Narrative Athletics works with athletes, clubs/organizations, and collaborators to define identity, sharpen positioning, and build clear direction.
Three services, one starting point: identity, moving from there toward positioning, narrative, and business value.
Services
Narrative Consultancy
Narrative Consultancy is the primary service for athletes at Narrative Athletics. It is a strategic partnership for professional athletes who are ready to build beyond their sport: business direction, intellectual property, opportunity identification, and venture development, in one ongoing relationship.
It is not a one-time product. It is an advisory relationship where Narrative Athletics works alongside the athlete to define direction, protect what they own, facilitate the right connections, and build structures that last beyond their playing career. This is not for every athlete, and it is not built to be.
How it works
Narrative Consultancy is delivered through three layers, each with a distinct function.
Strategic guidance is the core of the relationship: identity and positioning as a compass for every decision an athlete makes outside their sport, through monthly sessions, opportunity analysis, and ongoing direction.
Opportunity preparation follows when a concrete opportunity arises. Narrative Athletics analyzes it, prepares the strategic case, and determines whether legal structuring is needed, coordinating that step and staying involved throughout to protect the strategic line.
Legal execution, where required, is handled by a specialist legal partner: company formation, IP registration, contract review and negotiation, and ownership and venture structuring. The legal partner invoices the athlete directly, Narrative Athletics does not intermediate on legal fees.
The five components
Every Consultancy relationship is built around five things, tracked continuously rather than delivered once.
Business Direction Log, a living record of the direction decided for the athlete and how it evolves over time.
Opportunities Log, a structured overview of concrete opportunities identified, from first signal through to outcome.
IP Register and Ownership Map, a comprehensive overview of what the athlete owns: name rights, image rights, content, brand assets, and IP-relevant contracts.
IP Readiness Scan, a professional assessment of how ready an athlete is to negotiate from a position of ownership, with a recommended next step per category.
Venture Tracker, a status overview of every business initiative the athlete is building, from concept through to active.
This work is grounded in AIR (Attention, Intention, Realization), a research-based framework developed by HCOS Institute, giving the identity development behind Narrative Consultancy a documented, longitudinal foundation rather than a single conversation or questionnaire.
There is no public entry point to Narrative Consultancy. Every relationship starts with a direct conversation.
Narrative Positioning Review
The primary service for clubs and organizations is the Narrative Positioning Review.
Most clubs have an identity felt internally that does not fully travel externally. There is a gap between what the club believes it stands for and what actually lands with players, sponsors, media and audiences. The Review maps that gap, names it precisely, and provides a concrete direction for closing it.
The analysis is grounded in quantitative data from the club's digital channels across a full season, qualitative observation of existing communication, and competitive benchmarking against comparable clubs. The output is a structured document built for the people inside the organization responsible for direction, not just for communications teams.
Work in this area can be conducted in English, Spanish, and Dutch.
Four configurations, one methodology
The Review is available in four configurations, matched to the depth of insight and implementation support needed. The underlying methodology is the same in each. What varies is the scope, the type of data involved, and how deeply the recommendations go.
NPR Essentials: A complete, twelve-section analysis built entirely on public data: quantitative evidence across the club's channels, a full content audit, leadership-signal analysis, one verified competitive reference, and three strategic directions. This is the standard depth for the entry configuration, proven across every case built to date, not a stripped-down starting point.
NPR Standard: Everything in Essentials, plus a sponsorship and partner activation audit, a second verified competitive reference, an extended content-audit window, and deeper context research. Still built entirely on public data, sellable without any prior relationship with the club.
NPR Full Scope: A different kind of engagement, built on the club's own internal data rather than public signals: real backend analytics, an internal intake conversation, and actual sponsorship terms. Delivers separate, specific recommendations for each stakeholder group, players, fans, partners, and media, with a genuine implementation plan built around the club's own situation.
NPR Full Scope+: Everything in Full Scope, plus structured implementation guidance: Narrative Athletics stays hands-on to help execute the recommendations over the following months.
Every finding, especially at Full Scope, follows the same discipline: nothing is written as a recommendation before checking whether the club already knows it, has already decided against it, or genuinely hasn't considered it. The Review verifies before it recommends.
The right configuration depends on what a club needs most: clarity on positioning, or a concrete plan to activate it, and whether that plan is best carried out internally or with continued guidance. This is decided together, in conversation. For clubs who want a first impression before committing to a full Review, a Strategic Preview is available as a lighter, faster entry point, generated from the same underlying case data. (Coming soon via the Narrative Athletics App.)
