Should the CEO of Football Tasmania Live in Tasmania?

Leadership matters in community sport.

Where the leaders of our sporting organisations live is part of that conversation.

Which raises a simple question.

Where should the CEO of Football Tasmania live?

It sounds straightforward. But in a small football state like Tasmania, the answer carries more weight than people might think.

Tasmanian football is not a large professional industry. It is a community game sustained by volunteers, clubs and families who give their time week after week.

That reality shapes what leadership should look like.

A community game

On winter mornings around Tasmania the football day often starts the same way.

Wet grass. Cold wind. Mud on boots before the first whistle even blows.

Cars line the edges of community grounds. Volunteers set up goals and corner flags. Parents stand on the sideline with takeaway coffee while children chase a ball across a damp pitch.

A canteen opens its shutters. A committee member checks the draw for the day. Someone is already thinking about next weekend’s fixtures before the first game has even started.

If you spend enough time around grassroots football, dirty shoes and cold hands become normal.

After more than two decades involved in football in Tasmania, I have spent a lot of time standing on those sidelines.

This is where the game actually lives.

Understanding Tasmanian football properly means seeing it in those places, not just hearing about it through reports or meetings.

A relationship-driven sport

Tasmanian football operates through relationships.

Clubs know each other. Volunteers speak regularly. Referees travel across regions. Conversations on sidelines and in clubrooms often shape how the game evolves.

In this kind of environment, leadership that understands those relationships has a much clearer picture of the sport it is responsible for.

In community sport, leadership is not only about formal authority. Visibility matters as well. Leaders who spend time around competitions and clubs develop an understanding of the game that cannot be gained from distance alone.

Authority in volunteer sport is rarely granted by title alone. It is earned through engagement.

More than the top tier

The football community in Tasmania is much bigger than the top tier of the game.

It includes NPL clubs, but it also includes dozens of community clubs run almost entirely by volunteers.

Clubs like Cygnet Seadragons in the south. Southern Raiders in the north of the state, despite the name. Small regional clubs where parents coach teams, volunteers open clubrooms and referees travel long distances simply to ensure games can take place.

These clubs operate year round. Committees carry responsibility long after the final whistle. Volunteers often give up evenings and weekends so that others can simply turn up and play.

Those clubs are part of the football ecosystem too.

If leadership only hears from the top end of the game, it only understands part of the picture.

Tasmania is not one place

Football in Tasmania stretches across the south, the north and the north-west.

Each region has its own clubs, facilities and challenges.

A decision that looks straightforward on paper can feel very different depending on whether you are standing at a ground in Hobart, Launceston or Devonport.

In larger jurisdictions, distance can make regular engagement difficult. Tasmania is different. Communities across the state are connected by relatively short travel distances, and competitions take place every weekend in towns and suburbs across the island.

Leaders who spend time across those communities develop a clearer understanding of the game they are responsible for.

That kind of understanding usually comes from presence.

What presence reveals

Presence allows leaders to notice the things that rarely appear in formal documents.

The condition of facilities. The pressures volunteers carry. The way safeguarding practices operate in practice. The barriers families navigate in order to keep their children involved in sport.

These are the realities of grassroots participation.

Leaders who spend time in these environments see the sport as it is actually experienced by the people who sustain it. That understanding shapes better decisions and stronger advocacy when sporting organisations engage with governments, partners and sponsors.

Stewardship of public funding

State sporting organisations are not funded only by their members.

Many also receive significant public funding through state government programs, grants and facility investment.

With that funding comes responsibility.

Sporting bodies are not just administrators of competitions. They are stewards of public investment in community sport.

Understanding the communities that investment is intended to support requires more than policy documents and strategy papers.

It requires leaders to see the sport in action and understand the environments where participation takes place.

The quiet work of leadership

The best leaders often do this quietly.

They attend matches. Walk through junior tournaments. Speak with referees, volunteers and parents. Sit in a grandstand on a cold afternoon because they want to understand the sport they lead.

Not because anyone is watching.

Leadership in community sport is not only administrative. It also involves emotional intelligence, an understanding of the people, places and relationships that sustain the game.

Presence builds that understanding.

A simple question

If football in Tasmania is a community game, shouldn’t its leadership be part of that community?

Of course modern sporting roles involve travel and national responsibilities. No one expects a CEO to attend every match or visit every ground.

But living in the state and spending time within the football community should not be an unusual expectation.

Presence creates understanding. Understanding builds credibility.

Clubs and volunteers are remarkably perceptive. They quickly recognise whether leadership decisions are grounded in lived experience of the sport or primarily informed by second-hand information.

Leadership behaviour also sends signals. When leaders spend time within the competitions and communities they govern, it demonstrates that those environments matter.

In a small football state, leadership works best when it is embedded in the community it serves.

In Tasmania, that often means muddy boots, cold hands and time spent on the touchline.