#111 - Craige Whitton, CEO of Northline on Leading Through Transformation & Triumphs

Join us on a riveting journey as we unpack the success story of Craige Whitton, CEO of Northline. From his roots in Perth, the guidance of his father, to his meteoric rise in the corporate world, Craige has quite a tale to tell. Especially, as Northline celebrates its 40th anniversary, it's the perfect time to hear how he spearheaded its exponential growth while ensuring the values of culture and positive work environment remained intact.

🔑 Top 5 Key Topics Discussed:

1. Craige's Foundations: How Perth and his family values shaped Craige's distinctive leadership style.
2. CFO to CEO: Tracing Craige's remarkable career trajectory and how he weathered the storm of the Global Financial Crisis.
3. Northline's Evolution: A look at the company's journey from 8 depots & 250 employees to 18 depots with over 600 dedicated staff & contractors under Craige's stewardship.
4. Culture & Change: Craige's perspective on fostering an inclusive work environment and the paramount importance of employee well-being.
5. Navigating Economic Uncertainties: Craige's advice for businesses to remain resilient and thrive, drawing parallels from his GFC experience.

if you're as intrigued as we are by Craige's story, then don't just sit there! 🎧 Tune in NOW!

Feel enlightened? Elated? Eager for more? Then make sure to click on that like button, 🔄 share this episode with your mates, and 📌 subscribe to keep the synergy alive.

Let's create a community where inspiration meets action!

HIGHLIGHTS:

3:29: Craig's background and upbringing

13:58: Family values in the workplace

28:33: Impact of the global financial crisis

30:00: Importance of having the right people and culture

35:08: Strategic plan for growth and consolidation in the industry

45:00: Employee value proposition and high employee retention

52:01: Personalized customer service and relationship building

56:22: Managing the appetite for new technologies and focus on long-term challenges like sustainability

1:01:15: Insights from the Oxford leadership program

1:16:47: Navigating through economic crises and potential recession

Where to find Craige Whitton

• LinkedIn

Books Mentioned:

• A Bone of Fact By: David Walsh
• The Ride of a Lifetime By: Robert Iger

Join the conversation on Synergy IQ on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram (@synergyiq).

Access SynergyIQ Website to get to know more about us. 

Say hello to our host Daniel Franco on LinkedIn.

Transcript

00:00:04:17 - 00:00:30:01
Daniel Franco
Everyone. And welcome back to the Creating Synergy Podcast. Tonight we have the privilege of exploring the remarkable success story of Craige Whitton, the CEO of Northline, a prominent worldwide logistics company born right here in South Australia who are also Celebrar airing their 40 year anniversary this year as well. Originally from Perth, Craige's background and upbringing played a significant role in shaping his character and leadership style.

00:00:30:18 - 00:00:56:08
Daniel Franco
He credits his father and these family values for instilling him valuable principles and work ethics that have guided him throughout his career. So Craige's career progression is noteworthy. From CFO to CEO showcasing his exceptional leadership skills and strategic vision, he successfully navigated the challenges posed by the global financial crisis and shared with us his ability to adapt and make sound decisions during turbulent times.

00:00:56:09 - 00:01:24:01
Daniel Franco
When he first started with Northline, he was CFO for four years and then his tenure since then has been CEO for the last 15 years, where he took the company from approximately eight depots and 250 employees to around about 18 depots and now employs over 600 staff plus contractors. This growth is a testament to Craige's customer centric approach, where he prioritizes building strong relationships and delivering exceptional customer experiences.

00:01:24:08 - 00:01:51:03
Daniel Franco
So in this episode, we'll also delve into Craige's insights on change and culture and his thoughts on the importance of fostering a positive, inclusive environment for his employees where they feel valued, motivated and contribute their best. Craige will also share his advice on navigating through the upcoming potential recession. Drawing from his experience during the GFC, where he'll provide valuable insights and strategies for businesses who are looking to weather the storm and emerge stronger.

00:01:51:04 - 00:02:05:18
Daniel Franco
So join us as we uncover the inspiring journey of Craige Whitton, CEO of Northline Welcome back to the Creating Synergy Podcast. Today we have a terrific human in the in the form of Craige Whitton, CEO of Northline. Welcome.

00:02:06:10 - 00:02:07:25
Craige Whitton
Oh, Daniel, Thanks for having me.

00:02:08:12 - 00:02:19:16
Daniel Franco
So, Craige, just a quick, quick little background check on the CEO of Northline, previously CFO. So you've been CEO for about 15 years or so now.

00:02:20:00 - 00:02:31:07
Craige Whitton
Coming up in December is the 15th anniversary, managed to inherit the job or take over the job in December 2008, just as the GFC was starting to really.

00:02:31:19 - 00:02:32:25
Craige Whitton
Hit home in Australia.

00:02:32:26 - 00:02:33:19
Daniel Franco
Thanks very much.

00:02:34:21 - 00:02:37:05
Craige Whitton
So that made for some interesting times.

00:02:37:05 - 00:02:43:24
Craige Whitton
There. Very early on, after I'd done a what we describe as a four year apprenticeship as the CFO when I first joined the business.

00:02:44:13 - 00:02:58:18
Daniel Franco
And long history background, we'll go into that shortly. But Northline, for those who might not know, has an international reach of over 100 or so company countries, I should say 18 depots across Australia, over 600 employees.

00:02:58:19 - 00:02:59:03
Craige Whitton
That's right.

00:02:59:03 - 00:03:01:08
Daniel Franco
About them. And my research was correct.

00:03:01:08 - 00:03:03:16
Craige Whitton
And a whole swag of subcontractors as.

00:03:03:16 - 00:03:19:26
Daniel Franco
Well on top of them. So we'll deep dive through your journey now. And I guess I always like to start this conversation with, you know, who is Craig Whitten and what do we need to understand about your earliest contacts to really understand the person that's sitting in front of us today?

00:03:20:25 - 00:03:40:27
Craige Whitton
Well, you know, originally born and bred in Perth and have a have had an an older sibling, an older brother who's passed away now. And I've got a younger sibling, sister who still lives in Perth with my dad. And, you know, I think growing up in Perth is just so many good memories of of great weather and beaches and sunshine.

00:03:40:27 - 00:04:01:00
Craige Whitton
And just as a kid being able to play outside and kick the football and go running or do whatever you want to do. And I think that sort of idyllic Australian lifestyle that you can remember as you were growing up is just something that's that's never left me. And I think it's so easy to forget how lucky we are to live, not just here in Adelaide but in Australia more broadly.

00:04:01:20 - 00:04:08:03
Daniel Franco
Yeah, absolutely. And so. So who, who was Craige growing up when you were little, little, little rug rat.

00:04:08:12 - 00:04:08:23
Craige Whitton
Running.

00:04:08:23 - 00:04:16:24
Daniel Franco
Around? Did you get into sports? I mean, and you know, and what, what were your what were your parents background? What did they do and how did that set you up in your life.

00:04:16:24 - 00:04:53:05
Craige Whitton
Is really interesting. Mum, actually, who passed away from ovarian cancer about four years ago. Mum You know my mum. Mum was actually born in India to English parents. So there's an Anglo Indian background there if you like. Yeah. And my, my most fond memories of mummy's cooking and the smell that you always have in the house or the spices that flow from that and, and, and you know it's something like a Christmas lunch always used to involve like a roast turkey, but it always used to involve a bowl curry, you know, like a meatball curry or a lamb biryani or something like that.

00:04:53:05 - 00:04:55:04
Craige Whitton
That involved a lot of that mix. So when did.

00:04:55:04 - 00:04:56:09
Daniel Franco
She moved to Australia?

00:04:56:09 - 00:04:58:11
Craige Whitton
She was about 13 or 14.

00:04:58:11 - 00:05:01:19
Craige Whitton
So that would have been, you know, round about the sort of 1950s.

00:05:01:20 - 00:05:04:16
Daniel Franco
Yes, the culture was deeply ingrained in a big time.

00:05:04:19 - 00:05:13:09
Craige Whitton
Big time. And mum and dad meant ballroom dancing as they were like 18 or 19, and they were together for 56 years before mum passed away from cancer.

00:05:13:09 - 00:05:20:23
Daniel Franco
Common story. We've had a couple of ballroom dancing mate and grades back in the day. There was no technology back then, so everyone was out dancing or doing.

00:05:20:23 - 00:05:26:10
Craige Whitton
Something and I technology, the pubs would close the alley and whatever else. So I think that was the way they got to meet.

00:05:26:10 - 00:05:28:08
Daniel Franco
Yeah, Yeah. What do they do for a living?

00:05:28:08 - 00:05:29:15
Craige Whitton
What they did was.

00:05:29:15 - 00:05:47:19
Craige Whitton
Primarily in marketing. He was in sales and marketing, at least he was funded and a director of an advertising agency in market force. Yeah. And, and he also did a was a director of a direct mail company back then all before social media dads not the social media cum electronic.

00:05:47:19 - 00:05:48:09
Craige Whitton
Media type.

00:05:48:28 - 00:05:54:14
Craige Whitton
In his last days still working and he worked up until he was almost.

00:05:54:14 - 00:05:54:27
Craige Whitton
80.

00:05:54:28 - 00:06:04:24
Craige Whitton
Yeah well he was still having emails hard copy printed out for him that he could handwrite his responses on and then get someone to talk them and send them for him. So he's not particularly savvy.

00:06:04:24 - 00:06:14:29
Daniel Franco
Dad, that's brilliant. You think that I mean, obviously being direct, high up in roles that had a really major influence on you and your career.

