By Simon Woodhead
Last October I posted that I was stepping down as CEO and my long-standing colleague Grahame Davies would be replacing me. Today, I pick up the reins again.
As you may recall from that blog, the decision to step down was not out of choice, but a need to focus on my family. That said, readers of this blog and anyone looking under the hood at Simwood, not to mention those closest to me, might question what has changed as I have remained involved full-time in many respects, just not on the front-line. Grahame taking the lead afforded me the breathing space to pick and choose my involvement, and the opportunity to prioritise my daughter, which was greatly appreciated.
While, sadly, nothing has necessarily changed family-wise, our SMT has gone from strength-to-strength and the time is right for me to return and make a tangible difference within the constraints I have. I am hugely excited to do so, having had space to reflect upon the last quarter-century, gaining clarity on our place in the world, our successes and, of course, on where we have fumbled. This is a perfect opportunity for a reboot and early signs are that the team is 100% with me on this adventure and are re-energised and raring to go.
Simwood’s irreverence toward the establishment, and its innovative nature re-armed, with a startup mentality in a business with 26 years of experience, deep transatlantic network assets and some of the best minds in the business are an incredibly potent weapon to be charged with! I am committed, as always, to using it for the good of the industry and the good of the consumer via the most awesome customers around.
To that end, while customers and others in the industry can contact me any time (and do), I am more interested than ever to hear from you and would love you to drop me a note or for us to have a chat. My email address is no secret, but I won’t post it here for obvious reasons – it is available from any member of the team. I want to hear where we have let you down, if in our growth we have – you won’t offend me and the feedback will be hugely valuable. Moreover, let me know what challenges you’re facing with our whole industry, and where a well-resourced disruptor could make your life (and ultimately the consumer’s life) much easier. Feel free to include some positive things too – I won’t learn as much from them but the team would appreciate them!
As always, I would like to say a big thank you to all those who have travelled with us this far; we really appreciate you. I am really pleased to be back. Let’s build an awesome future together.
