With some prompting, STEPHEN FLEMING confesses nowadays he’s a little bit like Jerry Maguire, and does a good impersonation of Tom Cruise’s, ‘show me the money!’

The former cricketing great talks candidly about his learning curve in business over the last twelve months and about starting up two businesses with their foundations in his sporting past. – One representing cricketing talent in the lucrative Indian Premier League (IPL) and the other a new digital media. BY ANDREW GREGORY

Former Black Caps captain Stephen Fleming

It comes as a surprise to learn, “the money now in cricket is by far the most it’s been for players, and it’s the most financially rewarding game in the country -far surpassing rugby, which five years ago was unheard of.” This is clearly some of Fleming’s motivation to draw on his experience as former Blackcaps Captain and sign up for the IPL for another two years. In signing with the Chennai Super Kings for the 2008 season he commanded US$350,000 after retiring from NZ Cricket. “I still have two years with the lucrative IPL. I also have to acknowledge it’s taken a bit of pressure off the business side of things,” he admits.

Fleming’s decision to leave cricket for business was not as hard as it could have been. “The last couple of years of my career I made a decision to look at things outside of the game. I was being introduced to a lot of people through my position, who held positions of power and were doing good things in business. That decision made a massive difference to the way I started viewing my relationships with the sponsors and the people I was around. The crunch came when I lost the passion for cricket, when I felt it was time to move on, that’s when it became real.”

We talk some more of the IPL and his current involvement, Fleming smiles at the subject of the Indian Cricket market where there’s hundreds of thousands – to millions of dollars worth of contracts and player fees. This involvement with IPL underlies his new business venture, Maximum Global Sports (MGS) – a talent management agency, that sees him leveraging fifteen years of international cricket experience and representing big names like Brendon McCulam, Tim Southee, and Wellington players Jeetan Patel and James Franklin.

“I‘m looking for about five players, because sport management hasn’t had a lot of money in the past, but now with the Indian Cricket market, the guys need to be well managed. I look after their cricket and business interests, and provide financial advice as they move into the Indian Markets. So through my experience with the game it helps put me in a position to help them, and that’s what appeals to me – I’m able to impart knowledge and have a certain amount of financial reward as well.”

Stephen Fleming talking to editor Tim Collins

Fleming looks very relaxed for someone dealing with two start-up businesses (the other is Direct Digital Publishing.) He revels his external calm belies his inner turmoil. Unlike some start-up entrepreneurs he’s very open to talking about ‘set-backs and challenges’ he’s faced since coming out of NZ cricket twelve months ago. It was around the time of his retirement in February 2008, Fleming first talked of a partnership with Neil Maxwell, CEO of Australian company, Insite. Maxwell is also his sports management agent, responsible for securing endorsement deals with Rexona, Fujitsu and LJ Hooker.

“I talked to [Neil] a lot about opening Insite New Zealand and continue what they were doing in Australia, imparting some of that knowledge and experience into the New Zealand market. The first lesson was – a successful business model doesn’t necessarily transfer into another successful business. So long story short, that’s now not happening. Insite New Zealand came to nothing in the end after a lot of hard work, but I see it as an apprenticeship. I was trying to start from scratch and I didn’t know the [business language.] I was coming out of cricket still talking about maiden-over’s and fielding positions to explain a business concept – I knew it in my head, but I just didn’t have the lingo. So by just listening, understanding and trying to answer questions, the lessons were huge. – I was going home at night absolutely knackered, a day of test cricket in the field where I was captaining was nothing compared to some of this stuff.”

Starting two new businesses in the current economic climate, Fleming draws on his proven approaches to get results. “When I was captain I spent a massive amount of time behind the scenes reviewing the team I was going to play, looking at their strengths and weaknesses to understand how they were going to attack us and how we could attack them. When the time [required] our peak performance, the ability to act to the situation around you was second nature. You expected the way they were going to come at you, so you were one step ahead of the game.”

“We were always looking at different ways of doing things. In some ways that’s New Zealand strength, we look at ways to do thing differently because we are challenged by where we are located, and how are we going to compete with numbers. We’re always thinking of how we can keep competing, how we can hold our own.”

Fleming knows that to make a successful transition from the world of sport to business he has to “be prepared and be very thorough in the work behind the scenes.” His sports psychology approach to business is interesting, giving a rare insight between the two worlds, based around “similar philosophies and principles, with strong parallels between the two.” It’s his deep understanding of performing in a results based game, that gives him a slight edge in the performance and results based world of business.

His ability to translate sports techniques into business practise helps Fleming leverage his skills, wealth of contacts and recognisable profile for the other business ventures. Like a cricket captain, he advocates building up a strong team, so when you look at his business partner for Direct Digital Publishing (DDP) it’s comes as no surprise the team consists of former NZ cricketer, -‘marketing hired gun’, Richard Petrie. “It’s basically been my contacts that have been used to float this thing and get it going. I think it’s a good time for putting people into place. Richard is the first guy I started [DDP] up with and part of his brief is to form a team.”

Fleming confides that when he’s not being a talent agent, DDP is the ‘business that gets him going.’ DDP looks at placing a dynamic type of eBook into the New Zealand marketing toolbox. “Richard and I have been discussing calling it a dBook, unlike an eBook which has already been marketed, dBook has a bit more of a dynamic aspect where you can insert sources of rich media. So understanding what PDFs and how websites work within mainstream media and print work, has been one of my challenges, but I understand how our product fits in, and it’s potential is exciting. We feel that part of this product enables the company to direct market and get their product or message out in quite an attractive way.”

Fleming uses an example of how a Australian blue-chip bank that used a similar eBook system was able to cut down the publishing and storage of paper information costing them $15million annually. “I’m very enthusiastic about this product, New Zealanders in general are able to create something, we can throw into the world and have them look at us, I would love to have something like that and I hope that this is it,” Fleming says.

His business future is very much linked into his cricket past. And he’s using it successfully it to open new doors. “I put on a business suit, and I really hope they love cricket. It’s basically using my profile to give me an edge to go in.” But, he does so in a cautionary way, like any brand built up over time, Steve is wary of putting his name to the first opportunity that comes along. “What I don’t want to do is open doors and walk away with that person thinking – ‘what a crap product, what’s he doing?’ I’m [profile] conscious and I don’t want to blow it by being involved in product that’s not a great. I want to represent some of the things that are important to me and have quality. I’m very, very conscious of that.”

Fleming is clearly very focused, insightful and personable, which are many of the same traits he was known in cricket for amongst his ability to achieve. These characteristics will greatly increase his chances of succeeding in business. Conscious that Fleming has come to our office to be interviewed on the same day as a Wellington cricket one-dayer, we offer to speed things along to allow him to get to the game. “No interest in that,” he says with a smile, watching rather than playing, “it’s like a visit to the dentist for me now.”