Match point in the war room: what elite sport taught me about crisis leadership

There’s a particular kind of silence that settles over a room just before a reputational crisis becomes public, or a major board decision lands on the table.

It’s heavy. At that point, preparation, judgement and ethics are all you really have to rely on.

In those moments, it often feels less like a meeting and more like the moment before play begins. The room goes quiet, the pressure sharpens and you know the next move will matter.

When I was younger, my world revolved around the white lines of a tennis court. I was a nationally ranked junior and for a time thought professional sport would be my future. Life took me in a different direction. I moved into strategic communications and governance instead.

But in many ways, I never really left the arena.

These days the “court” is usually a boardroom and the match is crisis leadership. The skills are surprisingly similar. Sport didn’t just teach me how to compete. It taught me how to perform under scrutiny, stay calm when things go wrong and make decisions when there is very little time to think.

The Alysa Liu standard: precision when the ice is thin

In the high-stakes world of reputation management, we often fear the “pause.” We think that if we stop, we lose. But the story of Alysa Liu – the 2026 Olympic gold medallist – tells a different story.

At the 2026 Winter Olympics she reclaimed her place on the world stage, winning gold through a mix of technical precision and mental toughness.

Figure skating, like crisis management, is judged on execution. You can attempt something incredibly difficult, but if your edges are off or the landing slips, the whole performance unravels.

Leading through a corporate crisis is similar. Whether it’s navigating the confidential sale of a stadium or managing the fallout from a governance breach, there are some fundamentals you simply cannot ignore. Transparency matters. Risk needs to be managed properly. Decisions need to be made clearly and confidently.

Like a skater mid-routine, hesitation rarely helps. In the court of public opinion, there are no second takes.

In my consultancy, I often see organisations that need an “Alysa Liu moment.” Whether I’m navigating a governance reset or a multi-million redevelopment, the most resilient organisations are those with the courage to step back, re-align their systems, and return to the market with a sharper, more authentic strategy.

The Simone Biles standard: managing the “twisties” of leadership

Crisis leadership can sometimes feel like managing the “twisties”.

In gymnastics, the twisties are a dangerous form of spatial disorientation. An athlete suddenly loses awareness of where they are in the air, meaning their body and mind fall out of sync. For a gymnast attempting complex flips and twists, that loss of orientation can make landing safely almost impossible.

Simone Biles knows this better than anyone. With 30 World Championship medals and 11 Olympic medals, she is the most decorated gymnast in history. When she withdrew from several events at the Tokyo Olympics after experiencing the twisties, she shifted the global conversation about leadership, performance and mental health.

In the middle of a reputational crisis, leaders can experience something similar. The pressure is intense, information keeps changing and the ground can feel like it is moving beneath your feet. My role is often to be the steady hand in the room, helping leaders regain their bearings and focus on what actually matters.

Biles reminded the world that mental health is part of performance. In the same way, I’ve long believed communication is not just messaging. It is a governance discipline. If the internal gyroscope of an organisation, its culture, systems and decision-making, is out of balance, no amount of messaging will steady it.

The Emma McKeon standard: precision under scrutiny

For organisations under intense public attention, the real challenge is maintaining discipline while the pressure builds.

Emma McKeon, Australia’s most decorated Olympian, often speaks about the simple ingredients behind her success: patience, perseverance and years of work behind the scenes. Fourteen Olympic medals didn’t come from shortcuts.

Reputation works the same way. There are rarely quick fixes.

Whether managing the confidential sale of a major stadium over two and a half years, or navigating the merger that created Golf Australia, the outcome came down to consistency. Careful decisions. Technical discipline. And a refusal to cut corners.

You don’t win a reputation in a single moment. You build it lap by lap.

The final score

Whether it’s a quadruple jump on the ice or a high-stakes merger in the boardroom, sport remains the most honest mirror of leadership. It teaches us that “good leadership” isn’t about avoiding the crisis – it’s about having the systems, the courage, and the “match fitness” to deal with it when the lights are at their brightest.

Reputation isn’t built in the easy years; it’s forged in the moments when failure would be public and the consequences are real. The court may be different now, but the objective remains: stay focused, play with integrity, and never let the pressure dictate the outcome.

The pre-match check: are you ready for a crisis?

Before the next issue lands on your desk, it is worth asking a few straightforward questions.

1. Know the ground

• Do leaders have a direct line of sight into what is actually happening inside the organisation?
• Or is critical information being filtered before it reaches the top?
• Are culture, systems and leadership aligned, or is there a gap between what the organisation says and what it does?

2. Get the fundamentals right

• Is every public statement grounded in verifiable facts?
• Have legal and governance obligations been considered before communicating?

3. Bring stakeholders with you

• Do people understand why a decision or change is happening?
• If trust has been damaged, is there a genuine plan to rebuild it over time?

4. Build crisis fitness before you need it

• Have the organisation’s most likely risks been identified and mapped?
• Is there a spokesperson who can move calmly between the boardroom and the media?

5. Define what recovery looks like

• After the immediate pressure passes, is there a process to learn from what happened?
• Is the organisation actively building trust in quieter periods so it has credibility when it matters?

Crisis leadership rarely comes down to a single moment. More often, it is the result of preparation, clarity and disciplined decision-making long before the pressure arrives.