Ask almost any PGA of America Officer how they ended up in a national leadership role and the story tends to start the same way: Somebody in their Section asked them to help with something. It might have been joining a committee or hosting a junior golf clinic. Perhaps there was a board seat that came open unexpectedly, or a charitable event that needed volunteers. Maybe it was as simple as an invitation to play in a Monday tournament.
Regardless of the beginning, many stories of PGA Section involvement have similar endings – PGA of America Golf Professionals who say yes widen their network, gain valuable experience that benefits themselves and their facilities, and, in some cases, they end up running for national office.
Nathan Charnes can tell that story exactly. The PGA of America Vice President moved to St. Louis in 2004 and didn’t know a soul in the Gateway PGA Section. As the new PGA of America Head Professional at WingHaven Golf Club in O’Fallon, Missouri, he started building his network by playing in Section tournaments. Then he got on a committee. Then he fell in love with his new community of golf professionals in the Gateway PGA Section.
“I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t get involved, if I didn’t have the desire to get involved,” says Charnes, now the PGA of America General Manager at WingHaven. “I didn’t realize how impactful being involved in my Section would be on my career and my relationships within the PGA of America.”
PGA of America Secretary Eric Eshleman followed a strikingly similar path from his early career through eventually being elected to national office. A North Florida PGA Section membership committee spot led to a committee position in the Alabama-Northwest Florida PGA Section. Over the years, the progression included working through the chairs of Section leadership before being elected a national officer.
“I had been the beneficiary of the benefits that being involved in your PGA Section can create,” says Eshleman, the PGA of America Director of Golf at Country Club of Birmingham (Alabama). “And then it was time for me to take a leadership role and make sure I was providing those to other professionals.”
The pattern is not an accident. The 41 PGA of America Sections are the connective tissue of the PGA of America, the place where national programs get delivered to local members, where business relationships get built and where the Association’s next generation of leaders gets discovered. For PGA of America Golf Professionals looking to grow a career, a club or a reputation, the Sections are the catalyst.
Of course, career advancement is only one of the many functions served by the PGA of America’s 41 Sections. Each Section operates as its own nonprofit, with its own staff, its own tournament schedule, its own programming calendar, its own sponsorship portfolio and, in most cases, its own charitable foundation. Sections run member championships and pro-ams. They deliver PGA HOPE, PGA Jr. League, Drive, Chip and Putt qualifiers and a growing list of player development initiatives. They advocate for their members on employment issues, they steer junior golf in their markets, and they write checks to causes that matter in their regions.
Scott Wellington, who oversees Section Business Operations (SBO) at the PGA of America, prefers a corporate analogy. “Within the PGA ecosystem, in many ways, if you equate it to a franchise model – like a fast food restaurant – the Sections are, in essence, the local franchise,” he says. “We say they’re the delivery system to the member. They’re truly the delivery system to the PGA Member on the ground in the local market.”
PGA of America Master Professional Mike O’Donnell, the PGA’s Senior Director of Member Section Operations, has a similar view of the inherent importance of PGA Sections to the Association: When a member thinks about the PGA of America, they’re usually thinking locally.
“If you’re a member of the PGA of America, typically when you think PGA of America, you see your Section. It’s your Section Executive Director and staff,” O’Donnell says. “From a member perspective, the Section stands out as who the PGA of America is.”
The Sections also look very different from one another. The Metropolitan PGA Section operates in one of the densest golf markets in the country. The Carolinas PGA Section – the Association’s most populous – spans 10 chapters across two states. The Pacific Northwest PGA Section covers part or all of five states and is the largest geographic Section, reaching from Alaska to Oregon.
With PGA of America Golf Professionals throughout the country, best practices travel well. Templates do not, which is why each PGA Section has the freedom to serve its members in a way that best suits their specific needs.
Eshleman has a metaphor for this that gets quoted around the ecosystem. Carolinas PGA Section Executive Director Jeff Abbot borrows it freely.
“We’re all serving hot dogs,” Abbot says, citing Eshleman. “But in some areas, you want to put mustard on top, some you want to put ketchup, some you want to load it up and make it a chili dog. It’s a little bit different wherever you go, but it’s still a hot dog nonetheless.”
In the Carolinas PGA Section, the local flavor comes from a conviction that “all golf is local,” Abbot says. With 10 chapters, the Section can put events and education within reach of most members rather than asking them to drive three or four hours. Section-wide events still happen for members whose schedules permit. But the chapter system is what makes the Section feel local even at scale.
“Eighty percent of what we do at the Section level is the same throughout all 41 Sections,” Abbot says. “Twenty percent of it is kind of our unique flavor.”
What Sections do share is structure. Governance runs through an elected Board of Directors, led by officers – typically a President, Vice President, Secretary and occasionally a Treasurer – who serve staggered terms. Chapters, where they exist, function as regional subdivisions with their own leadership. Committees do the groundwork: tournaments, awards, employment, education, junior golf, support for assistants and associates, finance. Each is an entry point.
Most Sections also operate a 501(c)(3) Foundation as a separate legal entity from the Section’s 501(c)(6) trade association. It’s a distinction PGA of America Golf Professional Ali Wells, Executive Director of the Gateway PGA Section, says PGA Members should understand – because it points to two different kinds of opportunity.
“Our Section and the programs we do under our (c)(6), they serve the member in their current facility, inside the facility walls,” Wells says. “The Foundation looks outside of existing golf courses and existing programming. We look into the community and try to take golf where it might not otherwise already be introduced.”
Section programming gets the game to the people already at the facility. Foundation programming gets the game to the people who aren’t. Both need participation from PGA Section Members, and both shape the Section’s identity in its market.
