Joining Lloyd in this episode is a Workday Superstar - Simon Tuite. One of the best in the game. Someone who very often walks the tightrope of people and data in tech. How does he do it?
In this conversation we delve into it right from the beginning. With anecdotes from his university days and tenure across different clients, Simon demonstrates that building relationships is as vital as troubleshooting technical hurdles.
We discuss navigating the balance between career and personal life, particularly how you need to juggle the balance between being career driven, living your personal life without sacrifice.
Reflecting on the pandemic, Lloyd offers insights on work-life equilibrium, stressing the importance of savoring life's moments.
Further in the episode we explore professional growth, aligning team motivation with client expectations, and the necessity of disconnecting for genuine fulfilment.
From gym routines to holiday breaks, we share insights on fostering professional relationships and achieving equilibrium in the fast-paced world of technology and wellness.
Join us as we unravel the art of living well in today's high-speed domain.
Check out more of the Focus Cloud Group Podcasts and chats on your favourite media players!
Youtube, Spotify, Apple, Google!
Joining Lloyd in this episode is a Workday Superstar - Simon Tuite. One of the best in the game. Someone who very often walks the tightrope of people and data in tech. How does he do it?
In this conversation we delve into it right from the beginning. With anecdotes from his university days and tenure across different clients, Simon demonstrates that building relationships is as vital as troubleshooting technical hurdles.
We discuss navigating the balance between career and personal life, particularly how you need to juggle the balance between being career driven, living your personal life without sacrifice.
Reflecting on the pandemic, Lloyd offers insights on work-life equilibrium, stressing the importance of savoring life's moments.
Further in the episode we explore professional growth, aligning team motivation with client expectations, and the necessity of disconnecting for genuine fulfilment.
From gym routines to holiday breaks, we share insights on fostering professional relationships and achieving equilibrium in the fast-paced world of technology and wellness.
Join us as we unravel the art of living well in today's high-speed domain.
Check out more of the Focus Cloud Group Podcasts and chats on your favourite media players!
Youtube, Spotify, Apple, Google!
Welcome to all of our viewers to this month's Into the Cloud podcast. I'm very, very excited to be joined by one of the most highly technical integration architects in the work the ecosystem, mr Simon Chewett.
Speaker 2:Hi, nice to be here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, great to be here. Thank you for coming, thanks for the invite. We've been trying to do this for a while, right, yeah? And is it me that keeps moving, or is it you? I think it's you.
Speaker 2:Busy schedule. Yeah. And, yeah, I think we've been talking for a while even even work wise. We've probably been talking for five, six years, but different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we've known each other for six and a half years, I think it is.
Speaker 2:Looked at different opportunities. I don't think we've we've landed a role just yet, or kind of came close a couple of times. My bad, yeah, I think we. I think we've known each other well. I think I think over that time, I think yeah it was, it's always always happy to see a colleague, I think, from you.
Speaker 2:I think it's, I think, your perspective in the market and even the way you just got rolled or engage with people, I think it's always been memorable. To me it's been a bit of banter, a bit of the sales sales side obviously, but it's always been enjoyable and I think you remember different details about people, which is yeah it's always been nice to talk about different opportunities. So, yeah, great to be here.
Speaker 1:No, really really good. Yeah, no, no, you're welcome. You're welcome Going on to you know how are how are kind of relationship and we'll go back a little bit in your career afterwards. But how our relationship first started is I was. I was highly recommended to you as I was looking for an integration lead for one of my customers and someone I respect and trust highly in the work.
Speaker 1:The ecosystem said to me this is one of the best guys and I hope no one's offended by me saying this and I hope that you're not offended by me saying this, but I will say it because that's what into the clouds all about, right, it's about being open and honest and you know, typically when I speak to, let's say, the technical background people yeah, I, you know I've got some of my best friends are from a technical background, but it could be said that you know people who are highly, highly technical in the code and all that sort of stuff. They, they, they can be quite difficult to build a relationship with, like a close relationship with, and they're certainly not what you would say from a salesy type background. Would that be fair to say?
Speaker 2:I think, yeah, I think I think there is a maybe a stereotypical technical image of programmers, technical consultants, people who love tech, technology, but I think I think nowadays there is variety. But I think to your point, I think that was something I recognized quite, quite early on that and even back to my back to my college days fell in love with technology, loved programming, was up on like programming, coding, but at the same time was a, was a people person.
Speaker 2:So I like working with people, collaborating with people and the relationship. So, and and again felt that was a nice balance. And then, as I went through from college into my career, I guess I started to pick up on this might be a bit of a not a, not a unique trait but something I was quite strong on that I'm able to build a relationship, people and I enjoy that kind of first and foremost like, but I also really enjoy getting getting into the weeds of a technical problem solution.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was one of the first things I don't remember when I first conversed.
Speaker 2:It might have been a third or four conversation, actually, when I thought is it?
Speaker 1:safe to say this to Simon Right. And. I remember saying to you like it's, it's very. I was only on the phone to someone the other day, for example, very highly-taught, a very highly technical data guy, and he actually said to me that I much prefer data to people.
Speaker 1:That's what he said you know, and there's nothing wrong with that because we all got our skills set but why? Why I really liked about you and really enjoy about our conversations and I know that's translated into your career at PWC and the the other places that you've been, which we'll discuss but is that you do have such a great relationship building characteristic and you've got great personality. I can see you know why you've you've, you've touched on the sales element to what you do in your past as well.
Speaker 2:You know, I really did notice that about you when I, when I first spoke to you, yeah, I, I guess, just to touch on something there, I think part of this is also a choice. I, I think it's. I think it's people, maybe people, people like the tech, people like the data and actually they prefer to stay there. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I don't think it's a. I think if people wanted to learn something or develop something or get exposure to a different area or sales, business relationships, they, they could. But I think it's a, I think it's a choice. Again and again, it's understanding strengths and weaknesses of your, of anybody. So, yeah, I, I enjoy that, I get a buzz out of it. I like working with teams, I like building relationships. I, I like talking about the tech you said, but I like understanding business problems. I like talking about options. I like planning to an extent. Yeah, and I and I, and I think I've noticed through my career, it's it's, it's given me opportunities to, to, to, to lean into that more and open more doors in different ways. And.
Speaker 2:I think I was quite conscious coming out of college. I, yeah, I wanted to get that exposure on the techie side, but I I didn't want to be a sole developer. I wanted that broader consulting exposure to consult, with, with, with, with people, with clients, and just do the full um holistic kind of role. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So tell me, go back to your, let's say, your pre college days, your pre university days. Okay, you, you knew that you was going to be a technical guy. No, right, okay.
