Next to Me: Luck, Leadership and Living with Parkinson's

321 Pages·2006·0.99 MB·English

by  David Jones

Praise for
NEXT TO ME
“Many people live with Parkinson’s. David Jones defies it. This
story is inspirational to both those with the condition and those
without it. Buy this book and David Jones may yet fall into the
second of these categories.”
Tom Isaacs, Trustee, The Cure Parkinson's Trust
“David Jones’s story offers anyone living with Parkinson’s the
optimism and hope that great achievements – in business and in
life – are still possible.”
Michael J. Fox
NEXT TO ME
NEXT TO ME
Luck, leadership and
living with Parkinson’s
David Jones
First published by
Nicholas Brealey Publishing in 2005
3–5 Spafield Street 100 City Hall Plaza, Suite 501
Clerkenwell, London Boston
EC1R 4QB, UK MA 02108, USA
Tel: [phone] Tel: (888) BREALEY
Fax: [phone] Fax: [phone]
http://www.nbrealey-books.com
© David Jones 2005
The right of David Jones to be identified as the author of this work
has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
ISBN 1-85788-357-8
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the
British Library.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording and/or
otherwise without the prior written permission of the publishers.
This book may not be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise disposed
of by way of trade in any form, binding or cover other than that in
which it is published, without the prior consent of the publishers.
Printed in Germany by GGP Media GmbH.
Contents
Foreword by Philip Green ix
Introduction 1
PART I 1986–1996: RESCUING NEXT 15
1 ‘Gentlemen, we have a deal!’ 17
Making friends with George – The birth of NEXT – The merger and
the honeymoon – Businesses we should never have bought – How
it all turned sour
2 ‘Mr NEXT sensationally fired!’ 41
A row over Grattan – Taking sides – A late-night board meeting –
Exorcising the ghost – What happened to George
3 ‘If the worst comes to the worst…’ 61
Strengthening the board – Sorting out the retail side –
Auctioning Grattan to pay NEXT’s debts – The life-saving awards
4 ‘This is the day when life begins again’ 86
Rationalising stores – Talking to managers – Bringing Retail and
Directory together – On the front foot again – American adventures
– Rewarding the people of NEXT
PART II 1943–1986: LEARNING THE TRADE 113
5 ‘The most important decision is the next one’ 115
A happy childhood at Cwm – A paper round – The wise bookmaker
– A modest academic record – Catching the mail order bug
Next to Me
6 ‘Give that boy a 10 shilling increase!’ 140
Encounters with Isaac – Working with David Wolfson – The finance
director – A personal financial crisis – A row about VAT – An
appointment at Wigan
7 ‘I have 12 casting votes’ 164
Taking charge at BMOC – Lunching at the Savoy – Life under Leonard
Wolfson – Breaking the strike at Martland – A headhunter’s call
8 ‘The mail-order business is like sex…’ 191
An unhappy departure – The team reassembles at Grattan –
Adventures in Hong Kong – Building a better business – Dealing
with Robert Maxwell – Finding a way forward
PART III 1996–2005: LIVING WITH PARKINSON’S 219
9 ‘Retail really is detail’ 221
The NEXT philosophy – Training Simon Wolfson to take over – A change
of chairman – The rise of the internet – The shape of retailing to come
10 ‘Be reasonable – do it my way!’ 249
Good and bad chairmen – The unfolding saga of Wm Morrison – The
role of the non-executive director – Good and bad corporate governance
11 ‘Luck, guts and reading upside down’ 263
Teamwork and friendship – Rugby and cricket – Investing in good
ideas – Helping good causes
12 ‘People just don’t know what it’s like’ 279
A disease that takes over your life – An encounter in Oxford Street
– The two David Joneses meet at last – Drop goals and charity balls
– Movers and shakers
Acknowledgements 297
Chronology 299
Index 301
~viii~
Foreword
by Philip Green
first met David Jones in the early 1980s. I could perhaps be for-
given for not predicting then that I would one day be writing the
I foreword to the life story of one of the most admired men in
British retailing.
In fairness, few could have foreseen that the young boy who left
school with underwhelming A-level results would grow up to take
the battered and almost bankrupt NEXT of the late 1980s and turn
it into a multibillion-pound retail success story.
Fewer still would have backed him to do this while fighting a very
private battle with Parkinson’s Disease. His has been an incredible
career, dominated by two traits: honesty and hard work.
David’s career started as a temporary clerk at Kays of Worcester.
From this lowly base he worked his way up to finance director at the
age of 27. An obsession with the mail-order industry was born and
after a spell as managing director of the British Mail Order Corporation
– like Kays, a subsidiary of Great Universal Stores – he was headhunted
to run Grattan, where he pulled off a dramatic turnaround.
Grattan merged with NEXT, the new star of the retail industry,
and David was installed as deputy chief executive. He helped launch
the NEXT Directory, which is today by far the most successful home
shopping business in the UK.
But NEXT was in trouble after a period of massive over-
expansion. With the recession biting, the business needed slimming
down radically. David did just that. Having reported a huge loss in
1990, NEXT returned to profit in 1992 thanks to the sale of Grattan
and a cost-cutting exercise in which he was prepared to halve his
own pay packet.