00:06:15:12 - 00:06:40:23
Craige Whitton
Could certainly help. That is one of the role models that that I look to. And, you know, he was one of those guys, very hardworking, always very punctual, early, early start type of guy, but not not a very late night guy. You know, just one of those people whose work ethic and his relationships with people were terrific. And, you know, they were the sorts of things that I took away from him and and still do today.

00:06:40:23 - 00:06:45:15
Craige Whitton
When you meet with him, you know, he's he still wants to order his coffee made with feeling in love.

00:06:45:18 - 00:06:47:03
Craige Whitton
You know.

00:06:47:03 - 00:06:50:12
Daniel Franco
I love it. And and you and your mother, she.

00:06:50:25 - 00:07:08:16
Craige Whitton
My mum was my mum. Mum was a stay at home mom because after the family, the three of us in particular, we kept her busy, was she was a trained hairdresser and she still did some of that on a part time casual basis. As we got a little bit older and we weren't holding her back so much.

00:07:08:16 - 00:07:08:26
Craige Whitton
But.

00:07:09:17 - 00:07:13:27
Craige Whitton
But yeah, so, so we always used to get our cut for free.

00:07:14:04 - 00:07:15:23
Craige Whitton
So when I see.

00:07:15:23 - 00:07:16:09
Daniel Franco
That stop.

00:07:17:03 - 00:07:19:14
Craige Whitton
And, you know, I left.

00:07:20:24 - 00:07:28:06
Daniel Franco
I remember the I remember my mum growing up, she thought she was a hairdresser. Your, your, your mother sound like she was a train.

00:07:28:14 - 00:07:28:22
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:07:28:26 - 00:07:35:10
Daniel Franco
My mother thought she was because she had a very clip is there and I was rocking the the flat top for a long time. Yeah.

00:07:35:10 - 00:07:39:17
Craige Whitton
They're not easy on you need a bit of training to pull that off from.

00:07:40:06 - 00:07:42:04
Daniel Franco
I just look like a box head is all it.

00:07:42:05 - 00:07:44:01
Craige Whitton
Was to have some great photos as a kid then.

00:07:44:21 - 00:08:04:01
Daniel Franco
Yeah. They're the ones that we, we try to push to the back of the memory bank. So is there I think like you mentioned that earlier, like the smells and the spices coming through. Is there is there a memory when you look back as a as a young guy coming through the ranks and a young a young child teenager, is there a memory?

00:08:04:01 - 00:08:06:19
Daniel Franco
You look back and it just just makes you smile?

00:08:07:06 - 00:08:28:29
Craige Whitton
Look, I think I really think about the family dinner arrangement. And, you know, we always used to eat at 6:00 at night and we would always come together around the dinner table and have that conversation. And that's something that my wife and I do now as much as possible as we can with our kids. Three, three, three, sort of older kids, Nascita, 15, 18 and 21.

00:08:29:03 - 00:08:30:02
Craige Whitton
Was all girls.

00:08:30:08 - 00:08:31:09
Craige Whitton
I can only do girls.

00:08:31:21 - 00:08:32:00
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:08:32:09 - 00:08:36:11
Craige Whitton
And I say that to the late athletes that have all girls, but I'm not quite sure of.

00:08:36:11 - 00:08:36:26
Craige Whitton
The I've.

00:08:36:26 - 00:08:37:09
Daniel Franco
Got girls.

00:08:37:14 - 00:08:42:28
Craige Whitton
I must be this other. It just to me looks like that. And so we sit.

00:08:42:28 - 00:08:46:06
Craige Whitton
Around the the family dining table as much as we.

00:08:46:06 - 00:08:46:28
Craige Whitton
Can. Yeah.

00:08:47:00 - 00:09:02:17
Craige Whitton
To have conversations and to enter. It's part of an education process of us as much as it is of them and just talk about things. And we find that really that connection is so important when everyone's so busy. Yeah, the more often you can do that, the better.

00:09:02:17 - 00:09:20:17
Daniel Franco
So I've got I did have questions later on about family and how you manage it, but while we're talking about it now, I'm interested. Do you, do you make time for that 6:00 every night? Is that a religious thing for you? Is that something that you just like? This is a non-negotiable for me. I mean, obviously traveling a lot as well.

00:09:20:17 - 00:09:23:27
Daniel Franco
So how do you manage the the whole pace in your life?

00:09:23:28 - 00:09:50:15
Craige Whitton
So it's definitely a non-negotiable. The only thing that is negotiable is the time. Yeah, because with with five of us, we can't set a time and make sure that everyone's going to stick to that. We could do that back when we were young. That was much easier. But these days with whether it's basketball training or netball training or whatever, sports, the kids and events and functions have gone on and we make sure we try to do at least three, four nights a week as a minimum and sit down and do that.

00:09:50:15 - 00:09:56:16
Craige Whitton
And yes, that is pretty much a non-negotiable for all of us, because then we're all together and someone sit at the table and someone's doing the.

00:09:56:16 - 00:09:57:05
Craige Whitton
Dishes and.

00:09:57:14 - 00:10:07:23
Craige Whitton
Whoever's whoever's cook, generally my wife, Justine's cook. But you know, as a general rule, we also try to get the kids to do their share from time to time as well, you know?

00:10:07:23 - 00:10:08:00
Craige Whitton
So.

00:10:08:12 - 00:10:11:16
Daniel Franco
Yeah, well, we're a family, right? So we work as a team, run.

00:10:11:29 - 00:10:13:19
Craige Whitton
The experiments when I cook are generally.

00:10:13:19 - 00:10:25:01
Craige Whitton
Not as good. Yeah, well, generally a result, you know, in a problem that's going to be solved of some sort, ordering takeout by other night. So, like, food is the ticket. So.

00:10:25:24 - 00:10:51:18
Daniel Franco
So while we're talking about the family catch ups and stuff and how would you rank your book at a ten, how would you rank your availability to your family knowing that you've been a CEO for the past 15 or so years? And when this executive role for 20 plus years, is it something that you absolutely will give all your effort to?

00:10:52:09 - 00:11:18:28
Craige Whitton
I've been very lucky there. I run a family business. Yeah, effectively, even though we run it as a corporate business, it is still the family values still exist within our business. And so I set that tone and I set that example. And that is by being part of the family at work and by making sure you look after your family home because you'll never be able to look after your family at work if your family at home is not right.

00:11:18:29 - 00:11:43:10
Craige Whitton
Yeah. Anyway, so from that perspective, I've had lots of flexibility and lots of opportunity. I've always made a point at the beginning of the calendar year when you know whether there's a kids sports day or there's a particular performance or some other thing that goes in the diary straight away and then it's sacrosanct and you can't change it because there's always something that comes up from a work perspective that wants to override or take over other things that you're doing.

00:11:43:19 - 00:12:01:16
Craige Whitton
Whereas if you've got it locked in, then it can't be, it can't be. Take it out. Yeah, that's been the easiest way to manage it. And, and whenever I traveled as the kids were younger, always made sure I spoke to them every day and always try and keep the, the number of travel nights in particular to an absolute bare minimum.

00:12:01:24 - 00:12:04:11
Craige Whitton
These days the kids are probably not as bothered if I speak to.

00:12:04:11 - 00:12:05:25
Craige Whitton
Them every day or know. But you know.

00:12:05:29 - 00:12:12:00
Craige Whitton
As they were growing up, it was always, you know, we I always used to stop at the airport and spend 20, 30, $40 each on a.

00:12:12:00 - 00:12:17:11
Craige Whitton
Gift on the way home. You know that in the end, you get to the point you get, geez, I can't buy two more fluffy toys, right?

00:12:17:12 - 00:12:41:16
Daniel Franco
Yeah, that's right. Do so. I mean, setting up that routine every night, you know, kudos to you and the family are trying to do the same thing sometimes late nights and network functions and yeah, all the above get in the way. So yeah, a couple of nights a week at the bare minimum is absolutely important. What happens, What happens after that?

00:12:41:21 - 00:13:00:12
Daniel Franco
Do you how do you switch off? How do you, what do you do from a mental health perspective to do you switch off from work? Do you stop at 8:00 at night or 6:00 at night? Or do you just you get back on the laptop or do you. That's it. Now, at the moment I'm home, I'm father and husband.

00:13:00:12 - 00:13:23:21
Craige Whitton
It is nice to be able to say that in a theoretical sense, but the reality is is different. You're always on. Yeah, it's very hard to be off even when you're traveling overseas. Yeah. And in a different time zone, it's hard to be off. Absolutely. So it's really just making sure and and, you know, from the greatest challenge that we deal with as leaders, I think that and in fact, I was lucky enough to do some overseas study earlier on this year.

00:13:23:28 - 00:13:29:12
Craige Whitton
This concept of being versus doing was raised and was actually raised on the first day of a three week course.

00:13:29:13 - 00:13:29:24
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:13:30:00 - 00:13:51:00
Craige Whitton
And that that is the difference. And I'm also lucky that I've got married to someone who is way smarter than I am. So she's also really good at making sure that I have a break. You have a holiday, be that you you make sure you allocating time for your interests or passions or otherwise and that you are you when you there you're there.

00:13:51:03 - 00:14:09:28
Craige Whitton
Yeah and I've always over the years had to log back on at seven, eight nine 10:00 at night to make sure you're up to speed with everything that's going on. Yeah. And or early in the morning but, but you really do try to to I don't I try not to take my phone to the table. It's a lot harder these days than it used to be.

00:14:10:09 - 00:14:14:19
Craige Whitton
Never be a problem but you've just got to make sure you the way that you present me present.

00:14:14:19 - 00:14:18:28
Daniel Franco
Yeah. So explain the concept of being this is doing.

00:14:19:16 - 00:14:23:16
Craige Whitton
I sort of liken it to working on the business and working in the.