Speaker 2:No, absolutely not Um. So I think in in school I always liked the logical subjects. So, like love, maths, um, maths and economics, I think those were two subjects that I really enjoyed because it was about understanding something. It was about you're giving a, you're giving a topic and you're, and you can, there's, there's kind of reasoning behind something so you can do it. So, because of X and Y and Z, then it it. It that equals one Um. Again, it wasn't in that way, but it was. But there was logic and I, I, I much prefer those subjects as opposed to other subjects where you kind of have to learn off material to then recite and exams, or learn off languages, et cetera, um and again just the way my brain was, I I struggled to maybe pick up some of those areas as opposed to the kind of more logical things.
Speaker 2:So I think coming out of school I knew that I knew I was more logical and again, thanks to the kind of teachers at the time, uh, really, yeah, got benefit and and kind of enjoyed learning those areas. Um then, it came to kind of choosing where to go in college and you're kind of, you're going to career days, you're trying to guess what about this. What about that? Um probably recognized that wasn't going to be a bit of a sports star, so I think it's uh that was one of my questions.
Speaker 1:So was you decent at football or any of the other sports? Younger I played um Gaelic football.
Speaker 2:So we have it's like an Irish Irish um version of football. Um, and then rugby um did other things along the way, but those are probably the kind of two prime sports Um yeah, I really enjoyed this, um. But yeah, recognized wasn't going to, wasn't necessarily necessarily going to make a career out of that, even though I was very passionate about sports, fitness et cetera.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, so then it came to time to kind of pick a, pick a course and you go on open days to colleges et cetera. Um, kind of just use it as an opportunity just to just to see colleges. I'm not, uh, because as an 18 year old 17 year old you're not really clear on what you're trying to do in life. Um, it was really the advice of my dad. Um, he's in the IT industry, he was a program leader, leaders uh at the time and um, kind of knew me, knew, knew where my strengths were and kind of thought yeah, this might be a good mix of technical with with some business.
Speaker 2:Um and again he knew IT was a was a growing industry, so good opportunity to get in and kind of see where it goes. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, so, almost fast forward to your first workday role. And then, but tell me, tell me the one before. What made you think maybe the workday ecosystem for me?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, um, I had a big four consultancy um in Ireland, so we're still in Dublin at the time. Um, I had joined them from a wider tech space. So I came in as a, as a dot net um consultant so kind of did more typical traditional database and kind of website development Um, and they got the, got the opportunity or got kind of got selected to join the workday team. Um, at the time didn't know what what workday was, so jumped on kind of Google, what is workday? Uh, did a bit of research and it, it, it came across and and as a as a real powerhouse in that ERP, particularly in the HR space. Um, so I said, yeah, let's, let's, let's do it.
Speaker 1:You're talking about a long time ago though, right, yeah?
Speaker 2:we're talking? Which year are we talking about? We're talking 10 or 11 years?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we're talking about 20, it's 2013,. Wasn't it you? 2013,?
Speaker 2:2014. 2013 and that kind of time.
Speaker 1:So it's a year before I entered the work the ecosystem and it was early. Yeah, it was early, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And it was coming from the US but again in Europe. It still had that reputation of it was something different and it had that high demand, high reputation. So I was happy to, yeah, cool, let's go for it, flew to London, did the training, came back and then did the first implementation based in Dublin. Yeah, it was great. I was buzzing to get involved new technology, new customer, new team. At the time it was a team that was actually somewhere based in Dublin and somewhere in the UK, so it was an opportunity to get exposure to that broader community and then get hands on with it, with a client again, and then the kind of differences between the typical kind of dot net kind of web development versus ERP workday.
Speaker 1:But yeah, loved it. Yeah, so was it like? Did you feel like you was at home as soon as you went into work there, or did it take you a few years to?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it was very obvious going on, even through the training, speaking to clients, more and more comments about workday just reinstated this is the premium tool, this is top of class, very different to what had come before, very strong user interface and really that just again said yes in the right space, kind of keep going, let's see where it goes, yeah, and then make great people. So kind of working with different teams, different ambitions for growth alongside the workday, targeted growth within Europe. I think there was consultancy then saw that as well and we're trying to ramp up teams etc, etc.
Speaker 1:I remember clearly actually 2015, 2016, 2017 ramping up a lot of the partners teams in the ecosystem, which was fun and hard. It was really hard because the skill set wasn't readily available, right? So you had to really deep dive and go and look for these people, right? So obviously that's how we were introduced. So fast forward a little bit to the first time you started to lead a technical program within the workday ecosystem. So I'm more interested in how your typical integrations consultant and then, as soon as you made that shift from that to that next step which leads you to where you are today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's three steps there. I think it's integration consultant, integration team lead and then, I would say, technical team lead. Yeah, do you want to focus on that first one?
Speaker 1:I want to transfer. I want to talk about the transition from consultant to team lead a little bit and how that affects you, and then to architect level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what happened on the program? I actually initially I moved to London then just over nine years ago and on that program that was actually when it made the shift. So I was consultant advising and at that time you're really responsible for several integrations. So you own those integrations and, to end, you lead the client through requirements gathering kind of engaging with the vendor team or the technical teams, understanding the requirements, working with the design documents, et cetera. So it's very specific to your integrations. As you move into a team lead role, you have oversight and responsibility for all of the integration, all the integrations. There's a people management piece there as well, so you're now responsible for managing the team, structuring the team. Who is good at what?
Speaker 1:How did you find that?
Speaker 2:I loved it Again kind of back to who I am and back to what I was aware of. I liked the techie side but I liked the people side. That was another opportunity and I maybe adored that was open, because I enjoyed that and I liked that and I kind of maybe naturally enjoyed working with people and helping people et cetera. So, yeah, I enjoyed it. It makes the job more stressful. You have more headaches, you have more exposure to kind of different things to manage.
Speaker 1:You lose your hair a little bit quicker.
Speaker 2:Lose your hair.
Speaker 1:I wasn't saying anything about yours. I can't talk about that at the moment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it was great. I think it varies the role as well. I think you go from having techie conversations to having higher level techie conversations and people conversations and planning and kind of also managing the relationship of you as a. At that time I was part of a consultancy with the client and what's the roadmap and kind of where are our problems? How do we evolve, et cetera.
Speaker 1:So what was the first time you ever had to have a difficult conversation with another technical consultant because you was their team leader and obviously being as good as what's available from a technical point of view, but then having this skill set which allows you to manage people and lead people, when was the first time you had to have a difficult conversation with someone and perhaps exited them from the project or the business, and how did that affect you as an individual?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I'm quite an empathetic person. It's quite easy for me to. I'm not quite easy, but I try to relate to some of that I'm kind of working with. When you come up against a challenge like this, you do try and have awareness or acknowledge their side. What are they coming from? Where are they coming from? And then when there is a challenge, for me it's first to understand what's the issue. Is the issue capability? Is the issue kind of expecting too much of someone too soon? Is the issue motivation? Is the issue something outside of that person?
