Allan Grønkjær is a PhD candidate at the Department of Sport and Social Sciences, Norwegian School of Sport Sciences (NIH). On April 27, 2026, he defends hin doctoral thesis, Leading across multilevels. Understanding leadership and management in high-performance sport in Norway and Denmark, at NIH, Auditorium Innsikt, 10:15–16:00.
The project examines the management and leadership of high-performance organisations in elite sport. He works from a conceptual framework of multi-level leadership. This approach acknowledges the variation of different influences, which a leader, e.g., a high-performance director, experiences in the short term (everyday work life) and in the long term (creating and implementing strategy). There is a clear focus on how the context of sport affects leadership.
Allan conducted interviews with high performance directors from different national sport federations in primarily Norway and Denmark. In addition, he interviewed representatives from Olympiatoppen in Norway, Swedish Olympic Committee in Sweden and Team Danmark in Denmark.
- The PhD-project is made up by the following sub-projects:
- The management and leadership of the national teams for Danish and Norwegian handball.
- A comparative analysis of the elite sport model at the level of the National High-Performance Sport Institutions: How does the National High-Performance Sport Institutions in the Norway, Sweden and Denmark fit the concept of a uniform elite sport model?
- Leadership during the Covid-19 – a case study of the Norwegian women handball team
- How high-performance directors interact with national sport organizations and Team Denmark: A multi-level perspective of governance, management and leadership.
Read the thesis here.
Committee
Chair
- Professor Sigmund Loland, Institutt for idrett og samfunnsvitenskap, NIH
Opponents
- Professor Hans Erik Næss, Institutt for ledelse og organisasjon, Høyskolen Kristiania
- Associate Professor Laila Ottesen, Institutt for idrett og ernæring, Københavns universitet, Danmark
Supervisors
- Professor Dag Vidar Hanstad, Department of Sport and Social Sciences, NIH
- Professor emeritus Svein S. Andersen, Department of Leadership and Organizational Behaviour, BI
Program
