Same Pressure, Different Jerseys: Why Your Office is Basically AFCON
What AFCON Teaches Us About Leadership, Accountability, and Handling Pressure When the Whole World Is Watching
Leadership does not start with a corner office or a captain’s armband. It starts when we are toddlers learning to walk. Some kids fall, get back up, and go again. Others freeze and wait for a VAR review that is not coming.
As adults, we simply trade scraped knees for missed goals, failed projects, and those dreaded performance reviews that begin with: “So… let’s walk through what happened.”
We often pretend leadership is a boardroom science, but it is actually a high-pressure performance art. If you want a masterclass in human behavior, look no further than AFCON, which recently reminded us of this on a global stage. The drama on the pitch was a mirror held up to every corporate department in the world.
The Blame Tour vs. the Tactical Review
At AFCON, we saw coaches doing more than managing tactics; they were representing entire nations. When a leader handles a loss with class and accountability, the team earns respect—even in defeat.
But we have all seen the alternative: the Public Blame Tour. This is when a leader turns a loss into a frantic search for a scapegoat. Suddenly, the post-game analysis feels less like a coaching session and more like a crisis communications meeting, where the manager throws the goalkeeper under the bus to save their own seat.
In the office, we call this managing up at the expense of your team.
In football, we call it losing the dressing room.
In both cases, the result is the same: the squad stops playing for you.
Behavior Is the Brand
Managers represent their teams to executives and clients. When a leader stays composed and solution-oriented, the entire team’s reputation benefits.
In both football and business, leadership behavior becomes the brand.
It is not about the org chart.
It is not about job titles.
It is about behavior.
Penalty Box Politics
And then there are the penalties—those heart-stopping moments that can flip a match or a career in seconds.
You can dominate the pitch for ninety minutes, but in the corporate world, success sometimes comes down to one high-stakes kick and a very nervous executive goalkeeper. Suddenly, months of tactical brilliance take a back seat to a single moment of timing, while everyone stands around waiting for the referee to make a call.
Sometimes there is VAR. Sometimes there isn’t. And as AFCON showed us in its most dramatic moments, even after the slow-motion replay, the call can still feel like a total robbery.
The office operates on this same chaotic penalty logic. Promotions and praise often go to the person who made the last big impression, not the one who did the heavy lifting in the group stages. Management remembers the flashy final slide instead of the late-night defensive work that kept the project alive.
Because decisions are often made from the air-conditioned silence of a quiet office—miles away from the actual chaos on the pitch—you end up with referees who miss the context, ignore the fouls, and occasionally show a clear bias for their favorite players.
It feels unfair because it is.
But a legacy is not built on one controversial whistle or a single missed kick. It is built on consistency—staying in the game and having the mental toughness to be ready when your next moment finally arrives in the spotlight.
From the Couch to the Cubicle
It is easy to scream at the TV from the comfort of a sofa, but the psychological weight of the spotlight is immense. One heavy touch can make you a hero—or a trending meme.
AFCON also showed us how rivalry can turn toxic, when fans spend more energy rooting for others to fail than for their own team to succeed.
If that sounds familiar, it is because the office has its own version of ultra fans. Sometimes colleagues form alliances based on a shared dislike of a high performer. It becomes a workplace subculture where it is easier to whisper “must be nice” in the breakroom than to say, “maybe I need to level up.”
The Final Whistle
The difference between a championship season and a relegation scrap is not talent. It is the response to loss.
Great teams review the tape, fix what went wrong, improve their performance, and come back stronger. Others spend their time blaming the referee, the budget, or that one meeting that could have been an email.
Those who take feedback and upskill return sharper. The rest stay stuck, replaying the same excuses—resulting in the same season on repeat, just with a new calendar year and a different tournament.
Leadership is not about avoiding failure. Everyone loses sometimes.
It is about what you do next.
Pressure does not create or erase character.
It reveals it.
Same game.
Different field.
Same leadership rules.
