From lawyer to carpenter's apprentice

By JULIE MIDDLETON

It was a big deal for Pieter Burghout to study law at university. He was the first in his family to embark on tertiary study and, thanks to his brainpower, started straight from sixth form.

But after four years at Victoria University, admission to the Bar amid much family fuss, and 18 months working for an earlier incarnation of Phillips Fox in Wellington, he chucked it in to become a carpenter's apprentice with the Army.

Now the chief executive of the Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation, Burghout says it wasn't until he started practising that he realised there was a gulf between his ideals and the sorts of things lawyers had to do.

Two incidents cemented his decision to move: one was organising access to a carpark owned by a wealthy property developer, "and in the process I managed to put a business out of business".

The other involved a family who had mortgaged their house to buy a car. When they fell behind with payments, the house was flicked in a mortgagee sale, with Burghout powerless to prevent it.

Building was a childhood passion, sparked by his parents' frequent renovations. Carpenters did the work and when Burghout was old enough, he landed holiday jobs with those builders. "My ambition was always to be able to build my own home," he says. "But I wanted to get qualified rather then just do it as a labourer.

So at 22, he exchanged law ($14,000 a year at the time) for hammers ($16,000). He was able to credit some of his school holiday carpentry to his apprenticeship. That, plus two years in the Army and 18 months with a small family firm, added up to the 8000 hours required to complete.

Burghout took a job at Federated Farmers as a legal adviser, "and that started me on the career path I now follow, association management and the public sector".

But he's still on the tools and has built three houses for his family. He confesses the one in Johnsonville he shares with wife, Sindy, and two daughters is unfinished, its upper storey an empty shell.

Tales of his conversion can raise eyebrows, and lawyers are among the most negative, Burghout says. "It's a party-stopper when someone says, 'I'm a lawyer' and you say, 'oh, I left that profession'. Some people might think it's a wasted investment of four years of university, but the disciplines I got were more important than anything else, and I've used those skills throughout my career."

His line to detractors: "Your riches and life come from many things, not just money - and you have to find your passion to give you your riches.

"There is a level of marking down of hands-on vocational work. But part of the fun we're having at the BCITO is telling people they should be proud to work with their hands."

BCITO