Dev Pathik
Founder/CEO
Specialty: Strategy
Meet Dev
Interview with Dev Pathik
As the founder and CEO of The Sports Facilities Advisory, Dev provides the stewardship and strategic direction of the company which provides a suite of planning and management services to owners and communities seeking to develop or optimize performance related to sports and recreation facilities and tourism. SFA’s services include financial forecasting,feasibility analysis, economic impact studies, master planning consultation, and management services.
Along with SFA’s team of sports facility development specialists, sports facility management experts, and sports business analysts, he and the SFA team have worked on projects that include the National Stadium of the Bahamas, the Canada Games Centre, Al Dowli Sports Center (Dammam, Saudi Arabia), Kapalua Adventures (Maui, Hawaii), The Legends Sports Complex (metro Houston), and a large multisport center owned by the United States National Park Service. Dev is also an owner of two successful facilities which offer sport, recreation, teambuilding, and adventure activities.
With an education in Psychology from the University of Maryland, Dev became an internationally recognized expert in team and leadership development. Applying these skills Dev was able to provide innovative leadership curriculum to the sports, recreation, corporate training, and leadership development industries. As an athlete, Dev spent more than a decade leading international climbing and adventure expeditions in some of the most remote regions on earth. He managed the teambuilding events and adventure sports center at Clark Sports Center (home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Induction Ceremony) in Cooperstown, NY Dev then went on to open and operate Global Adventures, an international ecotourism company specializing in high-altitude trekking in the Andes and dugout canoe expeditions to isolated regions of the Amazon River basin.
In the ‘90’s, Pathik opened the one of the largest corporate teambuilding centers in the U.S. at Westin Innisbrook Resort. This center attracted more than 6,000 room nights to the resort in its first nine months of operation and served clientele from such distinguished companies as Campbell’s Soup, GE, Procter & Gamble, Roche Laboratories,Ameristeel, and Charles Schwab.
After selling his interests in these entities, Dev went on to become a leading business development and curriculum consultant to such notable clients as Sony Pictures International, Cornell University, Joe Dumars’ Fieldhouse, Wyndham Resorts, George Mason University, The Ohio State University, and a wide range of sports, tourism, and leadership development entities. This work has included the development of more than 40 teambuilding centers in destinations around the world including tropical, ski, and urban centers.
Dev has been a board member, guest or keynote speaker, or advisor to the following organizations:
- U.S. Indoor Sports Association
- Athletic Business
- International Association of Experiential Education (In 2002, Dev’s firm won the prestigious Organizational Member of the Year award)
- American Advertising Federation
- The Soderquist Center for Leadership and Ethics
- USNE Renewable Energy Advisors
- Lead America Youth Leadership Camp
- Leadership Pinellas (Clearwater, FL)
- Clearwater Chamber of Commerce
(727) 474-3845, ext. 105