MY JOB IN TENNIS
DAV E H AG G E R T Y ‘As a leader I think you need to have a vision’ The president of the International Tennis Federation tells
Paul Newman why revamping the Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup was so crucial to his plans
M ost of the world’s leading sports the corridors of power, but Dave Haggerty believes that some of his most important lessons came on the tennis court. Haggerty, president of the International Tennis Federation for the last seven years, had hopes of a successful career as a professional player during his time on a tennis scholarship at GeorgeWashington University (where he still holds the record for the most wins in singles and doubles), but, after trying his luck on the satellite tour in Europe, decided that his future lay elsewhere. However, Haggerty reckons his experiences as a player served himwell in his subsequent roles as a business executive and administrator. administrators rose to the top thanks to what they learned working their way through “Somany of the lessons I’ve learned in life have been from tennis,” the 64-year-old American, who still plays at least twice amonth, told tennishead . “The tennis
court is no different to the boardroomand life. From an early stage, you’ve got to learn to call balls in or out, so you learn about integrity. From there you learn to be competitive. Throughout your life there will be times when people will tell you that you can’t do something. That’s when you have to call on your competitiveness: you’ve either got to accept that they’re right that you can’t do something, or you’ve got to dig deeper. You’ve got to say: ‘I believe in this and I can do it.’ I think it’s that competitiveness that I got on the tennis court that I’ve tried to bring withme.” That competitive spirit, combinedwith a belief in his vision of the future, has helped Haggerty become one of themost influential tennis administrators of recent times. Somemight not agree with all the changes he has driven through, but nobody can doubt his impact on the sport. During Haggerty’s time at the United States Tennis Association, where he was president from2013 to 2014,
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