Megan Simpson, CEO Diving Victoria

Alex Mednis & Nicholas Watkins, Australian Sports Professional Association
Megan Simpson, Diving Victoria
 

Bonus content

Each CEO has bonus content available to ASPA members that is not found in the book. The philosophies below are sourced directly from the interview, however each interview contained so much great content we had to put together an excerpt. Note that the content of the interview differs than the philosophies.

Interview

From running parallel lives of coaching and administration all in one sport, Megan has been an elite netballer, worked in netball across Australia & Fiji, and is now the CEO of Diving Victoria.
 

From an athletic and then administrative career in Netball - what brought you to Diving?

Diving is a completely new sport to me, and a new opportunity and it has different challenges. I've been in the fortunate position of expanding my skillset and seeing where the direction of the CEO role might take me.

How was that as a culture shift for you? From 30 or 40 staff at netball to 2 or 3 at Diving?

Yes, it was a real challenge. I think certainly coming into this job, I knew a bit of the history of Diving, particularly in Victoria, and I knew that I wasn't going to have access to the same level of resources that I would have been used to in previous roles. However, that was part of the reason why I took the job, because I really felt that there were areas of running a business that I needed to learn a bit more about.
 

The resourcing must be quite different overall!

If you look at Netball New South Wales as my previous job, you're quite right; they have between 40 and 50 staff - we had whole departments to look after finance, marketing, high performance and game development. Now all of sudden you find yourself doing the whole lot at Diving.

You’re doing everything from preparing catering through to forecasting the next financial year’s budget. It is a real mixed bag, but I really think it was a great opportunity for me to learn about parts of the business that I either hadn't been exposed to, or weren’t my strongest skill set.

It is running a small business in a way, isn't it?

Yes, absolutely. And it's interesting that it doesn't really matter what sport you're in. I think all sports the same issues just at different levels of complexity and maybe on a different scale. But, you know, fundamentally, we all are just dealing with the same things.

Some decisions work and some don't, and I've certainly had that roller coaster of a ride over the last 18 months. 

And prior to this role, you spent a few years in Fiji, which is again a different environment again!

The cultural shift coming back into Melbourne, let alone into a new sport and a new role was pretty overwhelming. It was a really big 12 months for me because there was a lot of settling in - trying to establish my family life, as well as meeting new people, understanding the history behind decisions made within the sport, and importantly, learning about the key issues and identifying solutions for improvement. 

How have you built that support network up in a new city?

It's about building that network of people around you professionally that you can have a coffee with. At MSAC (Melbourne Sport & Aquatic Centre), we're lucky because there are so many sports nearby, and pre-COVID, I could just go and knock on the door of Swimming Victoria next door and say, "Hey, Jason, can we have a coffee because I'm really struggling with this issue?" and you build those relationships that way. We are fortunate that we're not tucked away in an office on our own because I think that would be far more difficult.

Volunteers must form a huge part of the environment as well. Long term, how do you keep those volunteers on the same journey as the sport?

it’s a very good question. I think there's a proportion of volunteers across the sporting industry that are aging so it is critical that we not only recognise them for the incredible and selfless contribution they have made to the sport, but importantly harness their expertise and knowledge. For us, it means identifying ways to engage in the next generation of volunteers, officials and judges, and providing them with the skills and confidence to perform their roles. Diving is also a small community – so building a sense of ‘family’ for people to connect with is also very important.

You've got such a build-up of technical expertise and sport knowledge that's kind of embedded in certain individuals. 

That's right. Divers often retire at quite a young age in comparison to other sports, however they still have so much to share. I'm passionate about trying to give Victorian coaches and officials and our members the opportunity to continue their involvement in diving beyond their ability to physically compete. 

Is it a particular challenge absorbing all of that diving knowledge to work through how it affects the business?

I'm not a diver, I can't coach diving and I don't know how to jump off a board. For me, it was even more important to build that rapport with our existing volunteers and officials in saying, "I don't know the technical answers. That's where you need to help me, and you need to tell me what you think."

And then you've just got to weigh it all up and filter out anything that doesn't make good business sense because sometimes people have fantastic ideas, but they don’t have the luxury of taking into account how it may impact upon the overall business. 

Is the focus from coaches on growing membership, kids and therefore finances? Is there a bit of stress from being compared to other sports?

Definitely. I've been very supportive of, "Don't worry about the finances. That's not your job. You just coach the athletes, you know, focus on that." And sometimes the coaches will go back to, "But I've got to build more numbers." Because historically that's where they have been told they have to focus. And I admire that and I really appreciate the passion, but trying to harness that energy and channel their enthusiasm into what they need to do is the challenge. 

They can worry too much about needing more kids in their squad - but it doesn't work like that. High performance and participation and all the other things a sport does, all bring different amounts of revenue but ultimately work together to run the sport. 

Log in to view full interview!

The remainder of the interview is only available to ASPA members. Membership is currently free! Become a member today and join Australia's growing national sport professionals network.