What 15 years in goal taught me about running a web agency

After 15 years in the goals, it is time to call it.

It turns out there is a limit to how many years you can throw yourself at balls and people before your body starts filing formal complaints. I did not imagine this chapter ending because of injury. Looking back, though, I mostly feel lucky as hell.

This is not a web design post. It is the one I wanted to write anyway, and by the end there is a point about client work, because the two things turned out to be more connected than I expected.

A basketballer who was rubbish at shooting

When a slightly crazy 21-year-old basketballer got put in goals, largely because she was pretty shit at shooting, I had no idea where that would take me.

It took me all over the world. I got to wear the green and gold in both indoor and beach handball, play World Championships, win titles in Australia and Europe, and see places I never thought I would. Along the way there was a season with HSV Solingen-Gräfrath in Germany, the World Games in Poland in 2017, the IHF World Championships in 2018 and 2019, and being named best goalkeeper at the Asian Championships in Kumamoto in 2018.

Which is all pretty fricking cool. But when I think about those years, the medals are not what comes to mind first.

The people, every time

What comes to mind is the random chats with opponents who spent a whole game trying to score on me, then shared a drink, some banter and their life story afterwards. Some became friends for a tournament. Some for years.

The people who gave me a bed, picked me up from an airport, fed me, looked after me, encouraged me, laughed with me, kicked my butt, or simply crossed my path at exactly the right time. The teammates, coaches, volunteers, staff, supporters and families who poured their time and hearts into a sport that only survives in Australia because people love it that much. And my family, who somehow got dragged along for the ride and share experiences none of us will forget.

Thank you for making this adventure bigger, richer, funnier and more meaningful than I could have imagined.

What actually transfers to running an agency

I used to think of handball and Creative Baguette as separate lives. They are not, and it took retiring to see it.

You learn to work with what is in front of you. A goalkeeper does not get the situation she planned for. The shot comes from the wrong angle, off the wrong foot, half a second early. Most client projects arrive the same way: no brief, no content, a rough idea and a deadline. Nobody hands you the tidy version. You read what is actually there and you go.

Pressure stops being a feeling and becomes a routine. Fifteen years of the game hanging on the next few seconds does something useful to your nervous system. When a site breaks on a Friday afternoon, or a client rings genuinely upset, the calm is not bravery. It is just practice.

Being the last line changes how you look at things. Goalkeepers watch the whole field and spend the game reading what everyone else has missed. That is more or less the job when someone sends me a website: not "is this pretty", but "where is this quietly losing you work". I cannot switch it off, which is why the free presence check exists.

You get fluent in people who are not like you. French, Australian, German clubs, teammates and opponents from everywhere, most of us operating in someone else's second language. You learn to find the plain words fast. That is the whole job when a client knows their business perfectly and has no vocabulary for websites.

Nobody wins alone, and small operations run on goodwill. Australian handball survives on volunteers who love it. Small businesses run the same way, on people doing three jobs because the thing matters to them. I know that feeling from the inside, which is a large part of why I build for not-for-profits and community organisations.

To the beach handball crew

What you are building is special. Your commitment, resilience and stubborn refusal to give up on this sport keep amazing me, and I cannot wait to see where you take it. I will be cheering from afar, only one coo away.

I also get to keep working on it from this side. Creative Baguette built and looks after Handball Australia, and the branding, website and social for the Drop Bears beach handball team. Turning up for the sport in a different way.

Where the time goes now

All that extra time and energy goes into Creative Baguette. Fifteen years of solving problems under pressure, adapting on the fly and working with people from all over the world was unexpectedly good preparation for running a web agency.

So one adventure ends and another is already well underway.

Dear handball world, thank you for one bloody amazing adventure. Now, onto the next one.