A LEGACY LOCKED IN

When you first joined Abloy UK it was in sales, was that your background?

Not really, if you look back at my history, I'm an electronics engineer by trade. I did my basic apprenticeship, but I would have to say that I wasn't the best electronics engineer in the world, however I'd always wanted to pursue a career in the sales environment. 

How old where when you moved into sales?

I was fairly young when I first went on the road, being just 19 and in fairness, in those days most companies were looking for somebody who was in their late 20s for those roles, so I was about 10 years too early! I began working for Ever Ready batteries and did that for 10 years getting myself a very good grounding, because effectively in that job I was running my own business. I worked remotely from the sales office, which was initially in Bristol and then, eventually and very strangely to fit in quite nicely a little bit later on in my career, I ended up being based from Wolverhampton, which of course, is where I spent most of my career.  

How were those early days?

With Ever Ready you had a situation where you ordered your stock and once a week the stock arrived. You weren't usually there when it arrived, but it would turn up in a local lockup and you essentially operated autonomously. Some business was done on accounts with most of the trade being cash transactions. I took the goods in and then around in the van, delivering the goods while I sold it. I was a lorry driver in a suit! I did all the banking and even in the early days, took the salary out of the money I banked. So very, very basic, but it gave me a very good understanding of the whole business experience. 

What made you want to move on?

One thing I want to do was progress my career and quite clearly to me back then the Ever Ready business was more on the decline than in growth due to the advance of the big supermarket retailers changing the market. I found out that the Chubb Lock company, based in Wolverhampton, was looking for a new regional representative for the South West, I applied and got the job. Chubb was a really good employer and gave me a lot of opportunities. I progressed to not really selling the Chubb UK product, but the Medeco product, which was a high security mechanical locking system and that's how I added the mechanics of the locking industry to my trained electronics engineer legacy. 

Which then led you to Abloy UK?

I joined Abloy UK in 1994 when 85-90% of the business we did was mechanical locks. 20% of the electric lock business and all that we called "access control" in those days was looked after by a different team from mine that didn't have anybody resident in the South West. So, I proposed, because I really loved the concept of the electric lock and believed it was the way forward, that I looked after both business units in the area. Doing this, I was able to combine my basic electronics engineering experience and adapt that with my mechanical locking experience from my time at Chubb to be able to try and create the new market. 

How did your career develop from that time?

My plan was always to gradually progress within the Abloy UK business. At the time we were part of Assa Abloy and based in Watford, and I became southern regional sales manager looking after the Southern region, with a couple of people reporting to me. I then moved to national sales manager, and in that position I looked after the whole business from Abloy UK, and that led us to establishing a bridgehead in the marketplace. 

What was this new strategy for Abloy UK?

Our product was seen as the product of choice, one that everybody wanted to use, but there was one big problem that needed addressing. There weren't really any proper industry standards and the discerning customers understood the benefit of a system that provided real security. We had the physical security on one side of the door with something on the inside of the door that allowed us to escape, either a lever handle or panic bar, but there weren't any reasons to say what systems MUST do, and I guess that was really the beginning of the Academy, 

You were already providing training though?

Yes, we'd always done training on our products, but the Academy was more about trying to influence the entire sector not just the people who fitted the kit. Installers understood the benefits of the technology but couldn't always sell those benefits or explain those benefits so the Academy concept was widened to include all the people that I would term as influencers - anybody who has an input to what that final solution might be. We didn't have any rules about the technology, we just had good reasons to have it, but what was the sense in having something aesthetically pleasing compared to a system that provides real security and doesn't fail unlocked in the event of a power failure?

So, we needed standards to help?

The big change came in 2013 when we had the Construction Products Regulation (CPR) which effectively changed lots of things. If the door had a green requirement, either an emergency or panic escape door as clarified by the European standards, there was nothing saying "you must" until the CPR came along. While the standards started around 1997 it wasn't until 2013 that the CPR said that if the door has got a green requirement, you must have a CE marked escape device on the door. In addition, if the door has a red requirement, it must have a fire tested product fitted to the door. Since we left the European Union, through Brexit, we published the UK CPR. At the moment the UK CPR is an exact carbon copy of the European CPR, but we should be aware that this might change as we go forward because the European Union might develop in one direction and the UK in another.

