Netball, cricket, water polo rows expose deeper leadership failings in sport

The Cricket NZ board has just seen the resignation of one of the “poster boys” of the game here, former Black Caps allrounder Dion Nash who it seems, has had a principled disagreement with the direction the board is taking the game. His departure follows that of the previous CEO, who also cited fundamental differences with the game’s stakeholders as the driver of his departure.

The reasons for the failures are as varied as the sports themselves. It may be, like cricket, a disagreement about direction, or like netball, breakdowns between coaches, athletes, and CEOs.

With many of the sports mentioned, a common inflexion point seems to be the relationship between coaches and athletes. It’s easy to see why. On one side, there is a coach demanding of an athlete what they believe it takes to become a high-performance player. On the other, the athlete variously feeling pressured, disrespected or hit upon, and possibly in some cases lacking the resilience or mental fortitude to play in the high-stakes environment that is high-performance sport.

Another point of tension appears to be between those in the administration and those on the field. The former includes sporting CEOs, their management teams and boards of directors. The latter comprises coaches, medical personnel and of course, the athletes themselves.

When it all falls apart, the allegations usually include bullying, favouritism in selections, and leadership failures. Phrases like “athlete welfare” get thrown around and “investigations” are established.

The outcomes of these incidents mean that every party gets damaged. CEOs, chairs, board directors, coaches and even athletes have variously jumped or been pushed as a result. Such outcomes impact reputations and are seldom fair to everyone involved. All too often, the victim is the athlete or the person who once decided to volunteer their time in the interests of the sport that they love.

My opinions are informed by 20-plus years of experience on volunteer boards, including eight years with a national sporting body, of which six were as chairman. I’ve also sat on numerous selection committees charged with the task of appointing boards for sporting and service organisations, too.

My own view is that, whatever the version of events or relationships outlined above, the ultimate responsibility lies with the boards of the organisations affected. But the problem lies in the fact that we have far too many sporting boards which are either ill-equipped or insufficiently experienced to deal with the matters they come across in the current environment.

First and foremost, board members need to be engaged in the sport. In the case of the national sporting organisation that I had the privilege of leading, we were able to assemble a board comprising people who are genuinely invested in the sport. Some were still competing in masters events. Others had represented New Zealand, including at Olympic level. All were capable in a meeting or business environment. These were people who understood the sport, understood the challenges and threats to success, and who possessed the executive skill sets to contribute accordingly.

But, as we have seen, that critical ingredient, relevant experience, hasn’t been the case everywhere.

I’ve always been guided by a simple thought. If an athlete is going to bust their gut, be at the gym or the track or the pool at ridiculous hours, endure the injuries, the loneliness, and the travel they must endure to compete at the top level, and cope with the highs and lows of that competition, then the least we could do is give them the platform and the environment that enables them to deliver their best work.

That means floor-to-ceiling coaching and support programmes, financial stability and access to quality events and strong competition. Most important is close one-on-one monitoring and strong communication with athletes and coaches.

But it has become clear that that’s not always happening.

With the breadth of our apparent challenges, there are a couple of sister organisations that must carry some of the blame, and yet who are seldom mentioned.

Sport NZ (SNZ) and High Performance Sport NZ (HPSNZ) carry plenty of influence in terms of how sport operates in New Zealand, up to and including how their governance is run. They are the organisations responsible for handing out the money and for making sure that money generates results.

Their only scorecard is results. Medals and trophies. Win and the money flows. Lose and it stops. During my time as chair of Swimming NZ up until 2021, I had to get closer to them than I wanted to be. In my experience, their “bully boy” tactics were particularly abrasive in the face of those of us who were volunteering for the sport we loved.

Their demeanour was usually best summarised as entitled, arrogant and disrespectful, with an air of “we control the money so you do as we say”. What they said was seldom informed, accurate or appropriate.

You see, there’s a game that they play. If they don’t like what you’re doing, they will openly threaten the money flow. Their opinion includes your governance structure. Notwithstanding the quality and balance of our board, I was frequently reminded of the need to have a 50/50 gender balance on that board. That was never an issue with our board, but it didn’t stop them.

Here’s the point. HPSNZ funding is for the provision of high-performance programmes, pathway development and targeted athlete support. It’s also for services that support the athlete, such as nutrition, sports psychology and medical care.

Attaching that money, or even threatening to do so, to any form of Government-induced or SNZ diversity requirements of sporting boards is wrong, on just about every level that I can think of.

My time on board appointment panels provides some insight into the calibre of people putting themselves forward for board roles in sporting governance. There is usually a small sprinkling of very good people, engaged in the sport, often active across many sports or a relevant community, who also carry strong executive skills. Sadly, these people don’t always get the job.

Beyond that small group, however, are the majority. People looking to develop a governance career, despite no apparent expertise in the field. People who think a board is the logical next step from the club committee they once sat on. People who will openly say that DEI is the reason for their appointment rather than their credentials. Believe it or not, even people with concerns about how the subject sport is threatening the environment and who think joining the board will help them to stop it! Yes, sad but true. Sadly, these people sometimes do get the job!

So, if you want to know why our sporting codes are experiencing the problems that they are, there will be many reasons. Many of those reasons will be specific to the sport, its circumstances and the personalities of the people involved.

But close to the top of the list of things going wrong will be the governance, the quality of personnel and the leadership, of the organisation. And if we’re not selecting the best people for the job of governance, we’re not giving our athletes or our coaches a fair go.

Sport at the top level is a high-stakes game. Athletes have relatively short careers, and the biggest international events are at specific timing intervals, often four years apart. Those events don’t wait for injuries to heal or form to return. The odds of being at your best at the most important time are low, even for the top athletes. A lot of things have to go right for the chosen competitor to be at their very best on the most important day of their career.

The goal of every sporting administrator should be to do everything we can to make those things go right.