About Nigel Rushman
Nigel Rushman has spent 40 years working with governments and enterprises on wide-ranging programs. Particularly focused on Energy, Hospitality, MICE, Tech, Media, Marketing, Communications and Sport. Nigel has developed, implemented and directed innovative programmes for hundreds of projects and sectors worldwide including Football, Rugby and Cricket World Cups, European Football Championships, and numerous other sports and industries. The founder of the industry journal SportBusiness, he continues to study psychology, critical thinking, emotional intelligence, negotiation and strategy as these are foundational to our work.
Nigel Rushman started his career in one of the toughest industries – restaurants. Soon enough, he was rising through the ranks in London and Paris and working in a Michelin 3-Star establishment.
With a solid foundation in the hospitality industry, Nigel started his own catering company and found a niche with corporate events for the likes of Pratt & Whitney and BMW. Succumbing to his impatience and need for evolution and change, he sold up and built a commercial event management business.
The events industry gave Nigel a new perspective: frequently witness to crises and a relentless need to capitalise on an opportunity, he created an award-winning marketing and PR company specialising in crisis management.
It was in the early 90s that Nigel noticed that the media was poorly served at major sporting events so he founded Rushmans, which provided very successful specialist media services for major sports events to specifically meet the need; quite literally raising the game for all involved. The Rugby World Cup in 1991 saw a huge team deployed by Rushmans in 5 nations that broke new ground in major event delivery. In 1996, Nigel saw yet another business opportunity and founded the industry journal, SportBusiness.
The next three decades saw Rushmans rise to success in a plethora of areas in event delivery: from venue bidding assessment and preparation, event management, security consultancy, accreditation and media management to rights brokerage, temporary facilities, scalability and knowledge and experience transfer.
A notable accolade of this time was when Nigel was contracted as Event Director of the ICC CWC West Indies 2007 Inc. Alongside the Rushmans and ICC team, he successfully implemented the event management, security, media management, accreditation and volunteer programmes for the Cricket World Cup across the nine participating countries in the Caribbean region.
More recently, Nigel had the pleasure and privilege to be Strategic Adviser to the innovative and highly professional team, which made history by winning Qatar the opportunity to host the FIFA World Cup in 2022.
Nigel has presented his thoughts on world-class events to governing bodies including the IOC and FIFA, been a guest speaker at the world sport and business summit, SportAccord and has presented for the Josoor Institute in Doha on what it takes to run a successful major sporting event.
However, this deep knowledge of the sports event industry is just one facet of his entrepreneurial expertise. Alongside and overarching these activities, Nigel built contacts in governments and commerce and put his entrepreneurial skills and network to use in facilitating international deals across numerous industries and continents. This blend of Commerce and Sport Nigel describes as “one hand washing the other”. Nigel Rushman is a continuous learner studying psychology, critical thinking, mental models, emotional intelligence, negotiation and strategy to create clarity of purpose and to realise and execute strategy.
Nigel’s network includes diplomatic operators, lobbyists, deal-makers, traders, communications specialists, subject experts and more. Working at the intersection of Sport, Diplomacy, Soft Power, Bidding, and Nation Branding and by harnessing his wealth of knowledge, he is able to assist emerging governments, exploit entrepreneurial and commercial opportunities, and deliver political longevity.
You can find out more about Nigel through his blog www.nigelrushman.com.
