Why did lan start his career selling sports equipment? Which quality in his staff does lan think is most important for success?

F Our next guest is lan Murphy, one of the biggest names in recruitment. Thank you for joining us today, lan.
M Good to be here.
F Your company, Solutions, is well-known in the recruitment industry. But I understand your first job was selling sports equipment. Why did you start your career in that area?
M Well, I knew there were a number of local firms selling sports equipment. And I thought, if so many of them work in this area, they must be making money. I must confess I had little interest in sport itself and didn’t have a particularly healthy lifestyle at the time. But I thought, if they can do it, so can I?
F And how successful were you?
M I think success isn’t about working long hours but about coming up with something different. In my case, I spoke to a variety of companies and offered to introduce their products to customers if they paid me. And it was worth it for them-plenty of customers did choose to buy from me.
F Was this working in a regular sales team?
M I was alone-but I enjoyed that. But after a while, I realised I was bored.
F So you moved to KTD Computer Systems?
M Yes, I wanted a job with training and support. But after a good start, I realised I wasn’t learning enough because the trainers knew as little as I did about the business  despite all their years of sales experience.
F Is this why you moved and became a recruitment executive?
M Well, I used to commute quite far each day. The money was worth it, you see- even if it wasn’t the most exciting of jobs. But finally, the effort became too much for me so I accepted a local job at Ace Recruitment for a bit less pay,
F I understand you were unpopular there there at first.
M Yes, it was very strange. The people there were really casual. They used to arrive just before ten and then they weren’t particularly interested in the clients. But when I commented on this they just got angry, So I wrote down some comments about the way people did things and what I’d change-and sent it to the Chief Executive, who immediately rang me back to talk about it. A few months later, I was managing the whole place!
F Which led a number of people to leave, I understand. Did you want them to stay?
M Well, it depends what qualities you expect staff to have. Obviously, every company needs skilled, experienced staff But the key thing is whether people use their skills for the benefit of the company. There’s little point in keeping workers who are unhappy in their jobs.
F So, how long did you stay with Ace?
M Long enough for tumover to double. Then I moved to another recruitment organisation, Solutions.
F Where you specialise in recruiting people with expertise in Change Management.
M That’s right. We were approached by someone with a lot of experience in this area asking if we had any openings. We didn’t-though plenty of other firms did. But a consultant suggested it was the industry to be in. So we set up a specialist unit.
F And what’s different about the way you operate?
M Well, we work with all the major companies in this field. But what we do is go to companies, analyse their business and search for and suggest suitable individuals to them - rather than waiting for them to come to us. We’re not experts in Change Management ourselves  but we’re skilled at assessing business needs.
F Which you obviously do well. OK I think that’s all we’ve got time for today. Thanks for coming, lan. And we wish you all the best.