大分工業高等専門学校紀要 第 58 号 (令和 3 年 11 月)

VOLUNTEERING AS AN NOC/NPC OWN ASSISTANT AT
THE TOKYO 2020 OLYMPIC AND PARALYMPIC GAMES- A COMPARATIVE RETROSPECTIVE IN TIMES OF COVID-19

Tomek ZIEMBA
Dept. of General Education

The Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic games were held after a one-year delay due to the ongoingcoronavirus pandemic. Although there was significant backlash from many people on still holding thegames during these times, both games had finished without significant incident. This paper is aretrospective analysis on how the management of the games had changed in comparison to thePyeongChang 2018 winter games, and will predict and give suggestions for improvements for the Beijing
2022 and Paris 2024 games as well. From a volunteer perspective, going from a regular assistant to an
own assistant for a specific NOC and NPC, reflections on the difference in responsibilities are detailed.
Key Words : Olympics, Paralympics, Tokyo 2020, Volunteering, COVID-19

1. BACKGROUNDThe Tokyo Summer Olympic and Paralympics
were initially scheduled to be held in the summer of
2020, but with the sudden global COVID-19
pandemic, the Organizing Committee of the
Olympic and Paralympic Games (OCOG) made theexecutive decision to hold the games one year laterin the summer of 2021. Now that both games havefinished, even with varying levels of support andlack thereof from the general international public,
the athletes and international committees of sport
are now switching their focus to the Beijing 2022
winter and Paris 2024 summer games.
As mentioned in previous research based onreflection as a volunteer at the PyeongChang 2018
winter games (Ziemba, 2018), volunteers desire toparticipate in a global super sports event and create
once in a lifetime memories and experiences trumps
most other desires, regardless of level of ability andfield of placement as a volunteer.
Furthermore, there are multiple differences
between the summer and winter games, not just interms of temperature and climate. The scale of thegames themselves, and it turn the sizes ofdelegations and number of volunteers is also almost
double that of even the winter games. Especially forthe home team of Japan, the delegation wascomprised of over 600 participants, including
athletes, coaches and officials.

(1) Variations of volunteers
One key point that was not detailed in theprevious research was the existence and use of what
is known as Own Assistants, which is when the
National Olympic and Paralympic Committees(NOC/NPC) are allowed to choose up to 2 or 3
people they want to work with their teams asvolunteers for various reasons – their familiarity
with the sports teams, knowledge in their field, or
existing connections or linguistic abilities as well.
The Own Assistant program that gained attention
during the 2016 Rio summer games, but has becomea norm since then (Feng, 2017) to guarantee theteam with a volunteer of their choice, and not
someone based on the selection criteria of OCOG.
(3) Volunteering under extreme circumstances
One of the biggest concerning factors from thevolunteer perspective of the Tokyo 2020 games isthat due to the COVID-19 pandemic, only
volunteers that already resided in Japan wereallowed to continue as volunteers. No overseas
residents were allowed to enter Japan to volunteer,even if they were fully vaccinated as the border
restrictions were kept very tight and limited to the
NOC/NPC members exclusively to maintain the
COVID bubble throughout the games and prevent
another wave of infections during the event. The
same will occur for the Beijing 2022 games as well.

―5―大分工業高等専門学校紀要 第 58 号 (令和 3 年 11 月)

2. CHANGING THE VOLUNTEER NORM

Fig.1 Posters of the Games in the Toyosu district of Tokyo

The Tokyo 2020 games were announced 8 years
ago in September of 2013, and since then the entire
country was head over heels for the revisiting of thegames since 1964 – over 50 years ago. After the first
Tokyo games, the entire world gained an interest in
this post Second World War nation that had
developed so much technologically since its end.
Now with the games coming back in the 21st
century, the key-phrase was ‘omotenashi’, or theJapanese sense of hospitality. Education systems
changed to include mandatory English language
education in elementary schools, and of course
patriotism from nationals to help spread the goodnews of their country to the world was high, as
noted in Lee et al. (2014). Even with public support
being low just before the games started, withprotests happening almost daily and very little
media support, it was clear that volunteers for thesegames would be dealing with a very different
situation than initially expected.
The first and biggest change came in only
recruiting domestic volunteer hopefuls. It was
expected given the state of the global pandemic, but
fully vaccinated people from overseas were still
disappointed. But this situation was just confirmed
to be the same in the upcoming Beijing 2022 wintergames as well, so this is first new norm. Due to thisand the executive decision to allow no spectators at
all events shattered the hopes of some volunteers,and even cancelled volunteer shifts completely. With
the Rugby World Cup in Japan in 2019, mostvolunteers who had started with those games were
worried if they could continue in their legacy, as
detailed in Tomazos & Luke’s study on continuity involunteering (2015).
Vaccination was encouraged and provided, but
not all were able to be fully vaccinated before thestart of the games. Still, over 90% of the staff within
the athletes village were fully vaccinated and withsocial distancing, regular temperature checks and
PCR testing, positive case counts within the village
were low – a sharp contrast to the explosive fourthwave that happened in Tokyo at the same time.
Koutrou et al. (2016) mentioned in their study
on volunteer management at the London 2012
games that some volunteers were upset even after
the life-changing experience because they were notused to their full potentials. It is safe to say the samefor the volunteers for these games as well, as
interviews with athletes village volunteers showed amajority of them disappointed with thecommunication and decision making of the
NOC/NPC Assistant desk in particular. This branch
is in charge of the assistants that work closes withthe teams and their athletes, and is often considered
one of the most difficult positions in games
volunteering. However, recent studies have brought
to light the exitance and growing popularity of the
Own Assistant program (Feng, 2017), in which the
NOC/NPCs are able to tell the OCOG whichassistants they want and have them assigned
regardless of the interview process, so long as they
have applied to the volunteer program. The
satisfaction rate was also very high and has seen
many of these committees using this option recently.

