Club Maitland City CEO Ian Martin reflects on his journey from Sydney’s west to becoming a respected leader in the club industry. He also opens up about overcoming significant personal challenges and shares the remarkable story behind his connection to a small West African nation.
Club Maitland City CEO Ian Martin’s road to the top of the industry was anything but usual.
A one-time junior tennis star who competed at state level, Ian’s journey has also included chauffeuring athletes from a small African country at the Sydney 2000 Olympics and a short-lived stint working for Coca-Coca Amatil.
But the hospitality industry has always held his heart — a love forged through the sights and smells he encountered as he grew up around his grandfather’s pub.
And while success has followed Ian at every stretch of his career, it’s been far from easy — particularly as he navigated his infant daughter Lily’s cancer diagnosis (stage-four rhabdomyosarcoma) just a year into his tenure at Club Maitland City.
Ian reflects upon the experience of essentially running the Club from John Hunter Children’s Hospital in the latest episode of the ClubLife Podcast, released today.
“My undertaking was to offer stability to my wife (Amy) and my daughter,” he says.
“We had to maintain the income. If that meant that I had to be (working) at the hospital, sure. I’d be on the floor at a table I could find, I’d have my paperwork laid out, wireless printer and I’d be logged in doing work.
“Work was not going to stop. It needed to continue. And I was strong enough in mind to make sure that I was going to succeed in my role, but also, I was going to succeed in family.”
Thankfully, Lily is now a healthy 16-year-old — a talented cricketer and dancer with a bright future.
Ian’s strength and stoicism throughout the harrowing ordeal goes some way to explaining his laser focus on establishing Club Maitland City as a genuine community pillar since he arrived in 2010.
But his values were embedded by his parents John and Lorraine during a lively upbringing in Bankstown, where he and his siblings never went without but were far from well off.
Sport was a constant for the Martins, with Ian and his brothers excelling on the tennis court. A modest Ian suggests the intensity as he rose through the ranks proved too much and prompted his move to cricket, where he relished the team environment.
“I wasn’t very good on a tennis court — I think you could probably say I was a little John McEnroe,” he says, referencing the famously hot-tempered American icon.
“The pressures of being able to perform, whether it be in front of a camera or the expectations of coaches and committees and things like that… it was a bit of a pressure.”
Though he never quite made it all the way with a racquet in hand, his love for sport took him to the Sydney Olympics — as a driver for two track athletes from São Tomé and Principe.
“We drove them around where they wanted to go,” Ian says.
“We spent most of our time within what is now Newington, which was the Olympic village, surrounded by megastar athletes and up-and-coming athletes.
“It was just a great experience to be involved in.”
Having first climbed the ranks at Revesby Workers’ Club after starting out picking up glasses and cleaning tables — an experience that instilled a strong work ethic — Ian moved away from the industry to work in sales for Coca-Cola Amatil.
Six months later, he realised club land was where he belonged.
Valuable stints at St Johns Park Bowling Club and Redhead Bowling Club — both of which brought about their own baptisms of fire — preceded Ian’s move to Club Maitland City.
He was thrust into the deep end as interim CEO after just 10 days, then formally appointed not long after, and quickly proved himself to be a shrewd operator amid several challenges.
At the core of Ian’s work is his ‘In Maitland, For Maitland’ philosophy, which is epitomised through the widespread community impact of the Club Maitland City Foundation.
In an engaging podcast episode, Ian also reveals his next undertaking away from the Club – a 223km trek along the Larapinta Trail later this month in support of the Mark Hughes Foundation, inspired by a family member’s battle with brain cancer.
Click on the link below to hear the full interview with Ian Martin in Episode 25 of the ClubLife Podcast, which is also available via ClubLife.com.au, Apple, Spotify and wherever else you get your podcasts.
If you have a suggestion on who might make an interesting guest for a future ClubLife Podcast episode, get in touch with the team by emailing clublife@clubsnsw.com.au.
