Lisa Crampton accelerates her international motorsport career with Deakin.

Working in the traditionally male-dominated industry of motorsport, Deakin Business School student Lisa Crampton has her sights set on becoming the first female to take on the role of a world championship-level race director.

To achieve this, Lisa’s working with Germany’s motorsport governing body on licencing requirements and the meantime running a very successful consultancy business while undertaking a Graduate Certificate in Sport Management with Deakin.

Australian-born, Lisa has been involved in the motorsport industry most of her life and in 2012 set up her own business where she works alongside international circuits, teams, drivers and sponsors.

After seven years in London, she now lives in Frankfurt and has clients based across the UK, France, Germany and Asia.

‘I work in both operations, and organisation and management. Depending on the client, that can range from marketing through to regulations and logistics,’ she explains.

While she’d previously explored other sports management studies online, Lisa wanted an accredited qualification that could take her further – both academically and professionally.

‘After many years of wanting to complete studies, I found out about Deakin’s Sports Management program. Because I live in Germany, being able to complete this course away from “home” as a Cloud Campus student is a fantastic opportunity and it also means I can fit my studies around my work,’ she says.

In early 2018, Lisa had the opportunity to compete with three other Deakin sport management students in the prestigious National Sports Forum’s (NSF) Case Cup Competition in the USA where they took out a remarkable second place.

It was the first time an international university had been invited to participate in the event.

‘Because there were a limited number of places on the team, we had a trial case study competition where we had one hour to complete a five-minute presentation based on a case study that was sent to us, and then do a PowerPoint presentation and recording,’ she recalls.

At the time, Lisa was working in Bolivia for the X-raid MINI John Cooper Works Rally Team on the Dakar Rally, the world’s toughest car race.

‘I had to complete my presentation whilst in the passenger seat of the service car, and then kick out my colleagues during a five-minute stop to record the presentation before handing it in! During this time we’d also arrived at the bivouac for the evening in Tupiza, only to be evacuated due to rains that had turned the place to mud, and were trying to finding places to park up and feed a team of 86 personnel,’ she says.

Lisa admits to being somewhat nervous before travelling to the USA to meet her Deakin team mates for the first time – just a day before the NSF competition.  

‘Our lecturer Henry Wear also did a great job in selecting the four of us because the minute we all met, we got along incredibly well. We’d had lots of information and discussion online thanks to our fab team captain, Tom (Humphries) and I had a remarkable sense of team work which I’d never felt before. It worked so well – I was really proud of what we delivered and we had a great time along the way including incredible experiences like visiting the headquarters of the Dallas Cowboys and networking with top sports business people from the USA,’ she says.

Reflecting further on the experience, Lisa says it was a huge boost to her confidence to be able to work successfully, under pressure, with the team before presenting to a large audience and team of judges.

‘I believe the feedback we received from the judges, and our lecturer, has really helped us all move forward constructively. It’s also prepared us for future challenges in our careers.’

Lisa describes Deakin’s style of teaching as ‘vibrant and current’ and says that any concerns she had about being an older student returning to study were quickly dispelled.

‘I’m enjoying pushing myself and learning all the theory behind many of the concepts and examples I actually see in everyday work life. This qualification will be very beneficial for my future career goals to work in top management in motorsport, especially the aspects of organisation theory and finance, which are rarely easily learnt in a hands-on working environment.’