I joined Nuaire, a Ventilation manufacturing company, after an interesting interview where my boss-to-be asked about relevant experience and I replied, I’ve no idea about ventilation nor Air Conditioning, all I can tell you is that I’m a very quick learner, that was obviously enough, I got the job and learnt it pretty well, I stayed with Nuaire for 14 years and during my time there moved house twice, got married, got divorced, became the manager of various departments, was part of the senior managemant team that worked abroard when buy ing a company in France.
The French experience set me aside as a person that the Directors could rely on to work on their behalf in remote places so I also was sent to Australia when we bought 2 companies out there and merged them together.
When I came back I worked back in the Caerphilly head office for a while as General Manager and then was asked to go to France again to oversee the operation there as it moved into a new premises, the posting was only meant to be for a month whilst they found a French Managing Director but I was there for 8 months as it took them longer than they thought to find the right person. I struck a deal with them to fly me back to the UK every weekend so I wopuld still be able to play hockey, which I was doing at quite a high level at that time, and they agreed, so every weekend they flew me home and I played hockey, it just happened to be the whole of a hockey season.
My last phone call from my then boss at head office whilst I was in France was a little shock, he asked me to come home early, I used to travel on a Friday afternoon and the phone call came in on a Wednesday, I was to fly home (Cardiff) on the Thursday, say hi & goodbye to friends and family, then get on a plane on Sunday to Australia again, the companies we’d bought there were building a new factory and they needed a project manager, I was the man for the job aparently to off I went again, a 28 hour flight with little or no sleep and on landing, 1 hour to get my bags in the house I was going to use before a site meeting with the contractors who’d already started, I was knackered and just managed the hello’s before I went to bed for a 12 hour kip!
After 3 months in Australia which included a great couple of weeks on the Lions Tour there and a trip to Sydney to see my cousin, Di, and her 3 boys who live there I was brought back to the UK, trouble was they had no job there for me as I’d been away for so long that they’d given all my responsibilities to other people. They were over the moon when I handed my notice in and so began my time in Dorset.