Boardroom Lioness: FA director Kelly Simmons on women in leadership

From Alessia Russo’s impu­dent back­heel to Chloe Kelly’s last-gasp win­ner, the Eng­land Lioness­es’ steely per­for­mances in the Euros finals cap­ti­vat­ed the nation.

While tak­ing home the Euro­pean Cup will have done much to increase the pop­u­lar­i­ty of the women’s sport, their suc­cess is like­ly to have a wider impact off the field too.

Kel­ly Sim­mons OBE, the FA direc­tor of the wom­en’s pro­fes­sion­al game, has seen first-hand the influ­ence that female rep­re­sen­ta­tion can have, both with­in foot­ball and in the wider cor­po­rate world. 

Here, she shares her jour­ney to the top and the chal­lenges she faced along the way.

What is the val­ue of pro­fes­sion­al groups for women in busi­ness and lead­er­ship roles?

I’m real­ly proud to be part of Women in Foot­ball. It’s a net­work­ing and a cam­paign­ing group that I think is real­ly impor­tant, espe­cial­ly for the indus­try that I work in where, clear­ly, women are real­ly under-rep­re­sent­ed. The organ­i­sa­tion is about the about women in foot­ball, as well as women’s foot­ball, and dri­ving greater gen­der rep­re­sen­ta­tion. We know the ben­e­fits that will bring to the indus­try and help make it bet­ter and more suc­cess­ful.

Hav­ing that net­work of women sup­port each oth­er, hav­ing male allies, is tremen­dous­ly impor­tant. They’re key to help­ing dri­ve change. Plus, it helps the invest­ment in that pipeline of tal­ent. We have to make sure that pipeline of female tal­ent is there, it’s sup­port­ed and that we invest in the lead­er­ship and devel­op­ment and men­tor­ing of women. Women in Foot­ball do all of that work to make sure we have a more diverse indus­try going for­ward.

Why is it impor­tant to have female rep­re­sen­ta­tion in busi­ness lead­er­ship?

It’s huge­ly pow­er­ful and it’s real­ly impor­tant because you can’t be what you can’t see. It’s impor­tant for young women to look up and see oth­er women and think, ‘Yes, I can get there. I can have it all. If I want a fam­i­ly, I want a career, if I invest in my devel­op­ment and work hard, I can come through to the top.’ That vis­i­bil­i­ty is real­ly impor­tant.

I’m lucky enough to work in foot­ball where an added dimen­sion to that – and what I find real­ly moti­vat­ing and inspir­ing – is going to events like the Women’s FA Cup final, where young boys and girls are see­ing these incred­i­ble, strong, healthy ath­let­ic role mod­els who are using their plat­form to cham­pi­on good caus­es. To see boys with the name of [Man­ches­ter City and Eng­land foot­baller] Lucy Bronze’ on the back of their shirt sends a real­ly impor­tant mes­sage to boys as well as girls about what women and girls can do in soci­ety. That’s what inspires me to try and do bet­ter every day.

What are the chal­lenges around chang­ing per­cep­tions of the foot­ball indus­try on behalf of women?

The his­to­ry of foot­ball is male dom­i­nat­ed. Our job is to make women’s foot­ball much more vis­i­ble, and viable and acces­si­ble. In all the work we’ve done, whether that’s the Lioness­es and 25 mil­lion peo­ple watch­ing them dur­ing the Women’s World Cup, or women’s Super League – where 2.5 mil­lion peo­ple a week are watch­ing live games and high­lights – it’s all about show­ing that foot­ball is for every­body.

I’m inspired by the fact I wasn’t allowed to play foot­ball as a girl even though I des­per­ate­ly want­ed to; I felt that there was a real injus­tice. There­fore I’m deter­mined, as so many peo­ple are in the indus­try, to make sure this gen­er­a­tion has much more oppor­tu­ni­ty in foot­ball. The vis­i­bil­i­ty and pro­file of the women’s game is huge­ly impor­tant as part of chang­ing the cul­ture.

What are your top three tips for aspir­ing female lead­ers?

First, you’ve got to focus on tak­ing respon­si­bil­i­ty for your per­son­al devel­op­ment. You’ve got to take respon­si­bil­i­ty for mak­ing sure you’ve got a real­ly clear per­son­al devel­op­ment plan and that you’re fight­ing to get that invest­ment.

If you get an oppor­tu­ni­ty to get a coach or a men­tor, you’d be crazy not to take it. And then, just being a sponge for learn­ing. Lead­ers are big read­ers. Take time out from your busy sched­ule to read up on your indus­try.

How would you define your lead­er­ship style?

Col­lab­o­ra­tive. I like to build rela­tion­ships inter­nal­ly and exter­nal­ly, and work with peo­ple. I’m very much a team play­er. I real­ly like to lis­ten to everybody’s views; I nev­er have all the answers.

I like to work in a team and bring teams togeth­er that are com­mit­ted to the cause. I think work­ing togeth­er to have a clear vision and strate­gic plan means that you can check in against your pur­pose, vision and val­ues, and make sure you’re on track.

This piece was orig­i­nal­ly pub­lished on 6 April 2022 and was updat­ed fol­low­ing Eng­land Women’s Euro 2022 win