3. OLYMPIC GAMESGiven that the scale of the summer games incomparison to the winter equivalent, the number ofvolunteers necessary is significantly larger.
However, due to the lack of public support, many
volunteers who had applied, been selected, got theiraccreditation, and even obtained their uniforms
simply did not show up for their shifts without
reason. It is assumed that public opinion was a big
factor in this, but it is very difficult to verify theseclaims as almost all cancelled volunteers refuse tocomment on their reasons, let alone respond tocontact requests by those involved in this study.
Regardless, the NOCs had to push through withwhatever people they had, Own Assistants or not.
Recent years has seen some NOCs bring their own
employees as Own Assistants due to the limitationin accreditation passes provided to each delegation,
which can lead to even further confusion among
regular volunteers, especially those who are new tothis field of experience (Ziemba, 2018).
Furthermore, some NOCs were not able to bring intheir designated Own Assistants due to the strict
border regulations. Some teams went as far as
bringing these people in as part of the delegation insome anonymously confirmed cases.

―6―

大分工業高等専門学校紀要 第 58 号 (令和 3 年 11 月)

Throughout the researcher’s volunteering
activities in the athletes village, despite the games
being held in the host country of the team assigned,
there were many opportunities to use linguisticknowledge during the duration of the games. Frominterpreting official visits to other delegations
common spaces within the village, to translating
confidential documents that needed urgent attention
to international sporting bodies not located on thepremises, it was a welcome surprise that despite the
COVID bubble keeping everyone inside a tight-kept
loop, there was the opportunity for genuine efforts
in international exchange all in the same location.
As stated in the work of Guntert et al (2014),
volunteers are most motivated and satisfied with
their participation when involved in their field ofexpertise, which was a surprising possibility for the
researcher involved, as they did not initially foresee
this being possible given the circumstances.

The most important rule for volunteering in
Paralympics is to not help without getting
permission first. What was often seen in previous
games and a common misconception by able-bodied
people is to resist the natural urge to help those witha physical disability at first glance. It is always
important to ask first and get permission, as jumping
in and doing something for someone can be seen as
condescending in some instances. If an athlete in awheelchair is struggling going up a ramp, ask if theyneed help before pushing them from behind. If avisually impaired delegate seems lost within thevillage complex, as if they need help and offer an
elbow or shoulder for direction before attempting totake their hand suddenly and make them panic. It is
the lack of everyday exposure to these kinds ofeveryday situations that lead to a misunderstandingof working and living with disabled people, letalone the occasional media glorification of some ofthese stories for personal gain as well.

5. DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION

Fig.2 Inside the empty New National Stadium in Tokyo

4. PARALYMPIC GAMESWith the Olympic games complete, there was a
short layover window for a smooth transition to thefollowing Paralympic Games. Contrary to the lackof seriousness in transition efforts seen in theprevious winter games (Ziemba, 2018), thereplacement of the Olympic rings symbolism wasquickly replaces with the Three Agitos, andfurthermore the inclusion of the new #WeThe15
campaign to increase disability awareness evenbeyond the scope of the Paralypmic Games.
This campaign aimed to give representation to the
15% of the world population that has some sort ofdisability, and to show that they are no different
from anyone else and still deal with the same ups
and downs of any able-bodied person. This also
linked with the main theme of diversity andinclusion, detailed later in the paper, which is also a
big topic of discussion in modern Japan as well.

