Giuliana Campanella has revealed how the Capgemini Women in Rugby Leadership Programme is helping her to take the next step on her illustrious journey in the game.
Campanella first picked up a rugby ball at the age of 14, defying opposition from her family in doing so, and going on to excel as part of Sicily’s first women’s team, in Messina.
A talented flanker, she represented Italy 59 times and played at two Women’s Rugby World Cups before hanging up her boots in 2013.
Since the following year, Campanella has worked as the Azzurre’s team manager but with Women’s RWC 2025 in England on the horizon, she concedes it is not a role she can continue in for ever.
That is why her acceptance onto the Capgemini Women in Rugby Leadership Programme last March came at a good time as she pondered what the future might hold.
“I didn’t know about the World Rugby-Capgemini programme because I am more on the field, focused on what I have to do for the team,” Campanella told World Rugby.
“But this [programme] with Capgemini was a really great opportunity and I saw all the other women before me, what they’ve done and what they’re still doing. It’s really been a great opportunity to grow.”
The women’s game has developed hugely not only in the 30-plus years since Campanella first found rugby, but particularly in the decade she has worked as a team manager.
As she prepares for her future career in leadership, potentially overseeing women’s high-performance in her homeland, Campanella has been able to lean on the resources offered to participants in the programme by Capgemini University.
“I’ve done this course with the Italian manager for Capgemini, about leadership and working with management,” she added.
“That actually helped me because we are in a phase of new people coming into our management group, and it was a good thing because women’s rugby has developed a lot.
“It’s growing, we have 25 players with a contract, we have 11 people working [with me], eight are full-time, so it’s important to have the competence to hold everything together and know how to manage.
“Sometimes, I feel that my old personality was probably to get up and can get angry [in adversity] but with this course, I learned how to engage with people, how to make them listen to me and I learned how to listen to people. And that is very important.
“When you are working with women – and probably with men too – but women, they need to be listened to and I think it’s important as a person to learn to listen to others.
“Sometimes we are rash. We just think, ‘I have to do this, I have to do this’ but never stop and think, ‘Oh, maybe that person needs more attention’. Maybe, that person is in a situation or a family situation you don’t know [about].
“So, I think this is a great value of the course and helped me.”
Personal development
Through the course, Campanella also came into contact with women in leadership who do not have a background in rugby or sport.
“I’ve learnt probably a bit more [about how] to engage with people who are in a different situation to me,” she said.
“For me, it’s [all about] the field, it’s teamwork. A team is easy compared to other people who are not part of your team. [It’s a] different context, different reality.”
Campanella has also started to build a network of contacts both inside and outside of the game thanks to her involvement with the Capgemini Women in Rugby Leadership Programme.
She has been asked to work with other participants and also speak about her experiences in rugby at events. Campanella believes it is vital to do so in order to inspire a new generation of female leaders.
“We have to share our reality, and that can help other women,” she explained.
“We can increase and probably develop women in rugby now for leadership and make the players understand that after sport, after rugby there is something more they can do.”
Campanella has been fighting to create more opportunities for women in rugby ever since she first started playing in Messina, back in the early 1990s.
“That was a long time ago, when women and rugby were two different things,” she said. “It was [considered to be] a man’s sport and so you don’t play.
“I had a family against, I had a coach against, I had other players, men’s players, against. But I played for 25 years, I think.
“I have two kids who are now older. My daughter plays rugby, my son played for a bit but now he’s working away. I think sport is important for a person, it makes a better human.
“And rugby helped me probably to develop my personality. I don’t know if, playing another sport or without sport, I would be the person I am now. And I’m happy with who I am now.”
Making ‘life friends’
Playing for Messina in those early years meant travelling long distances to the mainland, where the majority of teams were based in the north.
“If you say, ‘Don’t do that’, I have to do it. So, the more they said it’s not for women, the more I felt, no, I’ll do it because I can do what men do,” Campanella added.
“We enjoyed playing together a lot and now I have life friends from that experience. So, rugby really makes unique people because if you play rugby, you are not normal, you are unique.”
Having represented Italy at two Women’s Rugby World Cups, Campanella’s fondest memory remains her tournament debut in Amsterdam in 1998.
“I remember my first World Cup in ’98, every game, every time we had the anthem on, we held on together and that is a great experience,” she said.
“Every time it was a new stadium, a new team [to play against]. I enjoyed every single moment.”
But despite watching the game develop has it has done over the past three decades, Campanella is conscious that there is more work still to do.
“Because rugby is not the main sport in Italy, still you work against the mentality. Still parents think rugby is for men,” she explained.
“So, the more rugby there is on TV, the more rugby will probably be commercial, and everyone can see women’s rugby.”
