The Comeback CEO: Volante’s Ian Penman

Ian Penman - CEO - Volante

Volante

Ian Penman

ceoforum.com.au: Why did you originally decide to leave Compaq, and the corporate world generally?

Ian Penman: I'd been thinking about it for some time, as I'd been in the same role for many years. The catalyst for it was the birth of my first son in November 2000, and I left a month before. I was fortunate I was able to make that type of decision financially, and I really had no intention of ever coming back to the corporate world.

My wife and I decided we wanted to travel – like so many people who travel for business, I guess, I'd been everywhere and seen very little! We stayed in Monaco and the UK for a number of years, travelled extensively and then returned to Australia for both lifestyle and family reasons. We had retained a property in the Southern Highlands , and I became more actively involved with the property, something I'd always wanted to do. I have to say, however, that farming did get a bit boring, after a few weeks on the tractor!

I'd been out of the workforce for almost four years, by now a second son had been born and I must say I really benefited from spending the time with the two boys. However, they were starting to go to school, and I realised (as nearly everyone does) that I needed meaningful work. After all, this is what I do – I really enjoy the many challenges of building a high performance team. The added challenge with Volante was that it was an Australian public company, where I would report directly to the Chairman and the Board. Having worked all my professional life in local subsidiaries of Compaq and IBM, that was a very appealing proposition.

ceoforum.com.au: When you made the decision to leave for good, do you think a contributory factor was that was that you had become very worn down?

"I am more careful about the utilization of my time and the setting of priorities..."

IP: No question, although I probably didn't realise how tired I was for a few months afterwards. In the last few years I was in the role, Compaq made two major acquisitions: Tandem and Digital Equipment Corporation. The Digital acquisition in particular was highly problematic, as I now realize you don't change people's loyalties and behaviour simply by giving them a new Company name and management team. I personally found that time difficult as, up until the merger, I had always chosen my own team. Suddenly you don't have that comfort of understanding the key people around you within the working environment. The Digital acquisition became almost a reverse takeover in many ways – to give you an example, in Canberra at the time of the acquisition the pre-merger Compaq team had seven people, whereas the merger added 68 Digital employees!

ceoforum.com.au: During those four years you were out of the workforce, you went corporate ‘cold turkey', that is, you had virtually no involvement with any business. Did you find this a difficult personal adjustment, from Ian Penman the senior businessman to Ian Penman the private citizen?

IP: I did miss my colleagues and the day-to-day intellectual challenges of business. You get very close to people if you have worked with them over a period of many years. In other ways it was an easy transition, as I had a new, demanding and very fulfilling role – fatherhood – to move into. I was certainly kept very busy if nothing else!

One useful thing I did about 6 months before I left Compaq was to talk about these issues of personal identity with a family friend, who is also a psychiatrist. She warned me that, in her professional experience, many executives find this a very difficult adjustment, as they have often subordinated everything in their life – family, friends and other interests – to their work. On this basis I tried to prepare myself for the transition, by beginning to disengage from work and engage in other things.

I think this is an important issue for all CEOs in a similar situation to consider – in particular to what extent is having a public personae important to their overall mental and emotional well-being. Of course, many people will instinctively say that it is not, but few, if they really faced the real reasons for their self-esteem could honestly say it was not a key element in their thinking.

ceoforum.com.au: How did you get the role at Volante?

IP: I had approached a number of search firms about securing a non-executive director role, as by now I had come to the conclusion that I did want to re-engage in some way and that I was too young to retire permanently. After three months nothing had happened on the Director front but I had been approached about four full-time roles. Graham Willis at Russell Reynolds did ask me whether I was interested in a permanent role at Volante. Initially I was lukewarm, as I had known Volante many years ago as mainly a corporate reseller, so I doubted that the role would provide the intellectual challenge I was looking for. As I discovered more and more about the role and the company, I realised the fundamental nature of the company had changed dramatically, and that the challenge was definitely there. In fact, I had told one of the executive search firms that the one thing I was looking for, if not a non-executive role, would be a full time role that had a fair measure of complexity. Volante has certainly proved to be a complex and interesting role.

ceoforum.com.au: How did the four years away from corporate life change the way you approach your role now?

IP: It has absolutely changed, in that business in general is not as important to me as it was. I honestly believe that no commercial enterprise is worth subordinating everything in your life to, so it has given me a better personal balance. During my time away I met many successful people from many walks of life, and they certainly didn't all work long and exhausting hours! I'd probably been putting in 10-12 hour days for at least 14 of the 15 years I was with Compaq, so I certainly didn't want to go back to that. I just don't think that is good for anyone or more importantly for their families and friends.

ceoforum.com.au: Do you think you are more effective as a result of these reduced hours and different perspective?

IP: I'm not sure that I am, and that's not really the argument I would make here. Of course, I have an absolute commitment to delivering results for our shareholders, and, in many ways, I feel more committed to achieving high levels of financial performance than I did when I worked for multinationals. But I don't believe that means I have to be on the job 24/7 – that's where my perspective has changed. Do I believe having a different perspective means that I am more careful about the utilization of my time and the setting of priorities; then I would have to answer yes! In that way I think I probably am more effective.

ceoforum.com.au: Do you think that CEO employers – be they local shareholders or global business heads – can be fundamentally reasonable in their expectations of CEOs?

IP: The key, of course, is to produce results – if you are doing that, they don't care too much about how many hours you are putting in, and what level of dedication you have for their business. It is when things turn south that a higher level of scrutiny is applied across all areas of a CEO's performance. But if you have to work seventy hours a week on a regular basis to keep up with the expectations of the ‘employers' and you don't particularly enjoy that level of commitment to make it happen, you may be in the wrong job.

ceoforum.com.au: Do you think CEOs can establish more control over their work patterns, or do you think the role will always be all-consuming?

IP: My warning signal came when my wife after only two years of marriage said to me one night “What's going on here? I saw more of you when we were single!”

I think you have as much control as you want to have. The fact is, that if we apply reasonable planning and scheduling disciplines, and you have a good team around you, you can get a high level of performance and personal balance. But very few people do that in my experience.

ceoforum.com.au: Why do you think that is?

IP: Most people are striving to do the best they can, to be the best they can be so they feel they have to be totally committed. They want to progress, they want to win promotion for themselves and for their families. As it was for me, it becomes your sport, your work and your “raison d'être”.

Interestingly so many of the people I have worked with have been similarly committed.

Sometimes there is also a public aspect to that – not only are you 110% committed, but you want to be seen to be. Years ago, I worked in New York for IBM, and I remember a senior manager who, before he went home at 5pm, would leave his light on and spread some non-confidential papers all over his desk, leave his second brief case opened and in full view to give the impression he was still working! The sad thing is, that this was what he felt he needed to do to convey the right “impression”.