Where does cost fit into the product selection criteria?

Cost should never be the major consideration. The phrase I often use is, "what price is life?", which is easy to say but when you think about it, that's exactly the point of what we do. For example, a green door allows us to get out of the building and a red door provides compartmentalisation in the event of ire. Some doors are green and red, and there are other doors which are neither a green nor a red door. In the case of a convenience door, we've got no mandatory or minimum performance criteria for those types of doors. But where there are regulations, the system chosen for the door should always be the right one, not the cheapest one. That's why the Academy was developed to be educational, rather than simply trying to sell Abloy products - we will tell you what you need to know. 

I always say to my team that they are a sales and specification team and I want them to go out there, do the job properly, make sure they identify the right solution. Don't worry too much about the cost. If somebody is not prepared to work to the standards that are set in stone, embedded in law, then that's time for us to leave. If one of my team misses a target that's a problem, but I'd rather that than they put me in court! I sleep tight in my bed at night because I know that for all the buildings we've worked on, the people will be safe.

How often do people come here and say "I just fit the same locks that I've always fitted"?

Unfortunately, this is the legacy of the sector and it’s a big job to change habits. The problem is that when you bring in an access control guy and he knows all the ins and outs of the technologies and how the software works, he'll do you a brilliant job and leave, but he doesn't always ask himself why the door is there in the first place. Okay, it's a hole in the wall and the room is not a lot of good without a way in or out, but there are six door types, called A, B, C, D, E and F and I wrote that definition in 2013. The reality is those six door types tell us the design purpose and the work that needs doing. This is the starting point in the Foundation Course, because if you don't understand the purpose of the door you won't be doing the job properly or to any standard in the case of red and green doors. 

How has the Academy changed over time?

I recently looked back at the first Foundation Course content from 2007 and compared it to what it is now in 2025 and the message is considerably stronger. The quality is just unrecognisably different, and everything that lives around it is gradually moved in. But this is an interesting question, because we're not experts in every single thing, so I employ something called a parking board to help us develop the session. We always get asked "What's the difference between an emergency and a panic escape door?" and I would put that on the parking board, meaning we're going to park it over there, pick it up later. We will always give a straight answer to any question but there does arrive a time when somebody will ask a question, and I'll stop and say that I don't know the answer. I then research that subject, and I send everybody on the course an update. We often learn from the people that attend the courses - we're not conceited enough to think we know all the answers. So, I can say that anybody who took the Foundation Course more than a year ago will see that it has dramatically changed since they took it because of the input and interaction we have with the wide range of attendees.

How have you changed since 1994?

I would say that in my career, I've been known as a maverick within the business, and there's probably still an element of a maverick still inside me, but I've learned to control it better! I've learned to be more of a team player. There's always more than one way of achieving a result and a common statement I hear is "I've asked three people at Abloy and been given three different answers". Well actually, they're all correct answers and I might have chosen answer one but answer two is not wrong and nor is answer three. What that tells me is there's always more than one way of achieving the objective, and that objective is compliance I think the maverick side of me probably held me back a little bit in terms of career progression because I wanted to do everything my way. I hope that is no longer something I'm saddled with because I do listen, I have learned to adapt to how I approach things and what I actually do because of those hard lessons in life. 

After all this time, what will be your legacy?

From my perspective I'd say my legacy will be around standards compliance. It will probably also be the Academy, but the one thing I do hope above all is that the people who've worked for me thought I was fair, I was honest, that I had integrity and I supported their development. There are several people here that have come through the business, some worked directly for me and some I've mentored, so maybe I've left that legacy. 30 years is a long time, probably a third of a lifetime or even a bit more and I've enjoyed my time here and I'm still enjoying my time here. However, the business is now over 120 years old and we need to understand that we are the current custodians of the Abloy brand and I hope that we've delivered a legacy to the next generation that will understand the values, but most importantly be the new custodians for the brand going forward and they leave it in the same shape when they leave the business as when I do.