The golf industry offers many challenging management scenarios. Reputation-rescue jobs, re-starts backed by significant investment, and being the first manager of a completely new facility are a few of the most common.

But Howard Craft faced one of the industry’s more subtle challenges when he joined Berkhamsted Golf Club as club manager in early 2018.

Berkhamsted is a 131-year old private golf club set in Hertfordshire’s largest expanse of natural heathland, with a highly loyal, stable membership, and it is partially defined as a playing test by being one of the only bunker-free clubs in England.

Its enviable trinity of course architects – Willie Park Jr, Harry Colt and James Braid – also add authenticity to its appeal. Plus, in The Berkhamsted Trophy, it also has one of the most prestigious elite amateur events on the annual calendar.

“I arrived at Berkhamsted with change and improvement in mind, but I was acutely aware that those changes would have to be introduced gradually, and managed sensitively,” says Craft, 37. “Berkhamsted has a very distinctive special appeal, so anything we did needed both to retain the essence of the club and also to have the full support of the members.”

Craft’s to-do list included overseeing a large-scale irrigation upgrade project; securing approval to turn The Berkhamsted Trophy into English golf’s first gender-neutral elite-level amateur tournament; and introducing major new course-conditioning processes to bring the club’s playing surfaces up to national championship standards.

In his first two years Craft also led the adoption of the R&A’s Women In Golf Charter, signed in autumn 2020, and also managed the delicate process of reversing the nines at the club – the first major change to the golf course since James Braid redesigned seven holes in 1926, and a decision that had been much-discussed over the decades, but never clearly proposed to the membership.

However, two of the things which Craft considers to be his major achievements at Berkhamsted, as he approaches his fourth year in charge, are less headline-grabbing but still no less substantial.

“I am a passionate Sustainability Champion” says Craft, “and as our club’s motto is ‘Golf As Nature Intended’ I felt we had an opportunity to set a fantastic example to other golf clubs.

“I also felt that, with a strategic investment plan needing to be put in place, and agreed by all, we also had an opportunity to make significant improvements to the club’s governance at the same time.”

Craft entered the golf industry aged 21 as a greenkeeper, after completing a degree in Environmental Biology at Swansea University, but crossed over fairly quickly into general club management at BGL Golf – his employers immediately before Berkhamsted Golf Club.

Craft’s passion for the environment has led to his becoming one of only three Sustainability Champions appointed by the GEO Foundation in England as he explained: “Sustainability is not simply about increasing biodiversity.

“It’s about running an efficient business in a world of ever-decreasing resources. When I arrived I was determined to ensure that genuine, real-world sustainability was core to our long-term plan.”

With Craft acting as an inspirational driver of change, the Berkhamsted team are steadily introducing a wide range of sustainable initiatives at the golf club, such as changing the way in which the club bakes its bread and decreasing the carbon footprint of its ‘food miles’. The club is also planning to start to compost its own food waste, providing a popular free compost pick-up service for its more green-fingered members.

Other measures include a new polytunnel on-site where the club grows all of its own herbs and edible flowers for its restaurant. The club will also be adding new solar panels onto the roof of its clubhouse extension, subject to planning permission, and has a large-scale ongoing heathland restoration project ongoing, overseen by Natural England.

Another heathland-management initiative will involve the addition of cattle-grazing to some of the non-golfing land on the club’s 560-acre estate. Also key to Berkhamsted’s sustainability drive was a major new irrigation system, completed in 2019. Craft explains: “Just under 600 new sprinklers went in, a seven-fold increase on our previous sprinkler system.

“This increased our water efficiency to a great degree. Previously, like many clubs with an inadequate sprinkler system, our water wastage was unacceptably high. Now, we feel that we set the standard for golf clubs in the area.”

The drive towards ever-better practices continues, but the club’s initial carbon footprint goals have already been met. “We have had our carbon sequestration calculated for the entire estate, and we are now a net sink of over 500 tons of carbon per annum. The Sustainability Scorecard which we received from the GEO Foundation is now a source of great pride at Berkhamsted.”

Improving club governance may not be what you dream about at night when you’re imagining future career glories as an ambitious golf club manager, but a poor structure can thwart even the most well thought-out plans, and can in extreme cases create a toxic working environment.

Berkhamsted did not suffer from the latter, thankfully, but over the last three years Craft has overseen a remarkably thorough reorganisation at Berkhamsted Golf Club, and it is now a slicker, better-organised working environment for him and his management team to implement the necessary changes.

“You can have a first-class strategic investment plan, and communicate it brilliantly to your members, but ultimately the work needs to be done, day-by-day, by your staff, and I felt we needed to make some changes to give ourselves the best chance of actually implementing those plans.

“We also have become more disciplined with regards to our Board activities. A Board pack is now sent 72 hours before a meeting, keeping the agenda focused and clearly highlighting any decisions to be made. This means we can discuss the important strategic matters in a Board meeting – and not how the carrots are chopped!”

Craft’s heads of department now also prepare reports in advance for sub-committee meetings, enabling faster resolutions to some of the stickier operational matters. There is also now a Nominations Committee to identify candidates for future Board or Captain positions.

Role profiles have been also created for chair, captain, vice-captain, president and director positions, and a skills matrix has been created to highlight any knowledge or expertise gaps in the Board to help more efficient recruitment of new Board members.

The chair and directors are now in-post at Berkhamsted for a minimum of three years – and can serve for six – so the club now enjoys greater continuity.

“Our reorganisation has enabled us to create a new vision, purpose and set of values, with a solid strategic investment plan. Our members now have much better clarity as to the club’s future direction – which makes life much more enjoyable for everyone here.

“And after all, that’s what this is all about,” concluded Craft.