00:14:23:16 - 00:14:23:26
Craige Whitton
Business.

00:14:24:09 - 00:14:49:12
Craige Whitton
In the sense that you are, you are present, you are planning when you're being you are planning your, your strategizing, your thinking, your forward forward looking. Whereas when you're doing, you are just head down, crunching through whatever it is that you've, you've got to get done, whatever problem you've got to solve, whatever issue you've got to fix and you're not really looking down, then down the road, you're looking in the rear vision mirror.

00:14:49:18 - 00:14:54:13
Daniel Franco
Yeah, yeah. So it's hard to do that.

00:14:54:20 - 00:14:55:06
Craige Whitton
Very hard.

00:14:55:06 - 00:15:19:01
Daniel Franco
I mean, because I think I remember even in one of our previous conversations, you said one of the great things because it was Oxford. You went to Oxford, right? Well, I want to talk to you in-depth about that leadership piece after. But when we I remember you said to me one thing that I learned which kind of smacked me in the face when you when you did this, was the the ability to stop and think.

00:15:19:06 - 00:15:19:16
Craige Whitton
Yes.

00:15:20:03 - 00:15:23:00
Daniel Franco
And does that is that what that being this is doing?

00:15:23:00 - 00:15:43:05
Craige Whitton
That's exactly what it is. Yeah. And I'm also very lucky that I've got a chairman who is excellent at that and he over the time I've worked for him, if I've ever got too caught up in the way table, grabbed me by the collar and almost physically lift me up to say, Mate, the business can't afford for you to be the one that's reliant on.

00:15:43:05 - 00:15:43:19
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:15:43:23 - 00:16:01:05
Craige Whitton
Running that part of the operation or running that part of the sales team or whatever happens to be, you need to make sure you got the right people doing the right things so that the business can function and brilliantly. Time away proved to me that I've got the right people and that they are doing a great job in the business.

00:16:01:05 - 00:16:04:29
Craige Whitton
Rand didn't didn't need me while I was away, and that was just sensational.

00:16:06:00 - 00:16:22:13
Daniel Franco
Yeah, beautiful. So let's let's look into your career and then, you know, as you sort of started moving towards becoming the CEO of, of Northline executive roles at Regis and a core.

00:16:22:29 - 00:16:47:12
Craige Whitton
So when I was a young guy, I was living in Perth, and Dad had said to me one day after, I think my first semester uni results came out that said to me, I'm not sure these full time university studies the right thing for you. Basically, I was playing up. Yeah, I was enjoying myself too much. I spent more time at the pub than I did at the university that said, I think he might have just taken this university life to the extreme.

00:16:47:20 - 00:16:51:26
Craige Whitton
Why don't you think about getting a full time job and then completing your studies part time?

00:16:51:26 - 00:16:52:06
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:16:52:09 - 00:16:56:28
Craige Whitton
I managed to get this job at a company called Ahern's, which is like John Martin.

00:16:57:23 - 00:16:58:01
Craige Whitton
Here.

00:16:58:01 - 00:17:22:21
Craige Whitton
In in Adelaide and eventually got bought by David Jones just like John Martin's. Yeah, and I was an internal auditor for these guys because I was studying business at the time and gee, talk about a tedious job if there's anything at the lower end of the white collar food chain, I think that was right down the bottom getting till rolls from cash registers and going through them and looking for voided transactions or refunds and things like that.

00:17:23:03 - 00:17:42:13
Craige Whitton
But you got to learn the basics of the business from the ground up. And I happened to be in the lift one day with a group of people who who were running a hotel company and they shared the same office building that I did. And I'd been talking to them in the lift on and off. They then stopped me one day and said, Hey, we've got this job at the Novotel Hotel down the road.

00:17:42:29 - 00:18:13:15
Craige Whitton
What do you think? And so I went and had a chat to them, and before I knew it, I was the assistant financial controller, something I thought sounded pretty good back in about 1987 or 88, whenever that was. And there I was, I started a bit of a hospitality hotel career. Yeah. And I found from a grounding point of view that hotels and hospitality were terrific because you from a financial point of view, you cover sales, you cover operations, you cover every major and it and every other aspect of the business.

00:18:13:15 - 00:18:26:02
Craige Whitton
You get to sort of come across and touch and feel. And eventually I took the transfer with them to the East Coast. I, I relocated to Coffs Harbor in New South Wales, which is where everybody from New South Wales came to retire.

00:18:26:02 - 00:18:26:09
Craige Whitton
Yep.

00:18:26:19 - 00:18:29:03
Craige Whitton
And he was a 21 year old bloke rocking up, going.

00:18:29:03 - 00:18:30:02
Craige Whitton
Wherever I landed.

00:18:30:29 - 00:18:54:01
Craige Whitton
And that hotel had just come out of administration. So it was, it was a tricky place to go to because it had no money and it had a really bad reputation because it hadn't paid its bills. And we were a new management company coming in. And I'll never forget on that the second day of being there, a truck rocked up to deliver fruit and veg and they wouldn't take it off until I paid them.

00:18:54:10 - 00:19:05:24
Craige Whitton
So I had the chef calling me saying, You need to come to the loading dock because you've got to sort this out. And I had to actually bring a checkbook and write out a check to make sure that we could get fruit and veggies for the kitchen to.

00:19:05:24 - 00:19:07:14
Craige Whitton
Yeah, so cook for that night's.

00:19:07:19 - 00:19:22:28
Craige Whitton
You know, restaurant meal. So, you know, you learn pretty quick on the job in some of those type of things. And so I had a bit of a hotel career that covered some time on the Gold Coast, some time in Melbourne, some time in Sydney while I was in Coffs Harbor. And then I left that business in a move to Canberra.

00:19:23:03 - 00:19:23:14
Craige Whitton
And I was.

00:19:23:14 - 00:19:38:18
Craige Whitton
Working for the Regis Hotel Group looking after financially, looking after two or three hotels in Canberra. And then after I'd done a few a couple of years, they relocated to Adelaide in 94 to work at the Hyatt. So I was still following the hotel career, if you like.

00:19:38:23 - 00:19:40:25
Daniel Franco
Yeah. And what role were you offered there at the height.

00:19:40:27 - 00:19:43:11
Craige Whitton
Of financial control and eventually Director of Finance?

00:19:43:11 - 00:19:44:02
Daniel Franco
Yeah, beautiful.

00:19:44:12 - 00:20:00:25
Craige Whitton
And again worked for another great role model there, a German guy here, but he had a hospitality and hotel career that was 30 or 40 years in and there wasn't much he didn't know. And and so he had some great, great things to learn. He had a few things that you you also thought, okay, I might not.

00:20:00:25 - 00:20:02:22
Craige Whitton
Adopt all of these characteristics.

00:20:03:09 - 00:20:06:08
Craige Whitton
But but he was he was a lovely man with a great heart to.

00:20:06:09 - 00:20:06:25
Daniel Franco
Speak people, you.

00:20:06:25 - 00:20:10:23
Craige Whitton
Know? That's right. Exactly. Exactly.

00:20:10:23 - 00:20:21:11
Daniel Franco
So I think that means if you came in 94, does that mean you've been long? I think you said it early. You've been longer here in South Australia than than what you have in Perth.

00:20:21:15 - 00:20:31:13
Craige Whitton
Yeah, correct. That's right. So it's 29 years now, I think. I've been in Adelaide and I left Perth when I was 22. So. So the reality is I'm now a Croat and not a saying.

00:20:31:21 - 00:20:43:18
Daniel Franco
Laughs will claim you mate, That's the South Australian way. So. So we're from here. So you're at the Hyatt, you're moving your way up the ranks there. Yep. What happens in your career?

00:20:43:20 - 00:20:55:19
Craige Whitton
So during some of that time Justine and I worked together, my wife Justine, or my now wife Justine. We work together. She was in sales and marketing, so she always reminded me that she brought the money in and I.

00:20:55:19 - 00:20:56:25
Craige Whitton
Counted it, if you like.

00:20:57:23 - 00:21:21:27
Craige Whitton
But the reality of that was for a career in hotels, that meant sort of traveling the world and becoming a global citizen. We were getting ready to get married and start families and all those sorts of things. So in the end I looked for other opportunities and I actually was lucky enough to get tapped on the shoulder by a guy called Bob Ford, who used to have a company called Proud Australia Group that's in very different mold these days.

00:21:21:27 - 00:21:42:05
Craige Whitton
But it had assets in Kangaroo Island, it had the Barossa wine train. It also had the proud Mary on the Murray River. So it had a and a bunch of travel centers around Australia, one in each capital city representing the Tourism Commission. And so I was able to go into that role as CEO and look after that national business.

00:21:42:05 - 00:22:06:18
Craige Whitton
So my sort of service background, hospitality background worked very well in in that in that case. And another commonality for me when I took over that job as CEO was I think it was about May 201, and I'd done a bit of work creating a new corporate plan, corporate strategy. And six months later, September 11th happened and Ansett collapsed within a couple of days of that.

00:22:06:18 - 00:22:31:04
Craige Whitton
And we relied on Ansett for all the domestic tourism. And of course September 11 meant that international tourism just died. So we had to rip up that corporate strategy, throw it in the bin and deal with what we were having to deal with. And all of a sudden, not only did we have the challenges caused by those events, anyone that was working in tourism, domestic, internationally became a domestic competitor because there was no international tourism happening.

00:22:31:04 - 00:22:41:20
Craige Whitton
So it was a that was equally a very challenging time. But we we worked our way through that and came out of it on the other side, a much better business and much better people for it.

00:22:41:20 - 00:22:41:27
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:22:42:21 - 00:22:43:24
Daniel Franco
A silver lining, right?