Speaker 2:So, trying to really go in just with a broad perspective. So actually, at that first client so it was an aerospace client, global client I made the transition from integration consultant into the team lead role. I was quite stretched, I was pushing myself, I was ambitious, I was trying to take everything on and doing okay. And then bit of a conflict with someone on the team and it was around. It was kind of around work-life balance. Actually it was around kind of we traveled a lot, so we had to travel four or five days a week and there was expectations as to kind of how we presented ourselves to the client. So different times you had to be at the office, leave the office, deliverables etc. And again, that was part of what was being delivered at this ambitious level to do the best for the client. Yeah, one of the team members I guess was starting to kind of reflect or question on are they getting what they want out of their career and the time they have to commit to this? Is it what they want?
Speaker 2:So on a project, I'm like not your average of this I need to be managing because I guess my understanding is we're here to do a job. You're in an ambitious kind of environment. Again, we want to appreciate the person and if there's challenges or workload that I can move away from you, happy to do that and happy to do. We need to put you on some training. Do we need to pair you up with someone that maybe is more experienced? And really I think it came down to that motivation factor. I just don't think they had that same interest and that started to then show itself more and more At the time. Again, we tried different things. I tried to pair them up with a more senior person so again, they weren't getting exposed in ways that they weren't comfortable with.
Speaker 1:We're talking about a junior person here, or we're talking about an experienced integration consultant?
Speaker 2:It was probably more junior and I think more junior and again maybe that was the issue is that we may have had a mismatch of expertise. Again I think it would still go down to the motivational piece. I think it wasn't really fit for them. We tried various things. I think at the end they actually decided to move on.
Speaker 1:The consulting game is hard, especially when we're talking about consulting back in the day.
Speaker 1:It makes us feel like we're both particularly senior, which, of course, I'm not. I know recruiting for consulting partners throughout my career. The biggest thing about joining a consulting partner back in the day was the amount of travel and it became even before Covid. It became more and more of a topic and the more attractive consulting partners were the ones that had that flexibility to work from home. They didn't require you to be on customer side because you could live down the south and the customer, the project, is one up north, which meant that you were Monday to Friday up north. So people generally in 2016, 2017, they could become more and more aware of that.
Speaker 1:Do you think that was a factor and how did it affect you as well?
Speaker 2:I think comparing life, even if we compare that to now, I think it's very different. I think there is flexibility. I think you only know that now, looking back, how different it is. I think I've been quite lucky. I haven't had a high level of expectations of travel every week, except for one client.
Speaker 1:Throughout your.
Speaker 2:It wasn't week in, week out, it was travel, maybe for the first six months, couple of days a week as needed, build the relationships, make sure we kind of have things on track and then come and go as needed. There was one client in particular where it was an expectation that the whole team would be there all the time and that actually was the project that I did when I first moved to London, so at the time it was quite a challenge. So moving to London didn't really know anybody. Then travelling for a client.
Speaker 1:I was going to say something funny. You could say that I was going to say not speaking the local language.
Speaker 2:That's up time. I have to try and slow things down.
Speaker 1:I couldn't help that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so kind of had it, and then going home maybe so often to connect with friends, family, etc. So I found that yeah, just busy, busy, busy life. No real down time. But I loved it. It was part of why I came to London. It was one of the attractions of London.
Speaker 2:London is the kind of ecosystem of Europe really at the time from how I picked it. This is where the big again. There's consultancies everywhere and they have presence in different countries. But the scale was just that much bigger and it was opportunities then to work the biggest clients, the biggest customers, the biggest maybe opportunities and roles. But then with that comes travel, higher expectations maybe.
Speaker 1:Higher expectations, stress, of course.
Speaker 1:Does everyone get stressed. I know no one ever wants to talk about stress when you've got a high pressure job or whatever, but ultimately everyone gets stressed. And throughout my interviews in the cloud, I found that even people that you kind of look at and you know that you do not think. Sometimes I thought to myself how does this person even function? Because I'm not going to say I struggle with my role, but there are times when I'm like the emails I just want to go for lunch.
Speaker 1:I come back from lunch and I've got 100 emails and then I think to myself but you know, program directors, right, and these program directors, they're managing five, six projects at the same time. They've got all these different reports and they're all sending emails upon my emails because they're asking me for resources. So they've got my emails coming into them as well. How did they manage all of that stuff? Because they don't look stressed. So why should I feel it? I don't know what that's called, but it's something that I think about a lot, which you can hear in my mindset moments which I know you follow.
Speaker 1:Did you just say that because you came here today?
Speaker 2:No, no, I think. Firstly, on the mindset moments. I think it's refreshing. There's been days you jump on LinkedIn, or you'd be on LinkedIn and be looking at different updates, or you get notified and you jump on LinkedIn and you scroll down and you'd see a post by yourself, and it's either a mindset moment which yeah, for me I think it's quite powerful to be showing the real person.
Speaker 2:So from the time I know you I knew very big into fitness, working out, being up pretty crazy early in the morning to do that before you get into work, but even then to get more snippets of challenges you face and then people can relate oh hey, I'm having a bad day. Well, he's having a bad day, but we kind of move forward, so that's quite helpful. The other one, actually, which is really interesting is your motivational videos.
Speaker 2:I think no, I don't watch all of them, but some of them are very powerful and again some of them are sports driven, so it's like famous sports players pushing themselves, committed, working out which, again, we're not. We train on the side, etc. But I think there is a mindset that you can relate to in that and there is motivation. There's kind of a buzz that I would get from watching something like that. So, yeah, I think both of those kind of mediums are expressions that you put out there are beneficial.
Speaker 1:It's part of the reason why I did it. You know like this is not about me, but just for anyone who's interested in mindset moments, we will put a link on the bottom of the link to this podcast. So anyone who wants to follow mindset moments plug the reason why I did mindset moments. Do you want to know why? So there was years and years and years where I was purely just watching motivational videos, right, and this is gonna sound really strict and really sad.
Speaker 1:You could probably say I don't know, but it's the truth. So I'm gonna say it. I used to wake up at like four o'clock and I still do wake up at four o'clock in the morning and the first thing I would do is go and make myself a coffee and then come back and sit at my desk and what I'd be blasting into my head was the stuff that I earlier on say 2016 onwards was sharing every single day, and the mistake that I was making was I was putting 10 minute videos on my social channels and all that sort of stuff, and a lot of the people that used to listen to those videos and there's a lot of people they just, after a while, I guess they probably wanted to say Lord, we're just a bit bored of this Like, yeah, we wanna know you. Right, that's what they actually said. Okay, we know what you listen to and how it works for you, but actually no, they didn't know how it worked for me, but they kinda said we wanna know you.
Speaker 1:So why didn't you do one? And I can't see myself going ugh, you know, on the end, you know.
