Cricket Victoria was founded in 1851 and is the governing body for cricket in Victoria. Cricket Victoria plays a key role in the governance of cricket across Australia as a member state of the Australian Cricket federated model. Based at the state-of-the-art CitiPower Centre in St Kilda, Cricket Victoria oversees the development of grassroots cricket within the community through the management and development of elite teams. These include the Victorian Men’s and Women’s Cricket Teams and male and female Big Bash teams – the Melbourne Renegades and the Melbourne Stars.

As a not-for-profit entity, Cricket Victoria nurtures and promotes the development and success of cricket for all Victorians. The organisation’s vision is for cricket to be Victoria’s favourite sport. Over the next four years, Cricket Victoria has committed to four strategic priorities to determine its success: Cricket Excellence, Financial Growth, Fan Passion, and Cricket Community.

Cricket Victoria’s people are recognised as a key enabler to this strategy. Cricket Victoria has a clearly defined culture, enshrined in the ‘Leading the Game’ ideals of Integrity, Connection, Accountability, Respect and Excellence (I-CARE). These ideals are expanded and connected to above and below-the-line behaviours and are consistently linked throughout people processes such as recruitment, performance, remuneration and professional development.

Cricket Victoria continues to deepen connections and expand relationships with the local and international cricket community to support this nationally and internationally. New ventures include investing in female leadership at a community level, partnering with RMIT University to launch the Melbourne Cricket Education Academy, establishing new pathways to working in sport and sharing their expertise with emerging cricket nations such as the United States and Japan.

The Cricket Victoria Foundation is a philanthropic entity whose purpose is to create opportunities and inspire the Victorian cricket community to grow and thrive by harnessing the passion of Victorian cricket to make a positive impact on society. The Foundation drives several initiatives, including Victoria’s participation in the National Indigenous Championships.

Cricket Victoria works consultatively with its members to drive participation growth, improve sporting facilities for the community, provide competition management at all levels of cricket and evolve the talent development pathways. These focus areas are designed to ensure cricket’s future success and sustainability in Victoria. This consultative approach has also been adopted with employees to drive the organisational and cultural evolution that commenced in 2021 following a change in executive leadership. This has seen employee engagement improve by 28% (from 60% in 2021 to 77% in 2023). 

Monthly staff meetings provide an important opportunity for employees to connect and hear key business updates from the CEO and other business leaders. Through active consultation, employees have co-designed the organisation’s approach to reward and recognition. There is a belief that recognition exists on a continuum of ‘small acts’ and ‘grand gestures’ underpinned by a culture of continuous feedback. A peer recognition program called ‘Raise the Bat’ and various team-based initiatives have been implemented. The Social Committee allows the organisation to give back and recognise people’s significant contributions. Initiatives include the annual Christmas in July event, staff cricket and football matches, baking competitions and trivia. Cricket Victoria has also implemented key policy changes that have improved flexible working outcomes and increased parental leave entitlements for all carers. An organisation-wide commitment to rest and recuperation has also been reinforced through the ‘Annual Leave Bonanza’. Employees can win $10,000 simply by taking their accrued leave each year.

Cricket Victoria’s learning and development strategy has seen a significant investment in leadership development based on the belief that leadership drives performance, which drives employee engagement. The organisation believes in allowing every staff member to become the best version of themselves while working at Cricket Victoria. Cricket Victoria’s annual Little TED has quickly become a highly anticipated event. Inspired by the ‘TED Talks’ concept, all employees participate in a ‘choose your own adventure’ styled keynote speaker event. This program engages speakers from diverse backgrounds, sharing their perspectives on the organisation’s theme for the year.

At Cricket Victoria, role clarity and accountability are critical elements of the organisational culture. This is supported by the ‘Continuous Conversations’ approach to managing performance, facilitated through the Culture Amp system. Culture Amp has a 1:1 feature that empowers people to have holistic, people-centred conversations, creating the opportunity to talk about employee wellbeing, work-life balance, and performance reflections like productivity, relationships, and impact.

The goal-setting process embeds a connection to strategy and purpose. Employees are supported in setting goals that cascade the strategy into their day-to-day roles. The goal-setting process has become dynamic and agile due to goals being available and editable all year round. Employees are empowered to track progress and identify the actionable elements of the goal for the period ahead.

Cricket Victoria is committed to maintaining a healthy, safe, secure, and supportive work environment for employees. The WHS committee comprises representatives from across the business and acts as a conduit between staff and management.

In 2022, Safety Behaviour Conversations were implemented to consult proactively about health and safety themes.

Cricket Victoria is committed to continuous improvement and diversifying its workforce. Employer branding videos are currently being created to highlight employment opportunities in non-traditional cricket markets—a campaign entitled “There is more to CV than what you see on TV.” Cricket Victoria is on a mission to tell its story and highlight the broad career opportunities that exist. It is a place where people are connected and inspired by a shared sense of purpose and community.

For information about Cricket Victoria, visit cricketvictoria.com.au