The Narrative Positioning Review is being developed and validated through the Final Master Thesis Narrative Positioning Framework as a Strategic Tool for Professional Basketball Clubs: Development and Validation in the EuroLeague Context, at the Euroleague Basketball Institute and Vytautas Magnus University. This methodology has been proven across three complete Narrative Positioning Reviews.
Collaborator Network
Narrative Athletics works with a small, invited network of professionals, agents and regional partners, who apply the Narrative Athletics methodology in their own work and bring athletes and clubs into the Narrative Athletics ecosystem. They operate independently, with their own expertise and their own network, not as employees.
Collaborators introduce athletes to Consultancy and clubs to the Review, extending Narrative Athletics' reach into new markets to increase impact and value where sports miss clarity. For the collaborator, it means standing behind a serious strategic partner, and being part of outcomes that genuinely change direction for the people they introduce.
What this includes
A formalized position within the Narrative Athletics ecosystem
Direct strategic access to Kiran Jones
Optional access to the Narrative Athletics knowledge base, covering the governance, legal, and commercial landscape of professional basketball
The Collaborator Network is invitation only, limited to a small number of active collaborators at any time to maintain quality and consistency. Collaborators are selected based on their professional profile, network, and alignment with the Narrative Athletics methodology.
Cases
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What started as clear potential, an athlete with talent but no structured answer to who they were beyond performance, has become a strategic business partnership with real direction. Identity, positioning, and a set of concrete opportunity areas have been translated into an active business direction, now tracked inside Narrative Consultancy through a documented Business Direction Log and an Opportunities Log following each concrete step as it arises.
— Narrative Consultancy
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Three Narrative Positioning Reviews have been completed for professional basketball clubs competing in the EuroLeague ecosystem, produced as part of the academic research behind the Narrative Positioning Framework. Each club had its own identity, built over years, and its own relationship between how that identity was understood internally and how it actually landed externally. Across the three engagements, the pattern held: identity that is strong on paper does not automatically translate into how a club is experienced by players, sponsors, media, and fans. Each Review mapped that specific gap, supported by quantitative analysis of the club's digital performance, a channel-by-channel communication audit, and competitive benchmarking against comparable clubs in the same market. The result in each case was a structured Review covering the central observation, the supporting evidence, and a set of concrete strategic directions with a recommended sequence for implementation, built for the people inside the organization responsible for direction, not just communications output.
— Professional Basketball Clubs, EuroLeague
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Narrative Consultancy the same as having a sports agent?
No. A sports agent negotiates and represents. Narrative Consultancy is the strategic layer around that: identity, direction, IP, and ownership, working alongside an agent or legal representation rather than replacing it.
What makes Narrative Consultancy different from a business manager or a financial advisor?
A business manager or financial advisor typically comes in once direction is already set. Narrative Consultancy starts earlier: at identity and positioning, so that the decisions that follow, deals, structures, ventures, are built on something deliberate instead of whatever opportunity happens to come first.
What language is the app available in?
English, Spanish and Dutch.
Who is Narrative Consultancy for?
For professional athletes who are ready to build beyond their sport, business direction, IP, and the opportunities that come with both. Every relationship starts with a direct conversation.
Do I need to already have a business idea to start Narrative Consultancy?
No. Many athletes start with talent and no structured answer to who they are beyond performance. That clarity work comes first. The business direction, IP structuring, and ventures follow from it, not the other way around.
What happens after the first conversation?
If there's a fit, the relationship begins directly: a retainer agreement for Narrative Consultancy, or a scoped engagement for a club's Review. If it's not the right moment or the right fit, that's a clear answer too, and a useful one.
What kind of organization gets the most out of a Narrative Positioning Review?
Professional clubs, academies, federations and leagues that want to understand the gap between their internal identity and how it actually lands externally, and get a concrete direction for closing it. The Review is most effective when there is someone inside the organization responsible for strategic direction, not just communications output.
How long does a Narrative Positioning Review take?
Timeline depends on the configuration: Essentials and Standard are typically completed within a few weeks, Full Scope and Full Scope+ take longer given the depth of analysis and the number of markets covered. The exact timeline is confirmed at the start of the engagement.
How is a Narrative Positioning Review different from a brand audit or communications review?
A brand audit looks at messaging and visual consistency. A Narrative Positioning Review goes further: it maps the gap between what a club actually is and how that identity lands externally, and turns that into a concrete strategic direction, not just a set of observations.
Start a Conversation
If you are serious about creating business value through building clarity, positioning, and direction, as an athlete, for your club or organization, or as a collaborator looking to apply the method in your own market, this is where it starts.