Swimming Australia CEO Rob Woodhouse on how he hopes to save the sport

New Swimming Australia CEO Rob Woodhouse is hoping to reunite the sport in the country and reflect what our athletes do in the pool, off it. He speaks to JULIAN LINDEN to discuss how.

(L-R) Silver medallists Australia's Emma McKeon, Australia's Abbey Harkin, Australia's Mollie O'Callaghan and Australia's Kaylee McKeown pose during the medals ceremony for the women's 4x100m medley relay swimming event during the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka on July 30, 2023. (Photo by Yuichi YAMAZAKI / AFP)

The difficult conversations have already begun for Rob Woodhouse, who has promised to do everything he can to help restore Australian swimming back to the glory days after years of bitter fighting and mismanagement that has left the sport on the rocks.

While the Australian swim team is absolutely flying, there have been massive problems away from the pool deck, underlined by the revolving door of leaders who have come and gone in quick succession.

Things got so bad last year that World Aquatics even threatened to revoke Australia’s international membership unless it underwent drastic change, including the adoption of a new constitution.

With that came the appointment of Woodhouse, an Olympic medallist in medley swimming, who has gone on to strike gold in the corporate world.

He’s been living in Britain for the past decade and half but felt compelled to return home to try and calm the choppy waters in his beloved sport.

“I thought I can make a significant difference and make a contribution so that’s why I went for the role,” he said.

In the water Australia has been going really well. Picture: Getty Images

“There’s probably some skeletons and some issues that have happened in the past, but for me it’s all about learning from them and also listening to all of the many stakeholders about some of the things that have gone wrong, but also working with them.

“In terms of how are we going to make the sport better and how are we going to futureproof this sport well beyond 2032? That’s why I’m here. I hope that doesn’t make me mad.”

While the boardroom turmoil that has been going on at Swimming Australia in recent years hasn’t adversely impacted the performers of the swimmers, it has still hurt them in the hip pocket.

The big-spending sponsors have long gone, along with the free to air television broadcasts so many Australians don’t realise just how good the current team really is.

Many Australians don’t realise how good our swimmers are. Picture: Michael Klein

Woodhouse said there’s still plenty of very good people in the sport but it’s been divided for so long that some healing was needed to bring them all back together again.

“I guess they’re tired and have been pretty badly burnt in terms of some of the things that have gone on which have not necessarily been their doing,” he said.

“They’ve been hurt by it, and I guess from afar, from 10,000 miles away. I’ve been a part of that as a Dolphin myself. Looking at some of the things unravel, it’s hurt all of us but I’ve seen this overwhelming passion from everyone in the business, including the staff here at Swimming Australia and all the states and so on.

“There is a great desire to come together and to make significant change and do some great things. We see what the Dolphins are doing at the world champs and the para world champs and we’re really excited about the Olympics in the Paralympics. So they’re doing their job.

“Outside of the pool, there’s people working really, really hard. It’s just about harnessing that and heading in the right direction and bringing everyone along that journey and seeing what we can make of it.”

Kevin Hasemann was one of the first people Woodhouse wanted to sit down with. Photographer: Liam Kidston.

In his first public interview since taking on the role, Woodhouse said he was confident things could turn around but his first priority was to bring all the warring factions together.

One of the first people he sat down to speak with was Kevin Hasemann, Swimming Queensland’s long serving CEO.

Queensland has always produced the vast majority of Australia’s best Olympic swimmers but has also been at odds with the way Swimming Australia has run the sport in recent times.

Woodhouse came away thinking the strained relationship was already better.

“In terms of working with Swimming Queensland and building those bridges that’s just the start,” Woodhouse said.

“I’m really positive about it. And I believe coming out of that meeting that Kevin was pretty positive about it as well. I think he thinks that the change in leadership is a positive step and I believe there is a willingness to work together.”

In an hour-long interview touching on a wide variety of topics, Woodhouse singled out three areas that needed immediate fixing.

How will the Dolphins go in Paris? Picture: Michael Klein

“The most important one for me is the stakeholders. Not that things necessarily start and finish with the states, but they play such an important role in the development of our swimmers,” he said.

“We’ve got a long way to go in terms of repairing those relationships and moving forward together. So that’s probably the most important thing.

“On the commercial side, it’s been really disappointing probably in the last five or six years. We haven’t had the commercial brands that we previously had back in the glory days.

“We need to get the brands back on board, we need to give them a value proposition. We need to show them that we have scale and that we have relevance not just for the Dolphins, who are doing incredibly well, but across the board.

“And the third thing would be advocacy with government.

“If we’re going to ensure we have a really strong legacy coming out of Brisbane ‘32, but also the lead up to 2032 as well. We need government support to keep this sport sustainable and thriving and to keep the Dolphins successful.”

Originally published as Swimming Australia CEO Rob Woodhouse on how he hopes to save the sport