Cameron Schwab was the CEO of AFL clubs for 25 years. Here’s what he’s learnt about ethical leadership

Cameron Schwab is no strange name in the footy community. He was the youngest ever CEO appointed to a club when he took the reins at Richmond in 1988 at 24 years of age, and he stayed in that chief position – albeit at differing clubs – for 25 years.

These days, Schwab is an alumnus of Cranlana Centre for Ethical Leadership, and the founder of designCEO, a leadership and business management consultancy that teaches senior executives how to navigate the ambiguity of modern leadership.

SmartCompany Plus chatted with Schwab to find out how taking that mammoth role at such a young age affected his leadership approach, and what he’s learnt along the way.

Key takeaways

1. You need to have the curiosity to learn, and the courage to unlearn.

2. People attach themselves to your behaviours, not your intentions. It’s all about how you show up.

3. A good leader is calm, brave, humble and compassionate – and knows how to face ambiguity in those same ways.

The 24-year-old CEO

Breaking into the footy community is no easy feat, and to do it at such a young age is an extraordinary effort – especially since, as Schwab says, he went “straight from school to footy”.

But Schwab himself grew up in a sports family; a family that was “very embedded in Australian football”. As the son of Alan Schwab, a prominent sports administrator and VFL commissioner, Schwab says he had “an upbringing of the technical understanding of the game”.

“Most people in leadership generally do get their role based on technical expertise rather than necessarily experience,” he says, although he admits he “can’t think of any reason why I would have displayed any particular leadership qualities at that stage of my life”.

Prior to the appointment, Schwab was recruiting players for Melbourne, and through that process developed an even deeper “technical proficiency in the game”.

“I think just people saw something in me that I hadn’t seen in myself,” Schwab admits.

“And I’m forever grateful”.

Technical proficiency in the game is one thing, but being a chief executive of an entire football club – and a beloved one, at that – was always going to come with its challenges. Schwab says he was fortunate there were people around him who he could look to as “wonderful examples” of the sort of leader he wanted to be.

“But it still took me a long time to work out how I should lead,” he admits.

“I was still growing up.”

Across the 25 years he spent at various clubs – Richmond, Melbourne, and Fremantle – Schwab did manage to grow up, and especially so as a leader.

He developed and executed a project called ‘Save Our Skin’ (SOS), a campaign that saved Richmond from bankruptcy in 1990 – and one that was so successful it was nominated as the club’s ‘Defining Moment of the Century’ at Richmond’s Centenary Celebrations in 2008.

Cameron Schwab. Source: supplied.

Later, while at Melbourne, Schwab helped catapult the team from last on the ladder to the top four in just one year, and on to become grand finalists two years later. All the while, the club grew match attendances by 65%.

Then, as CEO at Fremantle, Schwab transformed the club from a debt laden one that had never placed higher than 12th in the ladder, to a regular finalist with an increased revenue of 320% and a balance sheet improvement of $13 million.

Ultimately, Schwab’s ethical leadership approach enabled all three clubs to regain more stability financially and grow in popularity – despite a lack of winning premierships.

From footy to fine arts

Schwab acknowledges he got to “do it for a long time” (being the CEO of a football club) and the challenges faced as a young leader led to many learning opportunities.

“The majority of [learning how to lead],” Schwab says, is knowing that “whatever happens that day, you’re going to have to show up in a way which is appropriate for what the situation demands from you”.

That lesson is one Schwab has carried with him through his life, and one that came to a head when Schwab decided to study fine arts at the Victorian College of Design; an experience that coincided with a change in his family life, when his youngest child, Evie, came out as transgender.

Schwab believes parenting and leadership are one and the same, as both require a “skill, or a system, by which you can open your mind and make yourself available to new learning”.

As Schwab eloquently summarises, in both aspects of life, “you have to have the curiosity to learn, but the courage to unlearn”.

When Evie first explained her transition to her father, Schwab admits he was afraid he “wouldn’t know how to parent” anymore, given his experience growing up in a different generation.

Yet Schwab acknowledges that, even at that time, there were “some select, very courageous people who were prepared to take the [gender transition] conversations forward”.

“And fundamentally, our role as leaders is to do that: it’s to take the conversation forward – knowing at times that it is going to be in the face of very severe opposition”.

How can you be a great learner?

It’s this curiosity to learn and courage to unlearn that remains a pillar Schwab stands on – and one he encourages other leaders to believe in, too.

“There’s a line in James Clear’s book Atomic Habits that goes ‘you don’t rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems’,” Schwab recalls.

“I found that regardless of when you become a ‘leader’, or particularly a CEO, there is this curse of knowledge and curse of power, because you can close your mind to what you don’t know and what you don’t understand.”

To counteract that, Schwab recommends leaders seek to understand it all, which can be shaped by “the books you read, the podcasts you listen to, the conversations you have with wise people”.

Ultimately, learning is about being able to say, “hang on, the way I’ve thought about this for the past few years might be wrong”, Schwab says.

After all, “if you thought the same way you did 10 years ago, you couldn’t do your job.”

It all boils down to one word

When faced with any situation, there are four words all leaders should consider, says Schwab.

The first is simply ‘calm’. Take the role seriously, he says, but don’t take yourself too seriously.

“The second word is ‘brave’,” Schwab continues. “What would a brave leader do?”

The third word is ‘humble’. Schwab says leaders should ask themselves, “What would a humble leader do?”

“It often feels like it’s about you, but it’s never about you. It’s always about what’s best for the collective,” Schwab says.

Lastly, the fourth word is ‘compassion’; the ability to put yourself in the shoes of the other person – or people.

“But often the most important type of compassion is self compassion,” Schwab acknowledges.

“Those four words just take a few minutes at any time to say, ‘okay, what would be a one-sentence answer to those based on the scenario we’re facing?’”

While Schwab continues to use those four words in his own leadership, as well as encouraging others to do so too, he says there’s actually one word it all boils down to: ambiguity.

“If it’s not for ambiguity, we don’t need leadership. If we’re not careful, we can live a very binary existence: whether it’s good or bad, black or white, goodness and evil,” he says.

“But leadership life doesn’t look like that.”