After debuting at the 2025 World Snooker Championship at the Crucible, one officialstill works a full-time job optimising operations for an airline
World Snooker Championship referee Malgorzata Kanieska has an interesting career that also keeps her on her toes(Image: George Wood, Getty Images)
Snooker referee Malgorzata Kanieska juggles her role officiating some of the sport’s most prestigious matches with a full-time career in aerospace. Quite the combination for someone already under pressure on the baize.
Kanieska made her Crucible bow at the 2025 World Snooker Championship, taking charge of a fixture at the iconic Sheffield venue for the very first time. She won’t, however, be among the officials on duty when the 2026 tournament gets under way this weekend.
The Warsaw-born ref first became involved in snooker as far back as 2010. However, she continues to hold down a regular job in Poland, where she oversees operational processes at an airport to keep everything running smoothly.
Speaking to Framed: The Snooker Podcast last year, Kanieska said: “When I did my first professional event I was studying. Now I’m just working full-time and I take days off to go to tournaments, that’s the biggest change.”
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You’d have to be a true devotee of the game to willingly take on the demands of refereeing on your days off. Yet Kanieska’s love for snooker is evidently strong enough to make the sacrifice worthwhile.
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She continued: “I use all my days off for the tournament. As much as I like snooker, it’s not a holiday.”
Other referees would likely agree given the demands of the job. Thankfully, referees aren’t under quite as much scrutiny in snooker as they are in other sports.
Kanieska won’t feature amongst the officiating panel guiding the forthcoming fortnight of action in Sheffield. But that certainly doesn’t mean her working life will be any less demanding in the meantime.
“I work for Polish airlines, I optimise [systems] for the upcoming days,” she continued. “There is a manager on duty but when you think about all the aircrafts coming in, [if] something happens you need to know how to make the network look the best, how to avoid delays, how to avoid over-bookings and how to find the best options for the flights to perform.”
Clearly, Kanieska is well-suited to a seat of authority. And she’ll likely hope to put her talents back on display at the World Snooker Championship in future editions of the tournament.
Much like her commanding presence as a snooker referee, Kanieska holds a similarly influential role in her aviation career. Fortunately, she is able to pass some of the more uncomfortable duties on to her colleagues in that line of work.
“I can cancel flights,” she added. “When there is industrial action, or airports can be closed, or aircrafts can be damaged, I have the power to cancel flights – luckily I do not contact passengers so that makes it easier.”
Kanieska’s fellow referee Rob Spencer has been appointed to officiate the 2026 World Snooker Championship final on May 4. In the meantime, she is set to observe this year’s tournament from the wings as she plans her return to the sport’s most prestigious stage.