00:22:43:24 - 00:22:45:16
Craige Whitton
Yeah. Oh, it wouldn't have had to be one.

00:22:45:21 - 00:22:47:14
Daniel Franco
Wouldn't have felt like that at the time.

00:22:47:23 - 00:22:48:08
Craige Whitton
It didn't.

00:22:48:09 - 00:22:59:04
Daniel Franco
It would have been very difficult. So then so from Prowse you then decide to move into north on as CFO as opposed to staying in the C-suite as CEO role.

00:22:59:04 - 00:23:12:29
Craige Whitton
That's right, yeah. So through, through some contacts at Deloitte at the time they were helping Northline looking for a CFO and that actually had their own Deloitte person in there as CFO for.

00:23:12:29 - 00:23:13:20
Craige Whitton
A period of time.

00:23:14:01 - 00:23:33:12
Craige Whitton
So through some of those networks and contacts, I had a conversation with the chairman and before we knew it there I was as the CFO. It was probably a larger turnover business, but not anywhere near what we are today. And from that perspective, it had its own challenges and it really was a a family business that I was stepping into.

00:23:33:12 - 00:23:41:24
Craige Whitton
And Pratt Australia was a family business that together with I'd been running a geographically dispersed business with brand.

00:23:42:05 - 00:23:42:21
Craige Whitton
Northline.

00:23:42:21 - 00:24:03:01
Craige Whitton
Had depots around the country and we really, even though we were in transport and logistics, we are a service industry, you know, we are a service business, we're providing in that transport service. How we get it there almost doesn't matter whether it's road, rail, C or air, you know, it's a magic wand here. We move it really it's just a matter of making sure we're serving the customer.

00:24:03:06 - 00:24:14:01
Daniel Franco
Absolutely. So why did you decide to move away from the CEO role and back into a CFO just purely because of size? Or was there a potential that you were going to take over at one point?

00:24:14:01 - 00:24:37:28
Craige Whitton
Well, there was not necessarily a discussed potential, but I could see that it was a business that had a lot of growth opportunities and it had some growth ambitions. And I just felt that from my perspective, I was going to be learning a whole new industry and that just sort of made sense. And from that perspective, you know, I was always encouraged in and mentor other people to say, you know what?

00:24:38:22 - 00:24:52:10
Craige Whitton
If you're going to learn, you're going to grow and you can take that with you to whatever else it is that you want to do down the track. Yeah, but if you stop learning and you stop growing, then you sort of stand still, right? So from that perspective, it just sort of made sense at the time.

00:24:52:10 - 00:25:03:13
Daniel Franco
Yeah, brilliant. So I read a quote that you thought that when you joined North Line, it was all blue singlets and thongs.

00:25:03:13 - 00:25:10:11
Craige Whitton
They said, Well, that was my perception of what the transport industry was, of course. I mean, it's it's.

00:25:10:17 - 00:25:18:01
Craige Whitton
Terrific to discover behind that. And, and now what we've been able to add in terms of depth and breadth of sophistication.

00:25:18:01 - 00:25:18:13
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:25:19:05 - 00:25:21:13
Craige Whitton
But the industry is a whole lot more sophisticated.

00:25:21:13 - 00:25:22:11
Craige Whitton
I can imagine what you might.

00:25:23:03 - 00:25:41:19
Craige Whitton
Most people from the outside think, you know, it is actually the logistics involved is it can be quite complex from time to time. And I love the fact that we deal with customers who are I would describe them as all shapes and sizes of the start ups or their blue chips or anything in between. They're in all geographies and all industry sectors.

00:25:41:19 - 00:25:54:18
Craige Whitton
So I can be talking to someone about retail. The next conversation can be about pharmaceutical, then it can be about construction and so on and so forth. So from that perspective, I love that sort of cutting thrust, if you like, of, of business.

00:25:54:18 - 00:25:56:05
Daniel Franco
Pici agnostic.

00:25:56:06 - 00:25:56:27
Craige Whitton
Yeah, exactly.

00:25:57:19 - 00:26:08:06
Daniel Franco
So you did a stint for four years as CFO and then from what I understand, you were offered the CEO role at a game of cricket, a test match guy, was that correct?

00:26:08:06 - 00:26:11:15
Craige Whitton
Sort of, but not quite. And I'd been offered the role.

00:26:11:15 - 00:26:13:04
Craige Whitton
And accepted the role. It was the.

00:26:13:04 - 00:26:14:22
Craige Whitton
Announcement of the.

00:26:14:22 - 00:26:25:01
Craige Whitton
Announcement came out, I think it was a Friday morning from memory. The announcement came out and at that time the chairman, the guy who was CEO who I was taking over from.

00:26:25:09 - 00:26:29:20
Daniel Franco
So the chairman is the founder, Correct. And he was the CEO at the time?

00:26:29:20 - 00:26:55:20
Craige Whitton
No, he was he was he was he was the chairman. Okay. But but he had a guy who had been national operations manager, had become the CEO a few years before me. And so he was at the point of sort of a lifestyle change. Yep. And so the three of us, the announcement went out in the memo back in the day, so to speak, which did get sent an email, of course, because it's only 2004 after 2008.

00:26:55:28 - 00:27:00:15
Craige Whitton
But we then went to the cricket. So my first day on the tools in.

00:27:00:15 - 00:27:07:10
Craige Whitton
Inverted commas, was literally at the cricket and I'm not quite sure how I got home that night, but nonetheless, it was a great first day on the job, which.

00:27:07:11 - 00:27:08:20
Daniel Franco
Which match was Australia.

00:27:09:00 - 00:27:09:20
Craige Whitton
It was a test.

00:27:09:20 - 00:27:10:17
Craige Whitton
Match at Adelaide Oval.

00:27:10:22 - 00:27:16:08
Craige Whitton
So we were in the members. I remember kind of it was, I'd have to Google it tonight.

00:27:17:18 - 00:27:25:12
Daniel Franco
That's brilliant. So when you came on board as CEO, what did it look like? Where where was the business at that point?

00:27:25:18 - 00:27:49:06
Craige Whitton
What actually was in not a bad place because back in sort of 2008, the Australian economy was traveling quite well. But and if I remember rightly in about September that year, the company we'd just been celebrating the 25th anniversary of the company, which this year is our 40th. But as part of those celebrations, things had been looking terrific and rosy and we were happy with where we were.

00:27:49:14 - 00:27:56:24
Craige Whitton
And then along came this thing called the GFC that slapped us all in the face like a wet fish and woke us up from a bad dream in a big way.

00:27:57:19 - 00:28:15:26
Daniel Franco
I can I can imagine it would have been it would have been tough. I do have a whole bunch of questions around that in a bit later, so I'm going to pick your brain on that. But but over time, over the past 19 years, you've learned a little thing or two about scaling and growing a business and you've taken it.

00:28:15:26 - 00:28:31:20
Daniel Franco
So I guess when I was asking the question, where was it from an employee size and and where was it from? Well, from a business source, from a depot. I think we said earlier there's over 600 staff now and 18 depots. When you took over, what did that look like?

00:28:31:20 - 00:28:37:25
Craige Whitton
Yeah. So I think we had eight depots. Yeah. And I think we were about 250 people at that point in time. So.

00:28:38:08 - 00:28:38:21
Craige Whitton
So it's.

00:28:39:04 - 00:29:03:29
Craige Whitton
Yeah, that's right. And in terms of other scalable things since then we weren't in international in those days. That's something that's come on, on since then. And, and you know when we get into other depots you get into a lot of other complexity around vehicles and staffing and all the things that go with it. So yeah, the business has continued to grow mostly from an organic perspective, not a big merger and acquisition type of company.

00:29:04:26 - 00:29:15:16
Craige Whitton
You know, we try to keep a very low debt profile know. And so from that perspective, we don't we don't have we don't have much debt. We don't go and borrow money to make acquisitions. It's about organic growth.

00:29:15:18 - 00:29:22:10
Daniel Franco
Yeah, very good. Then you would have learned a few things about scaling and growing. Was there anything, any insights that you can share at.

00:29:22:10 - 00:29:44:21
Craige Whitton
All about people? And from my perspective, if you've got the right people in the right structure and the right culture from that perspective, you know, you can get anywhere you want to get. You can manage change, you can you can manage the growth, you can transition whichever aspects of the business technology or whatever else other elements of it you need to do.

00:29:45:06 - 00:29:52:24
Craige Whitton
You've got to have the right people, you've got to have the right team and you've got to have the right culture. Without that, you really are doing it the hard way, right?

00:29:53:05 - 00:30:14:21
Daniel Franco
We're going to we're going to deep dive here now, but I am interested in your relationship with your chair and owner and David and I know he likes to keep a little bit of a low profile so we won't have to go into it too much. But he obviously is giving you the authority and the leeway to to take this on and grow in the way you see fit.

00:30:14:21 - 00:30:15:00
Daniel Franco
Yes.

00:30:15:09 - 00:30:39:06
Craige Whitton
Yes. Look, from from that perspective, I mean, we've now got 19 years of history between the two and the level of trust. You know, I've had two children born into the family during the time I've worked with him and with him. You know, you, you know, hey, you know, I have had many times morning, noon or night where we've been, where we've caught up, where there's been learnings.

00:30:39:06 - 00:30:59:02
Craige Whitton
And I don't think today there's a decision that I would make that I know he wouldn't agree with you. That doesn't mean you don't consult. That doesn't mean that you don't you know, you've got to be respectful. He's got a lot of he's as sharp as a tack. He doesn't miss a thing. And one of those people that can look at a page of numbers and go that one on the floor.