Speaker 1:So I thought to myself how can I help people? Because and that's why I do it Because I think you might be having a really crap day one day and you go on to LinkedIn or you go on to another social channel and someone talks about something, or you listen to something in a video and it really resonates and relates to your situation at that particular time. And what I found most comforting I think would be the best word about this stuff is I feel like I work really hard you know what I mean which I do right, as everyone else does, but and sometimes you can question yourself of whether it's really worth doing that. Yeah, and in the stuff that I've listened to, it's really about people who have also done that, and you kinda see these people maybe on a pedestal, you know, in sports or in business or in you know whatever else.
Speaker 1:Like, for example, elon Musk. Right, you know Elon Musk, how did he get to where he is? Worked his ass off to get there. You know he'd done between 80 and 100 hours and physically hearing in say that you go. So it's not that hard to get there. All I've gotta do is make some sacrifices here, which is not nice when you're doing it because you're tired and you know you're not going out with your friends and maybe, if you're married or you've got girlfriend or whatever, you're not seeing those people. And for me, listening to that was quite comforting.
Speaker 1:So when I share that on the mindset moments. I know people relate to it, I know they do, you know.
Speaker 2:Now, all right, but I think part of that is also the why. So why is he like that? What is pushing people and what is pushing him?
Speaker 1:and anybody.
Speaker 2:I think it was him. I watched the show about him. Yeah, I think had some hardships, maybe grown up in life.
Speaker 2:I think I've bullied in school, family difficulties and I think it's maybe that I'm not saying every successful person has come from hardship, but I think there is something about why someone is that way, why, and then what they want, because even back to what you said I think it's for each person to reflect on what's important to them in life, what are their values in life, and then, okay, well, if my top priority is to be CEO, cto, entrepreneur, whatever, that takes commitment, that takes discipline, and then it's about, yeah, cutting other things and for that goal. But I think it's also about balance as well in that, because if you go too extreme to that back to what you said about stress, burnout, and yeah, I think it's around finding that right balance, and I think balance is very individual. I think for one person it's one thing and for someone else it can be something else, and that's fine. Everyone's different, but I think it is about having a bit of everything, because if you just have that one thing I think it's I don't think you get to the finish line.
Speaker 2:I think, or maybe you do, but I think Elon most probably has his own size loaves, or I think he loves cars or something else. So how do you get out of Tesla and SpaceX and the rest and switch off as well and just have a hobby? Again, I think he loaves the detail, et cetera.
Speaker 1:Again, I don't know the guy, but that's his hobby.
Speaker 2:But then he can have you then switch off as well and have that balance. And I think he has kids and other stuff as well. Well, now he does, but when he started he didn't Right. Yeah, in the grind, it's the grind. Yeah, the grind is the grind.
Speaker 1:You mentioned balance there, right, and it's something that I did share a video a little while ago about trying to find a balance and not really having a balance. Right, and it's so hard to find a balance. It depends what you want. So, if you want to have, if you want to, it's not about what you want to have. Actually, it's about what you want to be, which brings the stuff that you want to have with it. Right, and I've just found that you can't really have a balance. You know what I mean? That's the truth. Not in the early days of my, with focus, there was no balance. Do you know what I mean? And, funny enough, Elon Musk said something like he's a very analytical bloke right.
Speaker 1:He's a technical guy and he said when you start a business, you have two choices. You can achieve in half the time what a company, the same entrepreneur. If the same entrepreneur is working 50 hours a week and you work 100 hours a week, you're going to achieve double what they will in the same period of time. And it was as simple as that.
Speaker 2:But even to mix it up again, to move away from Elon, even Kobe Kobe Bryant said something very similar. He's done interviews where he said things like basically trying to train, basically trying to train three times a day, and that was his mindset he had. He did from the outset and almost where. Then, when he gets to the summer, he would say, yeah, people might be doing stuff in the summer, but I'm doing three day sessions, so it doesn't matter what you do in that summer, you're never going to catch me. So it's again. It's. I don't play basketball. I'm kind of a basketball fan, maybe not I can see you dunking.
Speaker 2:You get a bit higher. But again you can pull those gems or those learnings or those motivations or just insights from people, just like you Like I have, yeah, like I have, and also like people pull from you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's the idea it's to kind of translate those learnings and those things that have helped me into others which I know need to hear it. They may not need to hear every single thing that's said on that particular episode or whatever, but I know that there's people who've when I stopped doing it just before Christmas, the amount of calls I had, I didn't think it was that. I knew it was successful because it's got lots of views and lots of comments and lots of stuff like that, but I didn't know how much it helped. I really didn't. And there's there was people who called me and emailed me and said why have you stopped this? Why have you, you know, like they?
Speaker 2:really cared.
Speaker 1:So I was being like you know, I knew I was going to start again. I thought I've got to start this again because it's not helping those people. So here's a question for you when have you been severely challenged? Because I've never seen, whenever I've spoken to you, I've never come off the phone to you, or when we've met or whatever, and come away from that conversation feeling he sounds really stressed. But I know there is times. There's probably you know, and whether you want to be open and honest, I think the viewers will want to hear this. So I know there's been times when you've been sitting there with your head in your hands. So talk to me about when that's been, why it was and what you did to overcome it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I think for me, when it became very obvious that I probably don't have balance and where maybe I don't have awareness of where I'm stressed and how I manage stress, was when I started to, I think, add more things into my life, so moved to the UK and really predominately was so very focused in my career, happy to do so, looked at this, had some fitness and everything else, and then kind of the social piece and traveling back home et cetera, but that was kind of it, I think.
Speaker 2:Then got engaged, got married, started and then kind of about to have a kid and these things are also very valuable to me as a person. So it kind of forced me to reflect on how my allocating time in my day, in my week, in my life and that caused a bit of stress. That's that challenge to reflect on how much time am I giving my career and how do I balance career with family? Life Was a nice, not nice at the time. It was difficult, but I think that was a real kind of wake up to say number one do I have balance? And I probably didn't.
Speaker 1:Number two Was this pre or after consulting?
Speaker 2:It was actually when I went out as an independent contract as well. So again additional, so I had pushed myself to now be an independent consultant to clients, so again out on my own a bit, have a vulnerability of I am now 100% responsible for making sales, bringing in money for my family. But me as a person first of all. But now I'm married, so I have a family I have to look after and support, and so it was at that time, yes, and then it was also COVID hit.
Speaker 2:I think that made everyone maybe just I don't remember Everyone just kind of take stock on things and life and everything else. And then, yeah, it was becoming a dad and again feeling that responsibility, and it was something that meant a lot to me as a person and I kind of always looked forward to that moment in life. But yet the stress of my role and making sure that I can continue to continue to do this and how I'm making sure income is coming in and I'm saving and I'm investing and everything else, but then also how do I make time on my day for what's important to me, and then even living with my wife, I think I think that was a great learning as well, because I think you living on your own and living with people, et cetera, you're in your own routine and you don't really know, maybe, what's unusual or what's maybe more yeah unusual.
