What has been your journey to MD of Computacenter?
Following a degree in IT and business studies, I joined Computacenter 19 years ago. During this time I have held a number of sales, operations and leadership roles from client exec to running the financial services sector; heading up support services and IT outsourcing, and director of services and solutions.
What has been your best moment in business?
There have been an abundance of great moments during those 19 years, making it very difficult to single out just the one. Winning deals is always a great memory for any team - but that feeling is too short lived! Playing a part in the evolution and longer term success of an organisation is extremely fulfilling, requiring a clear strategy, excellent execution, and a bit of luck along the way! But winning isn’t possible without great people, great teamwork and a ‘will do’ attitude. It’s therefore working with great people, which is at the heart of my best moments in business to date – a dependence that will not change.
What was your biggest regret?
I don't believe in regrets in business. I believe in taking responsibility for your actions, learning from them and moving on.
What is the best business advice you have ever been given?
A company is only as good as the people that represent it.
Which company (other than yours) do you admire the most and why?
I have a huge respect for many companies and many competitors, but when a company can turn a noun into an everyday verb that requires admiration – that's exactly what Google has done!
Which other CEO do you believe has done an outstanding job? Why?
As I’m not allowed to say Computacenter's Group CEO, Mike Norris, and as Eric Schmidt of Google has handed back to co-founder Larry Page, I will say Softcat’s Martin Hellawell. As an ex-Computacenter stalwart it’s great to see Martin doing so well – a journey made more pleasurable by the fact that he has a different target market to Computacenter!
Tell us about the Blenheim Triathlon Challenge?
Myself and about 25 other like minded CEOs and managing directors agreed (with only some gentle persuasion from our captain, Cisco’s Phil Smith) to compete at this year’s GE Blenheim Triathlon – an initiative called the Leaderboard Challenge for Sport Relief. Our aim is to train and compete together in an attempt to raise more than £250k for Sport Relief. Our team is made up of extremely varied abilities – ranging from experienced elite triathletes such as Phil Smith, Phil Doye of Kelway, and Terry Burt of 2e2, to mere beginners like me and Dave Callaghan from Oracle. We’re all digging deep, as a team, in order to focus on the training, but competitive spirits are starting to shine through. The first 100 metres of the swim will be interesting. I think I'll just stay out of trouble! (You can sponsor the team here)
What’s next for Computacenter?
Hopefully to emulate the group growth that we have experienced over the last few years. Continuing to delivering excellent customer service and value will be key to this, through remaining focused on competitive core offerings to our target market.
