Life After Hockey - Transition to the Future

About Us

The Professional Athlete Transition Institute (PATI) is a non-profit organization that strategically partners with professional sports leagues & associations, including the NHL Alumni Association (NHLAA), the National Hockey League (NHL) and the NHL Players’ Association (NHLPA) helping them to understand, support and develop customized, relevant programs and services that address the unique post-game and off-season challenges that elite athletes face.

PATI is also the exclusive and sole provider of career development and transition services for the NHL Alumni Association, the NHL and the NHLPA. Through its athlete research initiatives, PATI is dedicated to the development of customized services designed to meet the career transition, business training and educational needs of all former and active NHL athletes.

Our History

Over 100 members have participated in the Life After Hockey Program (NHL Alumni- former players) and Breakaway Programs (NHLPA members -active players). PATI’ s programming is predicated on years of on-going research with NHL athletes and our experiences in working with all major professional athletes.

These services have been developed over a period of five years with direct contributions from members of the NHL Alumni, the NHL, the NHL Players' Association and the player/ clients who have participated in the program as well as feedback from Life After Hockey-Breakaway Committee members: ex-NHLer’s, Mike Gartner, Steve Larmer, Pat Flatley and Mark Napier and Brian O’Neill & Dr. Brian Shaw.

PATI is based at Quinnipiac University located in Hamden, Conn. Quinnipiac University was founded in 1929 and is a private, co-educational, non-sectarian institution of higher education.

Our Services

PATI is proud to offer a variety of services for former NHL athletes. PATI employs a unique career transition system predicated on the concepts of periodized athletic training. We will assess your specific needs and objectives and provide you with customized options designed to meet your educational, business, skill development and personal goals.

Service Offerings include:

• Entrepreneurial Services
• Educational Services
• Career Exploration And Transition
• One-On-One Business & Life Coaching
• Business Skills Development
• Work-Study Programs (Mentorship, Internship, Job-Shadowing etc.)

Access to Flexible Services Options:

Programs and services are delivered through:

• group / classroom settings (seminars / workshops)
• 1-on-1 virtual coaching & webinars via the phone, e-mail, internet

Flexible delivery options make this a program for everyone. Access our services from your home-office or while on the road, while the kids are asleep or during your lunch-break at work - the choice is yours.

Entrepreneurial Training & Assistance Services

Athletes are constantly bombarded with business opportunities from a variety of different sources. As one athlete said, “everyone is always trying to figure out ways to spend my money.” Our goal at PATI is to assist athletes interested in:

• Purchasing an existing business
• Purchasing franchises
• Starting your own venture
• Invest in 3rd party business opportunities

PATI will provide you with the tools and the confidence you need to evaluate specific business opportunities. You can do this either through enrolment in our customized entrepreneurship course (for university credit or non-credit depending on your needs) or if you prefer engage in our personalized one-on-one coaching service. On-line or in a classroom setting, the choice is yours.

Educational Services: Complete a Degree or Start a Degree

If you are looking to either complete a degree or start a degree, PATI can assist you in making this goal a reality. Our institute will work with you to find the right program to meet your educational needs. Using our services allows you to explore many educational institutions at once. Our clients can choose to attend any school in North America with our assistance (provided you are accepted to the institution) and can decide to pursue their studies on-line, in the classroom or through correspondence.

For eligible and interested NHL Alumni the Professional Athlete Transition Institute and Quinnipiac University’s College of Professional Studies (CPS) have partnered to create a unique degree completion concept designed to facilitate the process for elite athletes within 30 credits of earning their degree. This program allows students to accelerate the completion of their degrees by taking courses every 7 weeks. For more information about QU CPS please visit us at this link.

Career Exploration & Transition Assistance:

As noted, the transition from athletics to new challenges outside of sport can difficult. Finding a new career that ignites a passion similar to sport can be a daunting task. PATI offers customized one-on-one and group transition service for retired athletes looking to explore and prepare for new careers. PATI provides clients with personalized business and/or retirement services; from developing your network & your résumé, to interviewing and negotiating a job offer, we offer you expertise in these areas and many more with a team of coaches and consultants who have a great deal of experience working with professional athletes.

One On One Business & Life Coaching:

You're at the top of your business career, or want to get there, or you just need/want a job. Accessing a LAH Coach will help you move to an even higher level of effectiveness. How do you know if you need a coach and what can a coach do for you? They will assist you by:

• Identifying the roles and accomplishments that have given you the most satisfaction, and determining which of these many skills that made you an elite athlete are transferable to your new opportunities
• Discovering your greatest strengths-those that may not show up in your job title or more obvious accomplishments
• Building on your strengths for career and/or entrepreneurial moves you may be interested in, while reducing the risk of moving toward new opportunities
• Conducting an inventory of your key interests and characteristics, thereby marketing yourself better in whatever work you choose
• Determining how closely aligned your current work is with your deepest values, interests and competencies
• Understanding better the work roles and environments that you should avoid to reduce the threat of burnout and/or work dissatisfaction
• Taking stock of your most important values and the degree to which they are being honoured in your current work-life situation
• Better determining what you need to do to reach your career goals at this time in your life

Business Skill Development

PATI offers NHL Alumni self study courses that allow you to learn at your own pace, at times and places that are convenient for you and provide a high degree of interactivity to reinforce basic skills. Lessons and activities can be repeated as often as needed to ensure skill development. Through Element K, www.elementk.com the LAH Program offers NHL Alumni access to over 1,600 on-line courses on a wide range of computer skills and business performance topics.

Everyone knows that today, technology - understanding and using it - is essential for any kind of work or career path you may choose. LAH will introduce you to the necessary computer skill sets to become employable or, for NHLA who are already computer savvy-senior executives, we’ll help you take steps to advance your business career in today’s competitive business economy. A sampling of how LAH on-line desktop courses can assist you in enhancing your business acumen and computer skills follows:

Computer Skills- We’ll help you enhance your computer knowledge and skills, one step at a time, from the beginner to advanced levels. Courses include all levels of:

• MS Suite, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook
• Office Productivity
• E-Business
• Project Management
• MS Office Pack

Business Performance Support Tools - LAH will assist you in advancing your business acumen and skills through these options:

• Developing Leaders/ Managers
• Financial Acumen
• Managing Transition
• Diversity Awareness
• Improving Customer Service
• Professional Effectiveness
• Sales Effectiveness
• Work-Study Opportunities
• Job-Shadow, Information Meeting, Mentor and Internship Programs

Former NHL player's -like all professional athletes - possess a wide variety of competencies, transferable skills and unparalleled experiences related to teamwork, leadership, perseverance, and discipline. However, what they often lack is first-hand corporate work experience.

In developing our business partners and senior executive leader networks, PATI is strategically partnered with leading corporations to develop a dynamic learning community, with customized, flexible job-shadow, information meeting, mentor and Internship guidelines and programs.

This proactive plan for integration with the business community enables NHL Alumni to gain valuable insights into the business world and gain hands-on work-experience. All qualified participants are trained by PATI in order to maximize their experiences and ensure productivity and ’fit’ with executive mentors and host organizations. The process often includes a solid introduction to the industry and specific functional areas of interest and can lead to employment opportunities within the host organization or business network. The ultimate goal of our Work-Study Program is to provide NHL Alumni the greatest level of business exposure in the shortest amount of time while maximizing business networks and Alumni’s celebrity, to find a best 'fit' opportunity.