Speaker 2:But I think living with someone my wife definitely kind of pointed out, you don't really switch off much or kind of what do you do to relax or what do you do that's like fun Again. Maybe you go to the gym or you go home to see friends et cetera. But yeah, I think she has always been a nice balance to try and say, okay, let's go do something fun, or okay, let's switch off now and let's kind of get out of the house. So again back to balance. But to your point, not something I, something I probably have had, what kind of was told to try and have, but took me a while maybe to implement it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think I know you're an independent contractor, but you're how do I put this? You're as close to an entrepreneur without being an entrepreneur, but you could say that you are an entrepreneur because you're a contractor. Right, and the difficulty is, I think, with that situation is your wife bless her probably doesn't think the same.
Speaker 1:So you know when people say to you you need to have a balance, it's because they don't think the same as you. You know, and it's nice for people to have a balance, but actually your wants, needs and desires are not channeled towards having a balance right now.
Speaker 3:Obviously that changes over time, of course, I think since you had a child, that's probably has changed, but that probably would have been one of your biggest mind shift.
Speaker 2:But I also think back to your stress point. I think for me I started noticing that stress more. I think that's what then forced me to think about that. So at that point it was go, go, go, ambition, drive, kind of always pushing.
Speaker 2:Maybe you should have been more patient at different times in hindsight, but I think, as you said, when you encounter that stress or that, I think for me it kind of forced me to just reflect on well, am I doing too much, or how do I rejig things, or how do I work more efficiently? And then maybe I'm too far out of balance and I've been doing that for too long.
Speaker 1:How bad did it get At its absolute worst? So I'm talking stress kind of creeps up on you, and how bad did it get for you? I think I was still able to operate, I'm still working, working full time, enjoying my job.
Speaker 2:If you would call me, I still would have been able to have a bit of banter etc. And I think it was just. I think it was just noticing I actually I don't feel I have time to put into what I want to put into and reflecting on yeah, reflecting on, am I giving what I want to my marriage? Am I present enough? Or actually, again, through COVID, you finish work at six and you turn around and then sit on the couch and that's you leaving your office and you're like, really, you're still kind of thinking about things and again, that's not fair to the marriage and to, again, something that was important to me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I think that was what kind of resonated and I think it was more. It was more examples of that. And then you have a kid and again, being a contractor, you don't have that pay time off, so you're taking that time to be with your child and then you have to go back to work and again there's a clear, there's a clear decision that you have to make on. Well, I'm going to miss the first time that you walks, possibly, but you're doing that for the betterment of your career ambitions, providing for the family, etc.
Speaker 2:But, again, it's the balance. So I think it was. I think it was around that time, I think it was. It was noticing where am I spending time? What am I missing out on?
Speaker 2:And then all my family back home and back Dublin. How do I, how do I kind of respect those relationships, how do I, how do I go home and see my parents kind of be there for them, because I'm in a different country, brother is a sister, etc. Close friends, Because, yeah, I am ambitious, I have been ambitious, but for me, those things also matter to me. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm, yeah, I can relate to that 100%. You have three kids two kids, five kids five kids and still up at five am to work out A little bit early no, yeah, but the way I think about it right is, I think to myself and this is a stupid way of thinking about it, right, I think in, I'm thinking I would love to get up at six or seven, let's say a normal time.
Speaker 1:They people say it's a normal time to get up, right. But then I think to myself but I want to spend, I want to go and see my son's football, I want to go and be able to, you know, spend time with my daughters and things like this, right. So I don't think to myself okay, well, I need to make that time. I can still get up at a normal time. Yes, I think to myself, I know what I'll do. I'll get up four hours earlier, yeah, and then I can spend four hours working, you know, or go into the gym in that time, which means I don't have to spend four hours in that time.
Speaker 2:You know which will save me four hours.
Speaker 1:And therefore, when you, when you, you know, if you imagine, three hours per day is 15 hours a week, I sometimes I do. I do Saturdays and Sundays as well. I don't work the full day on Saturdays and Sundays, but I'm still up at that time and I still work in the morning, but you can imagine, like, how much more work you've got done outside of your, your commitments. Yeah, and that way I've been able to. And this is only recently, right.
Speaker 2:From a conversation. When do you sleep?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's. That's a whole nother ball game.
Speaker 2:Even more and again. It's training a lot. You see online lots of, lots more about life, but again, it's very successful people. Then there's all this peace now of balance. Again, I keep playing balance, but it's an awareness of health going to help as well. Obviously, your it hasn't affected you sacrificing the sleep to still kind of achieve multiple business, business to kind of brands, and then five kids and your fitness and everything else, so clearly you're able to keep keep going. No, it has.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, you would, you'd be, you know my the early days of focus meant that I didn't see my kids grow up right, and is that something that I regret hugely? Absolutely. Is it something that I would do again tomorrow to know what we built today? Yes, and that's horrible to say that, because you you kind of look at your, your, your family, and you look at your children and your relationship with your wife and stuff like that, and nothing's more important to me than that.
Speaker 2:As it probably isn't for you right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but, like you said, you're doing it for them, so you're almost putting yourself on the line to give them a better life, and that's the realisation that I had. So I kind of my my feelings in.
Speaker 2:That don't matter is how I and it's and it's for yourself as well, because you have that ambition in you to be the, the CEO, and everything that you wanted.
Speaker 1:But rather not be no, no, you want to achieve it.
Speaker 2:Because, even because, even because it's, it's both and I and I, and I think it's, and it's then trying to have family, kids that understand that and appreciate that. And again, mine's two and a half, so not yet, but but for me, my wife, so for her to know that, yeah, I'm making those the sacrifices, that I'm choosing to do this, because, probably probably number one, I have something in me that that's that's saying kind of saying, why not Like, why not become CEO, cto partner someday, like, and let's keep pushing, let's. And I kind of I'm continuously trying to grow and take on the things and try new things and push myself. But then, secondly, is I'm also doing it for, yeah, our, our life, to be able to enjoy life, but and and again it's about not wanting to go to the extreme, though, either. So so again, if I, you could, you could cut back everything in life and be putting everything into into your career.
Speaker 1:And yeah, would you progress further.
Speaker 2:Pass up again, like we said at the start there's a need to do that, I think. And then it's around trying to find time to maybe transition and still be career is careers are priority. You have to commit, you have to work weekend, sometimes evenings, etc. And you bring work home with you. But then I think it's around trying to maybe, maybe, maybe, bring some back the other way and again, maybe it, maybe it flows, maybe there's there's downtime. So you go to a period of trying to deliver a program. You're traveling quite a lot, it's quite stressful coming up to go live, etc. But then afterwards it's okay, let's maybe take some, take some time out between the next the next program, go on holidays, do something with the family, etc.