One of the biggest focal points by the OCOG to
the volunteers was the promotion of diversity andinclusion at these games. Not simply within theparticipating delegations, but also among thevolunteers themselves. The message would havebeen further implemented had there beeninternational volunteers allowed, but foreign
nationals residing in Japan did comprise a small
fraction of the domestic volunteer body, and they
were seen as a valuable resource to other volunteers.
As stated in Benson & Wise’s guide tovolunteering at international sporting events (2017),
volunteer motivation is mostly for the participant
interest and potential to grow and must be remindedthat there is no financial renumeration whatsoever.
So, despite the volunteers being limited to adomestic workforce in a largely homogenous
society, just how diverse were the volunteers?
Most volunteers were older aged, most wereretirees, in comparison to the majority student bodyof volunteers seen at the PyeongChang 2018 games(Ziemba, 2018). Regardless of this clear age gap involunteer bodies, they all had the same motivations
by wanting to use their skills to the best of theirabilities and help promote the spirit of Japanesehospitality, despite a global pandemic. These arealso seen in research by Ahn (2018) on
PyeongChang 2018 volunteers and was still seen atthese games as well.

―7―大分工業高等専門学校紀要 第 58 号 (令和 3 年 11 月)

Although there was not much other diversity seenin the volunteer body within the athlete’s village, thereassurance of being part of a once in a lifetime
experience was definitely seen and felt, similar to
those previously detailed by Koutrou et al (2016).
Although the diversity of the volunteer body was
not necessarily seen on the outside, the sense ofinclusion through hospitality efforts was made clear
to the athletes and delegations within the village.
Noordegraaf & Celebi (2015) has said in previous
research that motivation and disappointment occur
when volunteers’ intrinsic motivation goals are notmet, so small gestures of hospitality seemedcommon – gifting handmade origami, friendly
greetings throughout the complex, and much more.
The spirit of omotenashi had come through.

6. CONCLUSION
With the games at an end and NOC/NPCs
struggling to make the switch to Beijing 2022 withvery little time, it was seen that it is possible to holdan international super sporting event safely withvolunteers (albeit domestic only) during a global
pandemic. Despite there being many known benefits
and learning opportunities for international sporting
event volunteering (Qi et al, 2018), the confirmationof only domestic staff for the next games severely
limits the possibilities for volunteers to act to theirfullest potentials. Regardless, having experienced
the successes of Tokyo 2020 as a participant has theworld hopeful for the same glimpse of hope in the
middle of an ongoing global pandemic.

REFERENCES
1) Ahn, Y-J. (2018). Recruitment of volunteers
connected with sports mega-events: A case study of
the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic and Paralympic
Winter Games, Journal of Destination Marketing &Management, 8, 194-203.
2) Benson, A. M., & Wise, N. (2017) InternationalSports Volunteering. London: Routledge.
3) Feng, X. (2017). The Study of the NOC Own
Assistant Program of the Rio Olympic Games,(Memos XX 2016-2017), [Master’s thesis,
Universite catholique de Louvain], Olympic World
Library.
https://library.olympics.com/Default/doc/SYRACU
SE/185077/the-study-of-the-noc-own-assistant-prog
ram-of-the-rio-olympic-games-xiao-feng
2) Guntert, S. T., et al. (2014). Motives for event
volunteering : Extending the functional approach,
Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 44(4),686-707.
3) Koutrou, N., et al. (2016). Post-Event
Volunteering Legacy: Did the London 2012 games
induce a sustainable volunteer engagement?
Sustainability, 8(1221), 1-12.
4) Lee, C-K., et al. (2014). The influence ofvolunteer motivation on satisfaction, attitudes andsupportforamega-event.
International
Journal of Hospitality Management, 40, 37-48.
5) Noordegraaf, M. A., & Celebi, M. (2015). The
challenges of volunteering during international sportorganizations/events, International Journal of
Human Sciences, 12(1), 1263-1279.
6) Qi, H., et al. (2018). Cross-cultural event
volunteering: Challenge and intelligence, Tourism
Management, 69, 596-604.
7) Tomazos, K., & Luke, S. (2015). Mega-sports
events volunteering: Journeys with a past, a present
and a future, Voluntas, 26, 1337-1359.

Fig.3 An empty Village Plaza at the end of the games

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: The author would liketo acknowledge the understanding and cooperationof the NIT, Oita President Yamaguchi andVice-president Takahashi for their permission toparticipate as a volunteer for the games’ duration.

8) Ziemba, T. (2018). Personal Growth ThroughVolunteering at an International Sporting Event –Reflections on Participation in the PyeongChang
Winter Games, 大分工業高等専門学校紀要, 55,
11-15.

―8―(Received September 30, 2021)