00:30:59:03 - 00:31:22:24
Craige Whitton
And, you know, third column across that number, there's not. Right. So what's going on there? You need to really get into that doesn't miss a thing and and keeps me on my toes still now you know 19 years later. So so I think it's about trust and I think it's about understanding each other and what motivates each other and and being able to respond accordingly and in a way we complement each other, you know?

00:31:23:08 - 00:31:46:29
Craige Whitton
And, you know, he has he has his own catch ups with members of the executive team without me because he wants to hear directly from them sometimes. And I totally encourage that. There's we're transparent, we're open. I think it's great that he can have that time and hear from them directly about the challenges that I might have been talking about or the capital we need to invest or whatever the particular issues happen to be, people issues or otherwise.

00:31:46:29 - 00:32:00:25
Craige Whitton
So so, you know, after you work with and for someone, you develop that level of trust that makes the world of difference. Yeah. And I mean, you and I don't have to worry about a share price, for example. And I love the fact that I don't have to worry about wake up every day. And that's the first thing I've got to worry about, you know?

00:32:01:23 - 00:32:24:28
Craige Whitton
So from that perspective, it works well. That means there are constraints, there's definitely capital constraints, and that is the challenge to getting the growth right is how we get that balance. And we just work our way through issue by issue as we need to. And you know, we've been supported by great bankers and things like that along the way that have worked with us and helped us because every time you get a property, you've got another whole heap of costs.

00:32:25:01 - 00:32:25:14
Daniel Franco
You can imagine.

00:32:25:25 - 00:32:35:21
Craige Whitton
Another whole suite of, you know, dollars that are required to support that growth. So but I think ultimately the relationship with the chairman comes down to trust.

00:32:36:09 - 00:32:41:01
Daniel Franco
So he obviously founded the business and he ran it for how long?

00:32:41:23 - 00:33:04:25
Craige Whitton
Originally founded it was for people involved in the very beginning. And eventually four became three, became two, became one. And and but he's been the he's been the one in it for the entire time. And just recently, only literally two weeks ago. And what I would describe as the very first employee just retired after 40 years of continuous service with the company.

00:33:05:07 - 00:33:08:15
Craige Whitton
We just did a couple of terrific things for him, which I loved.

00:33:08:20 - 00:33:09:03
Daniel Franco
Fabulous.

00:33:09:12 - 00:33:32:09
Craige Whitton
One of them we were for the first time in my 19 years, we actually stopped at Depots Operations at Regency Park and the team out there did this excellent guard of honor where they lined up all the forklifts in two lines. They raised the tines on them, so the tines were up and all the drivers were off. It's perfectly safe and the depot wasn't operating.

00:33:32:09 - 00:33:50:17
Craige Whitton
So we were able to do it and the operators were standing next to their forklifts and and the two oldest serving your longest serving employees at that depot together with the guy that had had 40 years service. And I walked through this guard of honor and with everyone clapping, you sort of had this little tingle up and down his spine.

00:33:50:17 - 00:34:16:15
Craige Whitton
It was sensational. And on a different occasion, we we actually had a minibus and we took the sort of ten or 12 oldest, the longest serving employees in Adelaide on a bus trip. And we went and visited every depot and every corporate office that we'd had over the 40 years in Adelaide. Just drove past them, had a chat, did some reminiscing, talked about how things had changed over that 40 years, and then of course went for lunch afterwards.

00:34:17:06 - 00:34:41:15
Craige Whitton
Yeah, it was, it was really unique. It was it was a great sort of fitting tribute. So. So yeah, so, so David has been he's been the, the, the connection, if you like, from the very beginning all the way through today. And, and now we've got the next generation of his family. He's his son and his daughter are part and parcel of the business and he's got another daughter who who we will hope will join us in a few years time when she's ready.

00:34:41:16 - 00:35:06:02
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. So 40 years, it's a pretty huge effort. I mean. Well, they say the average average doesn't even make it past ten years. The average business from a from start up. Yeah. Well, what is the what does the next ten look like for you guys? Is it is it continue growth? Is it, um is it is it just sort of hold your own?

00:35:06:05 - 00:35:07:27
Daniel Franco
What does it look like for you?

00:35:08:00 - 00:35:24:16
Craige Whitton
I think a couple of things. First of all, we've got a strategic plan that runs for 23 to 25. Yeah, I tend to keep them to three years size because I think beyond that is really crystal balling. And I think whilst I like to have goals and aims, I think we've got to be realistic on the way through.

00:35:25:05 - 00:35:48:20
Craige Whitton
But that is about growth and that growth will come organically, primarily it'll come from the growth in the economy and the growth in our industry sector, and we would also expect to get a growth in market share of that sector as well as sector. We'll have some consolidation. There's lots of businesses that have been more or still remain very family, small hybrid type of businesses.

00:35:49:02 - 00:36:13:17
Craige Whitton
So there will definitely be consolidation that will create opportunities for us, whether that's opportunities to take something over or whether that's opportunities to acquire customers or we'll just grow. And as long as we're doing the basics right, then that growth will follow. Yeah, if we've got an operational service we can sell and we've got the relationships with our customers and the relationships with our staff, the growth will come.

00:36:13:17 - 00:36:30:14
Daniel Franco
Absolutely. When when does enough become enough there? I like that, you know, because you're doing very well for yourselves at the moment. The business is well known. It's well respected, extremely quality customer service. When when does enough become enough?

00:36:30:14 - 00:37:01:10
Craige Whitton
And look, that is that is an ongoing challenge, I think, for everyone in a senior level, You know, most industry, any industry sector, because you're always looking for that growth of revenue, you're always looking for that growth. The profit, their growth, the market share. And ultimately I think it's you know, we sort of talk about it in terms of building platforms and so that we can then get to that next level, whether that platform is with a people structure or a technology structure or whatever other supporting mechanisms we need.

00:37:02:11 - 00:37:28:18
Craige Whitton
So we will keep focused on on that growth because otherwise you end up getting into a very sort of cost mentality and that can often have negative it doesn't have to have, but it often does have. So we'd probably prefer to avoid that and look to continue to grow and look to continue to improve everything we do. You know, all of our plans involve continuous improvement, you know, in some way, shape or form.

00:37:29:09 - 00:37:48:27
Daniel Franco
You've heard it quite once is like if a tree, what happens to a tree when it stops growing, starts dying? Right. And I think the I think businesses kind of build off the back of that. If it's not growing from a revenue and profitable point of view, it's growing in a productive type way or improved way. So yeah, absolutely.

00:37:49:10 - 00:37:54:14
Daniel Franco
Do you envisage being the CEO for for the long term into the future?

00:37:54:14 - 00:38:13:18
Craige Whitton
Look, you know, I'd like to say I'm still a young fella. I'm certainly young at heart. But, you know, look from my perspective, yeah, for the foreseeable future, that's absolutely yeah. And you know, you never know what that means down the track in terms of of still being connected to the business for, for many years to come and maybe helping and guiding the next generation through.

00:38:13:18 - 00:38:37:29
Craige Whitton
You know I think that's that's one of the things I took away from my studies that's incumbent on me to give back a little bit in that way. I've been privileged, I've been lucky, and I need to make sure the next generation in our business and not only in our business, anyone else that I can help, including my own children, that I can give some of my time and my advice and my experience to some of them to help them develop and grow.

00:38:38:03 - 00:38:43:15
Craige Whitton
And that is where I think I'll spend a lot of the next ten years doing a lot of that.

00:38:44:07 - 00:38:53:29
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. So as a mark of celebration for the 40 years and new offices or headquarters in Kent Town and a new depot as well is going to be 19 number 19.

00:38:54:08 - 00:39:25:19
Craige Whitton
So the depot is going to be in Brisbane. So we're building we currently Gran's broken. That's underway in Brisbane. We just need it not to rain over there. Touchwood And, and that should be ready for sort of April-May next year. That's the, that's the plan from that depot that will replace another depot. It'll stay at 18. Yep. But it has, it has expansion opportunity as part of that because it's another I think 6000 square meters under roof from where we are now and the headquarters in Adelaide.

00:39:25:19 - 00:39:46:25
Craige Whitton
Yeah, that's in Cape Town in King William Street, Kent Town. I actually was there yesterday and the footings were starting to be prepared, so we should be moving into there, hopefully September, all things going well. September 24. There are a couple of initiatives that we launched this year as part of the 40th. We had a pretty good party back in March, then at the Victoria Park Social Club.

00:39:46:25 - 00:39:47:07
Daniel Franco
And so it.

00:39:47:07 - 00:39:49:09
Craige Whitton
Should and we had.

00:39:49:09 - 00:40:10:18
Craige Whitton
Customers, we had staff, we had suppliers join that for a four fairly big night. And then we had one in Darwin in in May where we were at the sailing club in Darwin right on the water. And the minnows who were the the junior sailors, we've sponsored them for many years, I think at least I'm going to say 15, but I might be wrong.

00:40:10:27 - 00:40:23:29
Craige Whitton
And they've got some Northland sails, so we got them to sail past before sunset and that was just a great way to start the night. We had a bit of a circus theme and yet another big party in Darwin and we're doing one in Alice Springs in October.

00:40:24:09 - 00:40:34:17
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. So the business was started at a thousand, is that correct? I mean, because Northline Can you explain that? Actually, because I didn't realize this. Where did the name Northline come from?

00:40:34:25 - 00:40:35:29
Craige Whitton
Pretty creative. Yeah.

00:40:35:29 - 00:40:38:08
Craige Whitton
I'm told it was on the back of a coaster at the pub, but.

00:40:38:23 - 00:40:41:27
Craige Whitton
I haven't seen coaster so I can't be 100. There's a lot of pubs.

