THE ROLE OF SPORTS LEADERSHIP IN BUILDING FUTURE BUSINESS LEADERS

Purpose. This article examines how sports leadership—developed through roles such as captaincy, peer leadership, and coach–athlete dynamics—cultivates competencies that transfer to business leadership.Design/methodology/approach. We conduct a narrative review and integrative synthesis of scholarship on athlete and team leadership, organizational behavior, leadership development, and performance psychology. We map recurrent sports-leadership practices (e.g., shared leadership, deliberate practice, pressure-tested decision-making) to business-ready capabilities (e.g., strategic communication, team coordination, psychological safety, resilience), and we propose a translational framework—CAPTAIN—for designing programs in universities and corporate Learning and Development (L&D). Findings. Evidence across sport and organizational literatures converges on four transferable mechanisms: role-based responsibility (formal and informal leadership), contextual pressure (time compression, uncertainty, scrutiny), practice architecture (goal setting, feedback loops, film review/after-action reviews), and collective efficacy (cohesion, shared identity, psychological safety). These mechanisms consistently predict outcomes that matter in business: adaptive decision-making, reliable execution, ethical conduct, and sustained team performance. Practical implications. We outline implementable elements—leadership labs, constraint-led simulations, captain’s councils, 360° feedback with “game film,” resilience micro-drills, and OKR scrimmages—and propose assessment using multi-source feedback, behavioral rubrics, and performance KPIs.Originality/value. The article bridges sport and business via a designable, assessable pathway (CAPTAIN) and provides a program blueprint that educators and L&D leaders can deploy at scale.