Speaker 1:Which is tough for a permanent member of staff. But it's it's, it's achievable for a contract Because you, you, you choose when you work right, you know within reason.
Speaker 2:Right, because you know if a project, if there's a four to six week gap in between contracts.
Speaker 1:You would probably choose to have that, and then you could go on holiday.
Speaker 2:You can do whatever you want with the family and stuff If you had a guaranteed role, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but if you're permanent, then you can't do that Because you might be put on a, on a on another project. So you really don't have that choice. So I get it. Yeah, so yeah. This, this, this podcast, has taken a bit of a turn into and I'm glad it did. I'm fascinated by this Okay. You know, and the more and more I learn about this, the more and more I realise that actually everyone's the same. Everyone has the same issues. Some people have chosen that. You know what my balance is this. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and their, their career is secondary to their balance, and absolutely fine as long as they're doing what you know. I'm talking about people here, so if they're, if their work-life balance is more towards that side, as long as they do their job, and once they're happy if they're happy with that perfect yeah, and and yeah, happiness, but then you get some people on the other side.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And very rarely, very rarely, can you find someone who's right down the middle. No. I think that's. I've never seen someone that's right down the middle either that or that, yeah, or they're certainly a link, but we can. We can only desire to be that way, right? Because even if you are like 100% work focused and career focused, I don't think that if you quizzed any of those people, would you really like to have that balance. If someone asked me that, yeah I do, of course I do, I'd love to have a balance.
Speaker 2:But would you, but would you want to be on the other side? No.
Speaker 2:No, I wouldn't either. And I and I've done self reflection about that and I've said, oh, like, will I? Will I well, I can dial back things. Will I maybe go for a smaller project or a smaller role, or maybe maybe stop kind of trying to push to the next level? And I think, yeah, again, my wife kind of kind of being that, that, that good kind of bounce back on different things, you kind of said, well, that's kind of who you are. Yeah, so if you didn't do it there, you'd just be doing it about something else.
Speaker 1:Something else. You come up with something else and you'd put yourself in something else. It's um, yeah, it's funny, isn't it? Yeah, but I think, I think, if I was that way focused, I, I would, I would die right, yeah, you know. I need that in my life and I don't know why I need that, and nine times at a time when you ask people why do you need that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know. It's something in the past, something that's, something that's driving you.
Speaker 1:It always is yeah, it always is yeah, I think yeah, I don't know how deep you want to get.
Speaker 3:But I go for it. No, but I think, yeah, yeah, so I think, I think I probably have.
Speaker 2:I've had a point to prove maybe true, true, my true, my life, I think it's. I think it's trying to try to push myself, trying to take on new things. And I think I think also, if you go back when I, when I, when I kind of realized what I liked and what I was good at, I was like, okay, here we go In my head, I was like going going to New York, like doing the like, living the US dream and like, as you watch, you see on TV, etc. Like I was, I was, I was, I was up for it. I was like let's go, let's, let's push, push, push. And I think you're proving to yourself, I think you're you're challenging yourself and you almost have an inner and inner and inner hunger that even if you get to the next level, you're you're again, you're kind of not satisfied and I don't know if that's the nicest, the nicest trait to have.
Speaker 2:Because then when did?
Speaker 1:it stop so yeah, but.
Speaker 2:But. But I and I think what's important there is trying to remind yourself to enjoy the process, because if you don't enjoy, if you're always looking for the next thing and my mam always says this you're never going to be happy. You're always going to be, because what's driving you is partly not the unhappiness, but you're trying to chase happiness, you're trying to chase fulfillment. So I think, yeah, she's all remind me at different stages. Like, yeah, congrats, you got a promotion, congrats, you got a new job. Like like just just pause, just like turn everything off for a minute and just say congrats. Like this is, this is. You've done something. Like like, two years ago you wanted to be here, you're here, enjoy that moment. Yeah Again. What's the voice in the head would say, okay, now let's go for the next one, and that's okay. But I think it's and, like you said, it might never stop. But I think, if you don't enjoy the moment and enjoy the stages, what was it all for?
Speaker 2:Like, and then you're never going to, and then you'll never be happy and I think that's a shame if you, if you don't, if you can't have that through your career or your life because you're always looking for the next thing. I think it's a pity.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but if you're honest with yourself, you've never been happy. You've never been happy Because I, because I was asked. You know, in the lead up to, in the lead up to where the focus cloud group got pre cognitive right, we were we've done amazing. We've done amazing in a really short space of time. And people always said to me oh, you don't say, well, you're like, yeah, I've got great people around. Yeah yeah, great people around me. I couldn't do it myself, but I know personally what that's taken out of me to get there.
Speaker 1:And then Then we did the, the acquisition of cognitive. So more great people around you, right. And Do you know what? On the day I signed those forms and I thought, pre, pre, this, just get this business to X amount of turnover and X amount of profit, I'm gonna be so happy. Do you know me? Do you know? The day I signed those forms, it was probably the most Empty. Yeah, yeah, it was the probably the emptiest I've ever been in business and there was no celebration, there was no nothing. The following day, it was just like this girl, this, let's do this. It's well, yeah, maybe it is. That's, that's the truth, and I think, I think, if you, if you're wired like that, that's a sad thing about the way that people like that are wired and unfortunately, I am one of those Because we just never we know you never celebrate your wins, right, but you always think about your losses as well. Yeah, yeah biggest critic.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I I don't think you're stuck that way, so I think you're, I think it's a, I think it's a trait that I have. You have people have. And I think it's about a bit of self-discovery, a bit of understanding. Okay, well, if if I did that didn't make me happy, am I chasing the right thing? It's just is there actually, if I reflect on on my own, values are kind of Kind of who I am and what I want. Is there something else that actually I would, I would, get the more satisfaction from?
Speaker 2:yeah or just having someone beside you that says, okay, I'm gonna remind you when we get to this. I'm gonna force you to stop, get a cake in, get a party in, and force you to be present and be in the moment of. We've been working for five years to get to the stage we're here, just For sure to stop, because I think it's too easy just to okay, we did it, and then there's 50 people trying to grab you in that moment and you're just gonna go first, whereas if you don't force yourself to stop and say this is it, then it's, then that's not gonna happen. But then. So how about all the like the kids you've had, so like when they were born? Is that, is that happens? Is that joy, is it? Maybe we don't get that personal into family? This is in the cloud.
Speaker 1:We talk about personal stuff here, right?
Speaker 2:But for me, two of the big things for me is, yeah, career achievements and then life achievement. So, yeah, my marriage and then having a family for again for me, but again it's very personal, so it's. What does that? What does each person have for them? And when you hit those milestones, what did it feel like there? For?