00:40:41:27 - 00:40:42:06
Daniel Franco
In these.

00:40:42:06 - 00:40:42:15
Craige Whitton
Numbers.

00:40:43:15 - 00:40:44:12
Daniel Franco
Is that the blue.

00:40:44:24 - 00:40:48:00
Craige Whitton
The blue has the biggest single thongs. That's right.

00:40:48:17 - 00:41:00:17
Craige Whitton
I think the creativity of it of the name is a north from Adelaide to Darwin. Yeah. And along when we first started we were obviously servicing Alice Springs, Katherine and Tennant Creek on the way through.

00:41:00:17 - 00:41:01:23
Daniel Franco
So it was born out of the name.

00:41:02:11 - 00:41:07:24
Craige Whitton
It was born out of Adelaide effectively as servicing the Adelaide to into line.

00:41:07:24 - 00:41:07:28
Craige Whitton
And.

00:41:08:08 - 00:41:24:11
Craige Whitton
On the basis of the fact that most people saw that as remote, most people saw that as difficult. Yeah, you know, doing things like Sydney to Melbourne or Adelaide to Melbourne or whatever wasn't perceived to be difficult, whereas anything in the NT was perceived to be.

00:41:24:11 - 00:41:25:08
Daniel Franco
Through the Red Desert.

00:41:25:16 - 00:41:26:13
Craige Whitton
That's exactly wrong.

00:41:26:13 - 00:41:26:17
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:41:26:26 - 00:41:49:24
Craige Whitton
And then expansion sort of came on the back of customers where say the Brisbane came as the next about four or five years later and on the basis that we were servicing a is brewing from Brisbane to Darwin. And so from that perspective that's how the company name got into the Brisbane market and, and eventually into the other markets around Australia.

00:41:50:11 - 00:42:21:09
Daniel Franco
Premium premium. So we earlier you said get the right people in and culture. So I'm very interested in the cultural piece. What and you know, and in all conversations today that you and I have had have proven to me that you have a firm eye on, on the cultural piece within the organization. What is it, you know, from things like driving from depot to depot and what is it that is about your culture that you believes different?

00:42:21:09 - 00:42:21:23
Daniel Franco
Oh, great.

00:42:21:24 - 00:42:57:23
Craige Whitton
I think the underlying family values provide that that that benefit that everybody sees in wanting to be a member of the team, whether that's a local team or a national team. And and so from that perspective, you know, we provide the flexibility and we look after people and, you know, they want to come to work for us. Ultimately, as part of that strategic plan, I was talking about, we're doing an EVP, PSA, employee value proposition, but mostly because particularly during COVID, there was a lot of challenge around staff turnover.

00:42:58:17 - 00:43:27:27
Craige Whitton
You know, we had situations where companies like some of the bigger companies, not even direct competitors to us, but like a a Coles distribution center, when COVID was hitting, they might have had a thousand staff working there. And if they had 10% not turned up because of COVID that have 100 people not turning on, which is a big deal, whereas for us in one of those depots might have only been ten or 15, not the reality of that was they started doing things like paying silly money on a per hour basis.

00:43:27:27 - 00:43:44:04
Craige Whitton
And, and you can understand why those guys that are in those jobs wanted to take those opportunities. I was it has been a tricky time and what we've wanted to do is focus on well, for those staff that are new to us, why did you come to join us? What did you see and why did you want to come?

00:43:44:12 - 00:44:14:24
Craige Whitton
And for those that have been with us for a while, why have you stayed? And so we can understand what those triggers and those levers and those things that are important to them and make sure that our employee value proposition actually represents those things that are important to those people. I think some of our stats are that out of the 600 odd staff, there's more than 100 that have got ten years service and then there's another 50 on top of that that have got five years or more service.

00:44:14:24 - 00:44:35:03
Craige Whitton
So there's a really good tenure of people that that have stayed with the business for a very long time. That stability makes a really big difference in the culture piece and the structure piece. And it means that people understand what you expect of them. Yeah. And then they are passing that on through their levels of, of their business.

00:44:35:03 - 00:44:53:09
Craige Whitton
So, you know, the AVP survey that was not long ago completed, I think our engagement score was around 77%, which from our industry side is pretty good. And, but, but you know, you still want to get that to 80 or 85 or whatever, you know, wherever you can try to improve.

00:44:53:09 - 00:45:09:18
Daniel Franco
Absolutely. So the blue collar industry is definitely one that sees cultures as like this soft pacing and kumbaya. Have you managed to get through to your messaging through and your communications through? This is what we're creating. This is the culture that we're trying to achieve.

00:45:10:26 - 00:45:24:05
Craige Whitton
The challenges that come with some of those things is those guys are not necessarily whilst they're electronically connected with their own mobile phone, they're not necessarily connected to logging on and checking emails or getting information. They're on the.

00:45:24:05 - 00:45:24:22
Daniel Franco
Road, right?

00:45:24:25 - 00:45:43:08
Craige Whitton
That's right. They're either on the road or they're on a forklift or they're running around a facility. So so really the piece comes back to the leadership and it comes back to team meetings and toolbox meetings and and discussions and branch meetings for that matter, where the messages are being passed on and the messages are being passed through.

00:45:43:08 - 00:45:50:01
Craige Whitton
And, you know, we're also to add to the complexity that we're always trying to do an optimization project of some sort.

00:45:50:01 - 00:45:50:10
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:45:50:17 - 00:46:23:06
Craige Whitton
And that often means change for those guys. And we're not doing it this way anymore when they're doing it that way, you know, just changing the route management software the way that we send trucks out to do pick ups and deliveries and that that involves change in and, and you know, as part of rolling out that change, you know one of the things we did not that long ago was create our own project management office, our own PMO, and that that's really helped us get that level of sophistication into project management and making sure that the communication, because I think so much of it comes back to communication and sharing of the information and taking

00:46:23:06 - 00:46:41:29
Craige Whitton
their feedback. One of the comments we got from one of the forklift drivers in that AVP survey I talked about was when he was asked what else could we do? They said, Well, and I don't know who the individual was because I think that part of it was anonymous. But he said, Well, you can't do anything else because you're treating me like a king now by asking my opinion.

00:46:41:29 - 00:46:47:26
Craige Whitton
And you sort of think to yourself, Well, is it that simple? Yeah, But, you know, in some ways it actually is. They want to be heard.

00:46:48:00 - 00:46:48:09
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:46:48:17 - 00:46:57:03
Craige Whitton
The best ideas to change, improve, innovate come from the floor. They come from those and they don't come from the corporate office.

00:46:57:13 - 00:47:27:18
Daniel Franco
Well, it's music to my ears. As you know, we are a consulting company that within change and specializes in in change and business transformation. And when you think about great organizational change, it is it is about setting up the project for success from the front end. Right. And, you know, Abraham Lincoln famously said, if you gave me 8 hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend 6 hours sharpening the sauce.

00:47:27:18 - 00:47:51:29
Daniel Franco
So it's very much around getting that front part right. And so we through our methodologies, we have our own framework which we follow, where we take businesses through that framework. And one of those key pillars in that framework is perspectives and understanding those perspectives of all those people right at the front line, the key stakeholders, the community, the customer, you name it, we gain this perspective and we pull it together.

00:47:51:29 - 00:48:10:02
Daniel Franco
And I think about I'll give you I'll give you a scenario and I think we may have talked about this last time. If you're at an intersection and there's a car accident in the middle of this intersection and and Craige, you're on one corner and I'm on the other, and we're both looking at this car accident and you saw the little black cat that ran across the road.

00:48:10:02 - 00:48:32:13
Daniel Franco
And I saw the gun, the mobile phone in the back, in the back and the back. We both saw the car accident from a different perspective. And yet none of us wrong about why occurred. So if we can draw out those perspectives and you said you often hear some stories that come out from that frontline that you go, wow, Like that's where some of our innovation can come from.

00:48:32:13 - 00:48:36:08
Daniel Franco
So it's about how do we draw that out from our teams I think is really important.

00:48:36:24 - 00:49:01:02
Craige Whitton
Totally agree. I think, first of all, I'm borrowing that and yeah, I really like that analogy. I think that's a ripper from my perspective. You have to have people have to listen. Yeah. And, and because perception is reality, right? Right. Perspective is reality, right? So we need to understand that otherwise you can't improve, you can change technologies as you want to, but it's not going to help someone.

00:49:01:12 - 00:49:26:26
Craige Whitton
There's no point doing it. Yeah. And you know, technology's quite important in the things that we do. You know, everyone expects to know exactly where every piece of freight that they've given us is and you know, where we could have 30 or 50,000 pieces of freight floating in our network at any given point in time, in any capital city or on a truck or on, you know, on a rail, in a rail container, on a rail line somewhere.

00:49:26:26 - 00:49:48:07
Craige Whitton
So, yeah, so yeah, I couldn't agree with you more that getting their feedback and getting the reality from from the guys that that matter. I mean, they're the ones that ultimately make or break your financial results. They're the ones that make or break your profit. They're the ones that make or break the service that you're providing. And that service is what is what you're selling.

00:49:48:14 - 00:50:22:14
Craige Whitton
And that service in our game at least, and that service is, is what will help you grow. So, you know, and that's the big key. And then when you know, we get Mother Nature often gets in the way and causes challenges that we have to deal with and that's when you find yourself doing rather than being. Yeah, when the rail lines going out or there's a fire or a flood or some other thing, you know, there's challenges central come, come running at us at those points in time and before you know it, you're not being able to deliver that service that you've promised or you're not able to deliver.

00:50:23:02 - 00:50:39:06
Craige Whitton
You know, what's expected of what you did last week because of these challenges that you're like. And again, communication's key communication with the staff, communication with the customers. And if you get those parts of it right, people can forgive when something goes wrong. I mean, we can't help what Mother Nature has done in those instances.

