Change

Not so long ago the news emerged that the group CEO at one of my old businesses had stepped down after 9 years. This got me thinking about the pace of change in organisations and I did some reading around the subject. It’s been just over a year since I left SSP and whilst I thought that there would be a certain amount of change when the new UK CEO came on board (to be honest, at the time I felt that a certain amount of change was needed) even I was surprised at just how much had changed in such a short time with a (virtually) complete overhaul of senior management and a complete reorganisation of how the company operates, no one can accuse this business of standing still. As an outsider looking in you might be forgiven for thinking that all this change would have a detrimental effect, in fact the opposite is true and things are going very well. For me, it’s been a great example of how someone coming into a business was with a vision, a plan to execute that vision and the support of his line manager to enable him to execute that vision can make a real and lasting difference and I have been really impressed by it.

Of course, I have observed much of this from a distance, having made my decision to leave a few months before the new CEO came on board I had a new role lined up within weeks of his arrival and announced my intention to leave not long afterwards. On one level it would have been interesting to have stayed longer and to have been part of the change but I felt strongly that it was the right time for me to leave the UK business. It was a difficult decision as I loved the job and the company and would recommend SSP to people as a company to work for, not least because of their commitment to people’s development but also because its a great environment to work in and dealing with so many differing brands is very educational.

So what am I up to at the moment? Well, still dealing with odd jobs and trying to sort things out ahead of our move. I am doing a lot of research on Saudi ahead of landing my new role as I want to be as prepared as possible.