What a Young Boxing Champion’s Win Means for Pakistan’s Leadership?

Hamzah Sheeraz’s stunning win against Tyler Denny to become European middleweight champion on Saturday offers many valuable lessons for Pakistan’s leaders.

That is the view of Paddy Upton, the world-renowned mind coach who joined Sheeraz’s team three months ago to help sharpen the 25-year-old’s mental fortitude and further professionalize a boxing career that now seems destined for greatness.

Upton was ringside at Wembley Stadium in London on Saturday. Sheeraz, whose paternal family hails from Rawalpindi, dominated Denny, twice knocking him to the canvas before claiming the title via technical knockout.

Sheeraz, a devout Muslim, is extremely proud of his Pakistani heritage and hopes to inspire others of South Asian descent to take up the sport.

“Hamzah has the technical skill, the work ethic, the dedication, and many good people around him. He is also intelligent and down to earth. However, what stands out about him is that he boxes because he wants to give back to his family and community. And I think there’s something in this for leaders to pay attention to,” Upton says.

“His whole ‘why’ for boxing is to give back, add value for others, and lead the way as a proud member of Britain’s South Asian community. For him, boxing is bigger than trophies and money.”

It is no secret that Sheeraz’s family ploughed everything they had to allow him to become a professional fighter. He estimates they invested some £800,000 in his career, an amount so considerable that they are still paying off the debt.

Upton, appointed professor of practice at Australia’s Deakin University’s Faculty of Business and Law in recognition of his application of leadership principles across sport and business in diverse cultures, is regarded as one of the leading mental coaches in the sporting and business world.

He has also flourished as a head coach in cricket, including stints with the Lahore Qalanders in the Pakistan Super League and Sydney Thunder in Australia’s Big Bash League. In all, he has coached athletes across 20 different sporting codes.

Boxing was not a sport he had previously been involved in. But he adapted quickly, working with Sheeraz and the team in his corner. “The principles of success are universal across sport, business, and in life. They need to be translated and applied differently in varying contexts and with different personalities” Upton adds.

Upton says Sheeraz’s undefeated record (21 wins from 21 fights) stems mainly from his understanding that the “bottom line” is not the be-all and end-all. Instead, he fights from a place where something greater than himself is at stake.

“More and more, we see that athletes and businesses need a greater purpose. Having a meaningful ‘why’ creates buy-in and engagement and cultivates discretionary effort within the team. Younger people especially want to be involved in more than just making money. Those organizations that provide this opportunity will attract top talent and keep them longer.”

According to Upton, the message is clear: all the relevant contributors to a campaign be it in the sporting, political, or business realm need to collaborate and communicate well to lay the foundation for the best possible outcome.

“It’s about going from where you are to where you want to be. Everyone wants their country to prosper. But many countries, like the sport of boxing, are still very traditional. The reality is that we live in the 21^st century now. There is data, there is technology, there is science. To succeed, there needs to be an upgrade from the old traditional models that worked in the 20^th century.”

Upton notes that boxing is generally slower than other sports when it comes to studying data and adopting new technologies and innovations.

Similarly, many traditional businesses are still stuck in a situation where the CEO is a 60-year-old male with decades of experience, setting him apart from everybody else.

“The problem is this status holds them back because they are threatened by important modern-day innovations like science, technology and upgrading their leadership software to be more empowering and less authoritative.”

For Upton, the sooner leaders adapt to modern thinking, the better for sport and governance.

Being new to boxing, the South African was mesmerized by the exactness of the science required to put fighters in the best possible shape for their bouts.

“The training Hamzah did in the week leading up to the fight was about slowly bringing his weight to a place where he could cut the night before the weigh-in. To witness that was mind-blowing. It’s a very tough program they go through to prepare themselves. In the last week, some of the fighters would lose nearly 10% of their body weight in days leading up to the weigh-in and then regain it all for the following day’s fight.”

“A fighter like Hamzah starts at maybe 6% body fat, but he is not dropping fat; he is dropping water. I watched all the fighters at the official weigh-in. Their cheeks and eyeballs were sunken; they were not quite present. But as soon as they stepped off that scale, they attacked their rehydration drinks.”

“This level of discipline is another lesson for leaders”, he says.

There needs to be an undistracted focus on the task at hand in the present moment. “To do this, you first need to have the right skills, people, and clearly defined plans and then the communication that stitches these all together.”