00:50:39:06 - 00:50:40:00
Craige Whitton
Fires, floods.

00:50:40:05 - 00:50:50:17
Craige Whitton
And everyone understands and knows as long as they know what's going on and when it will arrive, when it will be there, it allows them to make their own decisions and work around it accordingly.

00:50:50:18 - 00:51:10:07
Daniel Franco
And so you guys pride yourself. I mean, Northline prides itself on its customer service. In fact, you say it's kind of what sets you apart from that. What does that look like? I mean, you said communication and all the above is critical, but what great customer service look like in the logistics industry?

00:51:10:28 - 00:51:30:27
Craige Whitton
Yeah, that's a great it's a really good question. And from my perspective, it it is a personal service. So you won't call our customer service center and get asked to push one or push to you will get my take 10 seconds or whatever the number is for the call to get connected, but you will get to talk to a person.

00:51:31:16 - 00:51:54:14
Craige Whitton
Our phone numbers are available. Our names are on the website. I get emails from people from time to time who don't know me directly, but they have connected my email address up, my mobile phone number and the executive team's access is on our internet so staff can get hold of it and it gets given out to customers and my business card has my mobile number on it and I'll give it to them.

00:51:54:14 - 00:52:22:23
Craige Whitton
I'll give it to customers. And if there's a problem, if we don't know about it, we can't fix it. Yeah. So that really good customer services about the relationships you have with your customers and therefore the relationships you've had with your staff. And that's through good and bad because every relationship gets tested at one time or another. We have a customer service center here in Adelaide run by a terrific team of people that are all really focused on delivering the best possible outcomes for our customers.

00:52:23:00 - 00:52:48:10
Craige Whitton
And so, you know, I could say I don't have an exact number, but I could save hundreds of thousands of dollars by offshoring that to the Philippines or to India or something. But it just won't happen, right? Not under our watch. It's not going to happen because you want to talk to a human and you want to talk to someone that's here that knows what suburb is in this state as opposed to, you know, you know, some of those other people wouldn't know where Murray Bridge is or.

00:52:48:10 - 00:52:51:00
Craige Whitton
Yeah, well, no, we're Port Augusta region, whatever else, we're not.

00:52:51:00 - 00:52:51:24
Daniel Franco
Connected to the land.

00:52:51:24 - 00:53:12:03
Craige Whitton
Right, Exactly. So so from that perspective, we think that's really important. And you know, what we've been trying to do is improve the connections through technology to allow them to spend more time being proactive rather than reactive. We don't just want to talk to a customer when they want to know when they're going to get their freight. We want to talk to them to say, Hey, we're already ahead of the game.

00:53:12:03 - 00:53:26:00
Craige Whitton
It's already loaded. It's going to arrive tomorrow or the next day or whatever ahead of the time it's due and keep people in the loop as opposed to having to respond to something after an event. And that's it's the proactive sort of thing we're really focused on right now.

00:53:26:00 - 00:53:43:27
Daniel Franco
Do you from a customer service point of view, I think you talked about frontline staff truck drivers and the people who are who are actually freighting this. Do they have contact point with the customer as well? And how do you train train them, especially like the subcontractors? Probably more so than I'm interested in anything else.

00:53:44:05 - 00:53:44:12
Craige Whitton
That's.

00:53:44:12 - 00:54:04:24
Craige Whitton
A real challenge is they're not necessarily a direct cook. And and our business model is that we tend to use our own employees in our own trucks in the regional locations where there's not a pool of subcontractors. So in a Darwin or Alice Springs, Cairns, Townsville, McCoy, they're our guys. Employee in our, in our vehicles that we own.

00:54:04:24 - 00:54:35:21
Craige Whitton
But in the capital cities they are subcontractors. Yeah. So that, that, that challenges exactly as you said it is exactly it is. And we've probably got four or five touchpoints with our customers because we've got customer service in the effectively in a call center environment. We've got salespeople who in every customer with us, he's allocated a sales rep of some sort, whether they are someone based in an office or whether they're people that are on the road going out to visit every customer is he's connected to a salesperson.

00:54:36:02 - 00:55:01:05
Craige Whitton
Then you've even got people, you've got your people in fleet control that are organizing the pick up or deliver. They are a touchpoint, the drivers are touchpoints and of course even the people that are collecting the money that we're owed are a touchpoint. Yeah, So that customer service ethos and that has to be shared not just through them, those five touchpoints, but through the broader business to make sure that everyone understands and to do that.

00:55:01:05 - 00:55:23:03
Craige Whitton
A number of years ago, we created a concept called connectivity, and it looks like a whole bunch of squiggly lines in a lot of ways when you see it as part of some of the the sort of branding that we do in the in the offices, but in underneath it, it actually has every postcode within Australia listed in there and the name of the suburbs.

00:55:23:03 - 00:55:35:10
Craige Whitton
So that it just shows that we can go anywhere, anytime, you know, to any location. So so what we try to do is connect our customer with their customer, and that's what we mean when we're talking about it.

00:55:35:10 - 00:56:05:12
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. Yeah, I love it. The one to go back. Just touch on change for a second. I think this will lead into a conversation around leadership. And you did this Oxford course recently, which I'm very keen on picking your brain on, but there's a lot of change going on in the world at the moment. The I think as a leader, as a CEO, there's more shiny objects in the world that you can sort of grab on to and pick and choose from than ever before.

00:56:05:12 - 00:56:25:13
Daniel Franco
AI's changing the way things are done. How do you as a leader, manage your appetite when it comes to, you know, and then I'm just going to tie the line, stick with the strategy. There's something new I'm going to run over. And how do you avoid the fear of missing out or, you know, you get what I'm.

00:56:25:18 - 00:56:26:05
Craige Whitton
Absolutely.

00:56:26:05 - 00:56:44:02
Craige Whitton
Get what you're saying and I think is probably the best example in that space. We are we are actually trialing our first use of, I'm sure the terminology bot. Yeah, we're using one of those right now for the first time to look to replace some sort of repetitive back office type of task.

00:56:44:02 - 00:56:44:09
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:56:45:12 - 00:57:15:15
Craige Whitton
But at this point in time it's not really in use in a physical sense, in a depot. I'm sure that time will come. Yeah, but for the time being, you know, you're right. That is something that becomes a project. And for us, other things that fit into that space are things are in climate change and sustainability where there are big challenges on the global sense as to where are we going as a as a global global economy and as you know, as places where people live.

00:57:15:24 - 00:57:27:03
Craige Whitton
What are we doing about? And, you know, from my perspective, there's some long, long time horizons that people have to, you know, sort of chip away at. That's not something that there's one easy. Yes.

00:57:27:03 - 00:57:27:16
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:57:28:00 - 00:57:52:27
Craige Whitton
But but as new technologies emerge and technology is the easiest space where the shiny objects distract you, there's no doubt that that's way you know, from our perspective, once we've set up the strategy and the structure, we've got the projects going through the project management office that allows us to be able to keep those things on track and allows a small number of people to get distracted to see, is there something else that we should be looking at?

00:57:53:09 - 00:57:55:22
Craige Whitton
And they're usually more senior execs that are doing them.

00:57:55:22 - 00:57:56:07
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

00:57:56:26 - 00:58:17:08
Daniel Franco
I think this is the the electric is the big shiny object also that's out there in the market at the moment. And there's apparently there's a company here in South Australia or in Australia somewhere that is has the ability to convert diesel and petrol into electric vehicles so you don't have to go out and buy an electric vehicle.

00:58:17:08 - 00:58:44:12
Daniel Franco
We can actually just convert the motor for you. Okay. It's that sort of shiny object that when do you make that call of, of the conversion is like because you're so reliant on everything else that comes with the roads being up to date, the charging points being up to date is this talk of swapping go as as it happens from an electric point of view, you're obviously your hands are tied, isn't it, from an environmental point of view, an emissions point of view.

00:58:44:12 - 00:59:18:07
Craige Whitton
Certainly from a nation's point of view, using rail as a mode of transport is a far better one. Then by using road because it uses less emissions and it can carry more. And the rail companies are very proactive in that space around sharing information. Electric vehicles are still in their infancy when it comes to trucks. There is some trials going on out there, but when you need vehicles to cover 500, 800, a thousand kilometers in a day, electric doesn't cut it, unfortunately, or not yet.

00:59:18:13 - 00:59:35:20
Craige Whitton
Now that time will come, that's going to come from the batteries more than come from anything else. I reckon in the bigger vehicle sense, it'll skip electric and end up with hydrogen. I know it's a lot of busses and a lot of other vehicles like that have gone to hydrogen and we're expecting that that's where it will end up.

00:59:36:06 - 01:00:03:11
Craige Whitton
And for the time being to get around that we do other things like partnership with other charities and other companies where we can use either electric or where, for example, we will do some works that will divert the products from going into landfill, that will allow us to make sure that we're keeping our emissions footprint as low as possible on the way through, because there's no doubt the industry, Waring, is in the mirror.

01:00:03:20 - 01:00:20:29
Craige Whitton
So, you know, you can't just stick your head in the sand and pretend it's going to solve itself because it's not. Yeah, you just got to do all the small things along the way to make sure you're doing your bit. And as the as the technology gets to those points, then you've got to do you've got to do the investigation and eventually an investment to make sure that it happens.

01:00:21:00 - 01:00:34:15
Craige Whitton
Yeah, but for the time being, it's still probably more expensive to be clean than it is to be dirty. And that's the reality of where we are at this point in the cycle. But we're wanting to do our bit along with everybody else. Yeah.