Speaker 1:me they are. They were personal milestones. Yeah right which which my personal milestones are separate from my career. My career milestones take over my personal milestones. Yeah, if that makes sense. They're not as important, but they are. They are as critical to my mindset. Yeah, so was I happy when I got married? Yeah, absolutely. Was I happy when I had my first child? You know each of each of my children?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was over the moon like put another child in yeah you know, but they're the times when you don't really think about career. Yes, do I mean? You were just focused on that and the line share of my time now, unfortunately, is still taken up with this company and where we're trying to grow it. But the one thing I have, the one thing I have tried to To learn from this and perhaps you could as well right, this is what I do. That, mr Mr Wisdom, right Is when you go on holiday. Yeah, for me, for years and years and years, I just used to work on holiday.
Speaker 1:Yeah right, bring laptop, open the laptop, I'd be on phone, I'd do everything, but just in a different country. Yeah, now what I try to do is I try to Convince myself that I've earned that, yeah, yeah. So all the milestones in your career and your company life and stuff like that when you go on holiday, you've earned that time. So you've earned that time with your wife, you've earned that time with your children. So therefore, the phone is switched off. Yeah, you know it was really hard to do, right, but that that's what kind of saved me over Christmas. If I was this isn't a bad way to walk in. The last year it was just, I was just sick of everything, do you know? I mean, you know, eight years of constant um and it came to a head and we went away and Luckily, thank god, I went to a place where it didn't really have a lot of reception.
Speaker 2:So I didn't have a choice.
Speaker 1:I didn't switch my phone off, yeah, but I didn't have reception, you know, and therefore that gave me that time away, to then come back after that break and go. I'm proper up for this now, do you know? So I'm gonna learn from that.
Speaker 2:But even though it's breaks, you break, you rest, rejuvenate, and then you come back with different insights, a whole new hunger. So there is benefits from having that Reflection time, that downtime, etc. 100%, yeah, 100%. It's a problem with me is I've never had those breaks.
Speaker 1:I've never given myself those breaks fully to. To switch off. It's always been half switched off and then come back and then you wonder why it breaks.
Speaker 2:But then, like week to weekday, today is gym a break for you, do you? Is your walks on the beach when you're not videoing? Is that a break for you, like, do you?
Speaker 1:I don't, I don't go to the gym. The truth is never even I've never told anyone this right. Um, I don't go to the gym to get muscles. Um, I don't go to gym to get bigger or anything, or fitter. I go to the gym because I have to go to the gym clear the head.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's nothing to do with how it makes you look or anything like that. I don't care, I have to go to the gym. And if I don't go to the gym, then that starts reflecting in all of the other places in my life, yeah and you, just, you, just know no use to anyone. So I have to go.
Speaker 2:I, I, I think, I think that mindset is something. So have you brought that into how you run your business? So do you have an? I think what's interesting now in in in businesses is have a great team, have great people, great ambition, trying to be the best, do the best, etc. But also, aware of people are people.
Speaker 2:So how do we, how do we give space and how do we support people with? Okay, we have people who are high achievers, highly stressed. They need to, they need to exercise. So let's get a gym here and everyone can go to the gym if they want to in the morning. Or how do we give people time for yoga, meditation, other things in life that again they need to give, to have to have that, that break, that mental break, mental clarity, to then be the best at what they do. So you recognize in yourself, you need that. I think it's. I think it's very powerful to see when businesses have that in their ethos. Yeah, is that something that you brought into the company or yes, I think it's something that's grown in the ethos.
Speaker 1:So, for example, we do two days a week and the guys get total flex, flexible working on hybrid working right. So that means they can go to the gym so that means they can go to the gym. Yeah you know, I don't go to the gym on Tuesdays and Thursdays when I'm in London, because I live two hours away and I don't want to get into the gym that early and be stressed about time.
Speaker 1:That's another thing I've kind of learned through through my career Um which you know, no doubt you've you've experienced that you know, when you were just rushing for the rest of my career.
Speaker 2:It's not worth it. I'm not doing it All right, do something at home. Yeah, like just empty your head and then go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so the guys who work here. They can they have three days at home and two days in the office. So that gives them that flexibility and the wellness is is something that we push as a business. We have. Um, we actually have someone from who works at work day, who comes in occasionally and gives like yoga sessions and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Um, so it's really it's really cool we push it as a business. You know Um let's talk about. I guess we should talk about what they Do, um, so tell me about the hardest project you've ever been on, um, and and why. I know we're talking about like um, wellness and balance. Right, yeah, tell me about the, the hardest project where you know, if you look back at your career, you could look back and go that almost breaking it broke me, or it did break me, but no one knew about it.
Speaker 2:I think, to give it the hardest project. I think there's probably two examples. The first one was aerospace clients had to travel quite a lot. So again, that commitment takes a lot of freedom away from you personally, because you're on the road, you're coming back, you're trying to wash iron, get clothes ready, get your home ready and then go again.
Speaker 1:But again, it's very exciting, you're on the road, you're eating out in restaurants etc.
Speaker 2:You're kind of away with a team, face-to-face with the client.
Speaker 2:So there's kind of pros and cons but it is very demanding.
Speaker 2:I think in this particular project there was various challenges that we had faced around just different delays, different challenges with changes in scope, and again I was changing role on the project as well, which kind of added to my own workload stress. But again, back to balance Me and a colleague of mine would kind of every morning get up and go to the gym. You'd be getting up at like 5.30 to go because again it was maybe not for the mental clarity Again we were a bit younger, it was more just to kind of be fit, state fit, and it was regardless of what time you were to bed at. So it was just you do it. It was part of it. It kind of had to be done because you were away for four or five days of the week and if you didn't find a way to squeeze it in in the mornings it didn't happen. So again, very challenging project, working longer hours, high demand, stress through the day, but still wanted to prioritize.
Speaker 2:Let's have something here as well as on the personal side, I think, if we step into program challenges or delivery challenges. I think for me it was a global media company. It was huge, had grown over decades and I came in and, at the start of the program, conducted analysis of current system landscapes. So what systems does the client currently have across all of their countries and then also across all of their entities in those countries, and they're all very different. So straight away, this is the scale just goes through the roof Again workday or you're bringing in an ERP that's still the same, it's still one ERP, but from a technical complexity that's very complex. You have lots of things to consider, lots of people to engage and really stresses let's understand what the way of the world is now before we jump into. Let's just implement the new ERP.
Speaker 2:So in that we brought on board maybe 6 or 7 technical BAs and then we conducted interviews with stakeholders across all of those countries, all of those different entities I think there's about 80, asked them questions around what systems do you have today? What functionality and modules do you have in each one of those systems? They came back and then went away, created documentation around, drawing a visual representation of those systems per entity, per country, and then describing what happens today at a high level, as the process overlays across those systems. So we have a HR system today. We have an onboarding system, we have a recruitment system, a payroll system Okay, great.
