Personnel boss focuses on things new and exciting

Roger Lampen

Position: Lampen Group managing director

What makes your day?

Seeing things going forward, staff having successes, responding to new challenges, developing new solutions, creating and developing new opportunities and having fun along the way. I'm definitely more excited by the positive, the new, the creative, the successes. Everyday routine and dealing with people who aren't open to positive solutions and new ways of doing things doesn't do much for me.

Why are you valuable to your company?

I think my greatest contributions fall into two main areas. We have a very strong corporate culture and a highly empowered group of people who identify strongly with who we are and what we stand for. In the end, it's all about people - our colleagues, clients, candidates and our community - and who we are. I play a key role in championing this belief system and ensuring that it remains a key strength.

Another area I am involved in is the development of the new - services, countries, ways of doing things. You contribute most in areas that excite you and these areas in particular really excite me. At present, we are putting a lot of emphasis on establishing and developing a health staffing business here in New Zealand and in Britain. This type of project is stimulating and gets the juices going.

What is your management style?

I believe strongly in empowerment and delegation and always have. I'm not a hands-on, controlling manager and far prefer to lead, to inspire, to stimulate, to provoke and to challenge. You get stronger people and a stronger organisation that way. As far as actual managing is concerned, it's management by expectation. Everyone, at every level, should have clear expectations of everyone else, including the expectation that they will do the best possible job for their colleagues and the organisation. It's certainly not a science but it is an inclusive and involving approach which values everyone for their contribution to our overall success.

What is the work tool you can't do without?

E-mail has added a whole new dimension to clear and immediate communication wherever you are. It has now reached the point where I would be totally lost without it. However, keeping it under control and limited to communication that is important is going to be the challenge. I would hate to be tied to it the way some people are.

What was your biggest career break?

Working for a company which collapsed into receivership and suddenly left me jobless and with the world wide open in front of me. This gave me the time out to work out what I really wanted and led to my moving into personnel consulting, the right business for me, and starting my own business. It provoked me into taking responsibility for my own destiny.

Who was your most important mentor and why?

Unfortunately I never had one, at least as far as business is concerned. Everything was just hard work and trial and error. I'm sure things would have been much easier with a mentor but that's the way things turned out. However, now I really enjoy the chance to support others and share some of the lessons I have learned along the way. It's rewarding, enjoyable and worthwhile.

What is the biggest challenge for your organisation? For the economy?

We're a big small business competing almost entirely with players who are substantial and global. Having the resources to keep up is one challenge.

Another is maintaining our strengths and values as we grow in different countries such as Britain and Australia and with new service lines such as health staffing.

As for New Zealand, I think there's a real issue developing with the imbalance between the outflow of funds to overseas owners of much of our economy and the inflow we generate from overseas. We need to be more successful in developing our international interests and maintaining this in the longer term. We need to create our own identity as a nation and we don't seem to be able to do this so far.

What do you do when you are not working?

Biking has been my passion for the last while. Last year I biked around New Caledonia, from Brisbane to Sydney and from Vienna to Paris. The Vienna to Paris ride on my own really fed my body and soul. It was wonderful. I plan to head off around Ireland in a few months and then, who knows?

What skills do you wish you had?

I would like to be much more competent with computers than I am. They're a wonderful tool for so many different things but at the moment they're more master of me than I am of them. However, I'm committed to reversing this state of affairs.

* Roger Lampen spoke to Susan Jennison.