one of Europe’s top leagues. He asked the founders to create a mental development programme for football based on the RISE Human Development System, which had been the foundation of the business’s success for six years. From the very beginning of the research and development phase, it was clear that there were many similarities between team development in sport and business, so the principles of the system could be easily transplanted to the new field. However, it was also clear that there were very significant differences in the way a business organisation and a sports team should be evaluated and coached to achieve success.

The most fundamental difference is that while in business, crucial decisions – what we call real “crises” – are infrequent, rare even, while in sport, they are far more common, often from the first second of a high-stakes match, and even in the days, weeks, or months leading up to that match. Since the first development programmes began, we have coached 42 club teams (18 men, 24 women), which have achieved their goals 62 times, achieved the best results in the club’s history 17 times, won the domestic championship 14 times and been international cup winners 7 times. We have provided complex mental development programmes for 28 national teams (11 men, 17 women), who have achieved their country’s best results in international competitions 33 times, won 16 gold, 2 silver, and 9 bronze medals, and achieved many historic successes at continental, world, and Olympic championships. 8848 was the first firm to provide a complex mental development programme for Olympians. At the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, we were involved in the training of 14 teams and 62 individual athletes, and provided complex mentoring for 4 national teams and 11 individual athletes. Our athletes won 4 gold medals, 2 silver medals, 4 bronze medals, and 4 5th place finishes at the Games. In Tokyo, 3 teams and 9 individual athletes achieved historic successes for their nations. In the course of our work, we have developed 18 youth academies. Our development projects have focused on team sports such as football, handball, basketball, water polo, and ice hockey, and individual/technical sports such as athletics, swimming, fencing, martial arts, and shooting.

Our development programmes are based on the RISE Human Development System, which interprets and analyses an athlete’s decision-making mechanisms, behaviour, and reactions during both normal and crisis situations. It understands differences and addresses the challenges they pose (for more information on the RISE system, use the following link:

https://riseanalysis.com/sport/

8848 Mentoring builds and manages mental coaching programmes that go far beyond traditional psychological approaches. The programmes focus on identifying, analysing, and managing the mental performance and decision-making mechanisms of individuals, entire teams, head coaches, the technical staff supporting the team, and opponents and referees. Therefore, 8848 focuses on all the elements necessary to fight the mental battles needed to achieve results. Thus, team development, mentoring by the head coach and profiling of opponents are essential modules of mental preparation.

Exclusivity: 8848 develops only one team within a league or championship. In this way, we avoid any conflict of interest and instead give athletes a clear advantage for upcoming mental battles. Our collaborations are strictly confidential, ensuring a relationship built on deep trust with our partners. Likewise, we operate a limited number of development programmes at any one time to ensure the highest level of commitment and expertise. In this respect, we differ significantly from the methodology generally used in the market. We provide our partners with a continuous and stable backup to enable them to address all challenges related to mental development in a timely and successful manner.

Complex sport mentoring is a new concept for the mental preparation of athletes. Mental coaching in sport has evolved significantly over the past decades. Today, it is unthinkable for an individual athlete or a team to achieve serious, sustainable success without a well-structured mental programme. Physical preparation, nutritional management, ability testing, and selection are now maximised for athletes almost everywhere in the world. Mental preparation, therefore, remains the main area where a competitive advantage can be gained. In most sports, whether at the individual or team level, there are several competitors of almost equal ability and fitness competing for the top places, and the winner in this competition is the one who can summon their true abilities at the most important moments.

Over the past decades, sports psychologists, mental trainers, and mental coaches have been used, and athletes, coaches, and professionals have chosen one or the other. More and more people are also using advanced data analysis, and some now believe in it. Complex sport mentoring is about providing athletes and coaches with all the knowledge they need to achieve mental peak performance from a single source. This includes the:

• mental assessment of athletes/teams
• management of existing mental strength
• preparation for crisis situations
• ongoing support for the coach in managing the athletes/team
• mental development of the coach
• mental, video, and social media analysis of opponents
• data analysis-based mental management

It also includes all relevant information and knowledge that affects the mental performance of the athletes/team.

Complex sport mentoring, therefore, combines several disciplines:

• psychology
• sociology
• generational research
• team-building
• crisis management
• big data analysis

Additionally, these disciplines and their conclusions must be communicated by professionals who, through their unique communication skills, are able to convey serious, in-depth analytical information in a clear and understandable way to the people they mentor, so that they can properly translate and apply the information in practice.

Complex sport mentoring is a field of expertise that is not currently being taught anywhere in the world, so one can only become a sport mentor after having the appropriate professional knowledge based on the experiences and knowledge gained via real athletic events and real crisis situations. An essential element of complex sport mentoring is the high degree of trust between mentor and mentee, as this is the only way to ensure real information transfer and true development.