Speaker 2:How does the process and data flow through those systems? And let's understand that and then, with that, you can then scope what is the goal of this transformation for these entities? Which of these modules or capabilities are moving to workday or whatever other ERP that we're doing? Which are staying in the existing systems? Therefore, what systems are decommissioning targets? So we need to keep that in mind to make sure that we are decommissioning old systems to save costs, etc. And we're doing that in the right way to In a phased approach.
Speaker 2:Yeah and to store data so we can refer back and the systems that remain. They are your integration requirements.
Speaker 2:And not everything is an integration. Some things might be manual, but they are your data flow requirements. This is what your new ERP needs to talk to, and I think the sheer number of those was a challenge. And then I think and again it was a challenge trying to get engagement off, who were the people that understand who those systems are Trying to chase and follow? Different people, different calls, kind of going through the same thing. But I don't think the challenges went away, I think it continued.
Speaker 2:So then we get into scoping out what are we going to try and do, what are we going to try and deliver, getting people to agree what's going to get an integration versus what's going to be manual, and everyone has different opinions on that. And how do you understand the business value for where you choose where to invest your time? So again, bring it back to program direction. What is the business case? What was signed off, what was the real stakeholder goal at the start, and how do we stick with that? And then how do we have those directions and objectives and guidance to say, guys, this is what's in scope for now. This can be reviewed at a future point in time. But it went live right.
Speaker 1:I think I know which one you were talking about, and it's obviously a phased approach, phased approach.
Speaker 2:So it was. For me, it was again enjoyable project Stressful complexities, challenging, but enjoyable. You're working with great people, you're learning a new business, you're learning how there are ways of working, you're partnering with different enterprise architects and finance and payroll and HR people. That process, that experience is vital, isn't it?
Speaker 1:Being on large projects like that and obviously, smaller projects and complex projects. Funny enough, I refer back to a number of our conversations. You just want to tell you on a very interesting project. Everyone wants interesting projects. The more complex the better. That's what we are as technical people. We want that really complex project that's going to push us as individuals.
Speaker 2:That adds value to the business. I think that's number one. What excites me is working with businesses that are taking on or interested in the latest technology to find and add value for business. And then it's complex problems. Let's work through them. I'm not saying I'm going to answer this to it, but that's what interests you partnering with very skilled and ambitious, smart people, being challenged by each other, which is healthy, but then working together to really add that value to the business and then solve complex problems.
Speaker 1:So where do you think technology is going to go? Technology is going to go, even in the last 5-10 years. It's so advanced. Now Workday is talking about AI, machine learning, all these advanced things that are now in the product. They're always there, but they're more current now. So where do you think technology is going to go? Where would you like it to go as well?
Speaker 2:I think over the last 10 years. Technology is telling us that it is endless. It can do anything. It can do everything. It can grow boundlessly, even in the stock market. The Magnificent 7 and the Ronde don't for the last 10 years.
Speaker 2:However, again, I'm a techie by heart. Part of me kind of questions is what happens in the history going to repeat itself or will something change? So I think that's in my mind from a broader tech perspective. But I think if I compare now to when I started my career, I think technology is much more advanced than it's advancing faster and faster. I think business readiness and business appetite has also changed. I think businesses are more ready for cloud technologies. They're more ready for trusting technology, using technology more so, moving their financial capabilities online, putting more data into the cloud and therefore trying to get more business value out of the technologies.
Speaker 2:I think specifically I'm not sure I think in the ERP space, the obvious one for me is each ERP trying to be able to be. Maybe some of them specialize we're HR, we're finance, we're payroll okay, fine, but I think the more joined together it can be, the better value it offers the client and I think clients maybe clients would prefer, if there's one ERP to rule them all. So I think that's where that is a part of a direction. I think that it will go where an ERP builds capability to offer that or builds. I think they all have partnerships with other ERPs to complement themselves, but I think stronger capabilities there, so there's more of a seamless integration.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I would need integrations or whatever it is kind of like. Again, within workday, there's a workday extend capability which you're able to build a visual within workday that can pull data from other systems and the imprism and other things. So it's an ability for a more seamless connection between your back office operations. I think, if we're specific on back office, I think HR, finance, payroll, it, learning, recruitment for a company to be successful we need all of these to be as closely aligned as possible and I think we can have unique use cases for why we would want a different system, but I think we need a way for it to be more seamless in how they work together and not have these trade-offs of are we integrating or are we manually at manual entry or some of the capabilities and really fit for purpose. I think that's where I'd like to see the ERPs not necessarily one ERP to rule them all, but it's just a way to deliver a more connected service operation for the business.
Speaker 1:You could say that there are ERPs out there that already do have the whole space right, but they're not, perhaps not the leading ones.
Speaker 1:And one of them is I think both know what I'm talking about here right. And certainly their biggest competitor would be absolutely right out there. But maybe they're not the best in the HR payroll world. So that's why you don't get one ERP. But yeah, absolutely, and before we close off. Simon, what would you say to younger people? You're so young, I'm so young, young people both of us that are looking to get into the work they're doing and perhaps looking to take the technical route. What would be your one bit of advice?
Speaker 2:I think take the time to learn the foundations at the start.
Speaker 2:I think people who I've coached through workday training, I've tried to stress or I've tried to guide them or mentor them, if they didn't already have the kind of foundations of what is web development, what is database development, these skill sets.
Speaker 2:You're not going to use it directly with workday because workday has a different ERP, it's kind of cloud based and you're more abstracted from it. But I think it's important to understand those concepts so then you can relate it to what your technical role with that tool. And then, if I can give a second one, I guess during that process, yeah, be open to learn, be aware of where your strengths are, but also be open to learn different areas and understand that to be successful you need to work with the process team, the data team, the functional team and they all need to come together and the change team and testing to be successful. So the more you understand what they do and what they want from you, I think the better you'll be. And try, have balance and try, enjoy the Well, try and at least go on holidays don't bring your phone and enjoy the journey.
Speaker 2:Do bring your phone because someone might need you.
Speaker 1:If I can back this off, then no, thank you, it's been amazing. No, it's been great, thank you.
Speaker 2:I wanted to. I got you a little gift for helping me on. Oh, look at this. Hopefully you haven't gotten it already. Look at this guys, it was something to go with your mindset moments.
Speaker 1:Oh, I really appreciate that I can't. Here's the time I can't see it. So how much more intelligent do I look with these on Significantly? Would you hire me on one of your projects as a techie?
Speaker 2:Depend on my needs, A balancer maybe.
Speaker 1:A balancer? Yeah, I'd be good security for the system, wouldn't?
Speaker 2:I oh, thank you very much, sir. I really appreciate it. Thank you, thank you so much.