01:00:35:02 - 01:00:53:06
Daniel Franco
I mean, there's only so much you can do, right? Cash is keen, You can. So that's the we always keep coming back to that. So let's jump into this Oxford leadership program that you, you just recently returned from. It was a couple of weeks ago now a month or so ago, another year.

01:00:53:12 - 01:00:54:28
Craige Whitton
Yes, I was there in June.

01:00:54:28 - 01:00:55:13
Daniel Franco
In June.

01:00:55:21 - 01:00:56:16
Craige Whitton
Three weeks of June.

01:00:56:22 - 01:00:59:27
Daniel Franco
So you it was a leadership and management course.

01:01:00:04 - 01:01:03:04
Craige Whitton
Advanced management and leadership program. Yeah. Yeah.

01:01:03:13 - 01:01:05:24
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. What were the key takeaways.

01:01:06:10 - 01:01:07:26
Craige Whitton
Oh gee, there's so many them.

01:01:07:26 - 01:01:18:08
Daniel Franco
Well, just looking back now and thinking to yourself, you know, that was one thing that absolutely changed the way in which I think about leadership.

01:01:18:08 - 01:01:42:23
Craige Whitton
We've already touched on it. Sort of the being this is doing aspect was something I wrote down, I think on my first day when I was there, and I've referred to it and reflected back on that concept a lot, and that means sitting up my day differently and that means setting up the way I operate with my team differently and really making sure we're concentrating on the bigger picture far more than what I was before I went away.

01:01:42:23 - 01:01:47:12
Daniel Franco
So let's let's jump into that. Setting up your day. What does that look like?

01:01:47:12 - 01:02:05:12
Craige Whitton
So, I mean, I'm lucky enough to have someone that that assists me on a on a day to day basis with getting all that comes out that I need getting calendar entries or whatever done not. That's one of the things that I love. And what keeps me really on my toes is that no two days are over the same.

01:02:05:12 - 01:02:22:15
Craige Whitton
You know, today I'm here with you and I'm meeting with our bankers later on today, you know, whereas on Tuesday I was with the customer and on on Wednesday I was with the sales guys. So, you know, from that perspective, you know, no two days are the same. And it's really about where I see where my focus needs to be.

01:02:22:15 - 01:02:50:11
Craige Whitton
And right now, given the economic challenges that have been going on, my time is being spent more sort of mentoring and engaging with the sales team so I can get more messages from the field about what the customers are telling us, what they're hearing, what they're feeling, what the volumes look like in the lead up to Christmas and beyond, and understanding what that and the implications of that so that we can make sure we got the operations and the sort of back of our stuff.

01:02:50:11 - 01:03:19:25
Craige Whitton
Okay. So at the moment, I'm spending way more time in that space than I have previously. And ultimately we're a sales based business, so that's where I should be spending more of my own. You know, I think in terms of takeaways from being on the course prior where you want to spend your time linking that to the strategic plan and and really making sure that you have enough time to think and enough time to plan.

01:03:19:25 - 01:03:47:28
Craige Whitton
It have been the biggest issues that I've taken away out of it. But I was really pleasantly surprised that what I saw and what I heard, there was 40 people on the course from 21 countries and 22 different industry sectors, heaps of diversity. And I haven't spent three weeks with people from Nigeria and Botswana and South Africa and Oman and all of these sort of countries of the world.

01:03:47:28 - 01:04:21:05
Craige Whitton
I haven't spent that amount of time with people from those different cultures ever and to hear their perspectives and understand their problems compared to what we have in Australia, you know, gee, we're so lucky in Australia and and in Adelaide, even more so than broader Australia. We are so lucky and we do so many things so well. That was one of my takeaways, is that we've got to do more of what we are doing, whether it's technology people, whatever happens to be, we get most things right and we can't, we can't think that we're not and that everything else is better.

01:04:21:05 - 01:04:25:06
Craige Whitton
Or the grass on the other side of the road is green. It is ultimately, it's actually not.

01:04:25:14 - 01:04:27:28
Daniel Franco
What was one of those things that you heard that you just saw? Wow.

01:04:28:00 - 01:04:29:05
Craige Whitton
Well, when.

01:04:29:05 - 01:04:55:15
Craige Whitton
You were hearing about the challenges in the organization structures that some of those people were working with, you sort of sit back and you go, okay, well, I would probably do it this way or I would probably do it that way. And you say, well, that, you know, some of those things are pretty straightforward. But when you hear about some of the problems, that's what really you go, oh, well, you know, there was a lady in South Africa who was describing to me the problems that they have to deal with, with energy that's rationed every day.

01:04:55:27 - 01:05:12:08
Craige Whitton
And they never know from one day to the next how many hours worth of energy they're going to get. How much power are they going to have to run a manufacturing plant tomorrow? Could be 4 hours, could be 3 hours, could be 5 hours. They don't know. And to try to work your way through that every day, she talk about a wicked problem.

01:05:12:08 - 01:05:14:12
Craige Whitton
You know, I like that. That would bend your head out of shape.

01:05:14:15 - 01:05:16:21
Daniel Franco
Yeah. They do have lots of problems over there.

01:05:16:23 - 01:05:28:21
Craige Whitton
All they really do say, you know, you can understand why, why, why They have some of the other problems that flow off from some of those things. But, you know, it just reminded me how lucky we are as much as anything else.

01:05:29:25 - 01:05:43:15
Daniel Franco
You alluded to earlier, you said how I structure my day and how do I work with my executive team. What what's changed around the way in which you work with your executive team? How do you structure that now?

01:05:43:24 - 01:06:03:08
Craige Whitton
So we've got a fairly small executive team. We deliberately run it with a CEO, our CFO and myself, and I'd like to describe that as a horizontal structure. Mm hmm. We get together once a week and that's it. We allocate an hour, an hour and a half a week, and the rest of it is if we need to on a phone call.

01:06:03:08 - 01:06:21:21
Craige Whitton
Otherwise we can go days without necessarily talking to each other or coming across each other. And each week after we've had our meeting, we connect up with other key parts of the business. So once, once a month we would meet with, had a once a month, the head of sales once a month, the head of the international business and so on.

01:06:21:21 - 01:06:39:24
Craige Whitton
And we give them an hour of our time after hour and a half to hear with their challenges or problems or whatever else what other help we need from them. And then, you know, so that's the way that that allows us to get on with doing all the other things that we need to do and not just getting caught up in meetings between the three of us.

01:06:39:24 - 01:06:43:24
Craige Whitton
We don't like meetings and we really try to avoid them. If we can help it.

01:06:43:24 - 01:06:44:06
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

01:06:45:23 - 01:07:06:08
Daniel Franco
So I think you mentioned to me on this course as well, there was an expert negotiator that was on that was invited to speak to the to the cohort as well as Toto Wolff, which is the Mercedes Formula One chief, can you Well, any insights from those two? I mean.

01:07:07:07 - 01:07:19:06
Craige Whitton
Those we had a guest speaker once a week coming and in the first week it was the lady who was the chief negotiator for kidnap and ransom for Scotland Yard.

01:07:19:15 - 01:07:19:29
Daniel Franco
Yeah, well.

01:07:19:29 - 01:07:25:02
Craige Whitton
And, you know, she was she looked like somebody Nana.

01:07:25:04 - 01:07:27:18
Craige Whitton
Right? So and that's.

01:07:27:18 - 01:07:46:10
Craige Whitton
Just a visual, I suppose I'm trying to give you. But she, she, she, you know, don't judge a book by its cover. Right. Like when you looked at her, you would never have expected that. But once she started talking, I think I wrote down 14 points in the hour and a half that she was speaking about ways to improve negotiation and how you go about it.

01:07:46:22 - 01:08:04:19
Craige Whitton
And and she was she was hilarious in the end, but had this sort of steely resolve, you could sense it in the way that she was speaking and just a, you know, a wonderful human being. And, gosh, what a tough job because the consequences of what she gets right and what she doesn't get right are pretty big there.

01:08:04:20 - 01:08:30:18
Craige Whitton
Often someone's loss is huge. And Toto Wolff, he was another one of the speakers. Well, he was it was very well received. And, you know, he drove from London to Oxford to give us two and a half hours of his time, and they called it a fireside even. That was like 35 degrees outside in London. And, and, you know, we just talked about leadership and management, his style and what's worked.

01:08:30:18 - 01:08:33:19
Craige Whitton
And what's not. Everyone kept trying to drag him into the particular.

01:08:33:19 - 01:08:34:04
Craige Whitton
Race.

01:08:34:22 - 01:08:53:21
Craige Whitton
In Abu Dhabi, I think it was. And everyone wanted all the details about what happened and how it went down. I think was an Australian official that ruled against them in that sense. Yeah. So I Aussies weren't his favorite favorite group of people, but he's an impressive guy. He really is an impressive guy to listen to. And he from.

01:08:54:09 - 01:08:57:19
Daniel Franco
What was one of the points that you wrote down from a negotiation point of view.

01:08:57:27 - 01:09:07:27
Craige Whitton
It was the first things you need to in any conversation is listen so that you can understand what someone else's position is, what they're looking for, why they're doing what they're doing.

01:09:08:01 - 01:09:08:26
Daniel Franco
With perspective, right?

01:09:08:28 - 01:09:24:01
Craige Whitton
Correct And one of the guys that that works for us has always said to me, a 75 year old guy with I've always heard from him, you've got two years and one math and make sure you use them in that proportion.

01:09:24:05 - 01:09:29:16
Daniel Franco
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I love that one. So you were asked to write a poem as well?

01:09:29:27 - 01:09:30:07
Craige Whitton
Yes.

01:09:30:17 - 01:09:33:11
Craige Whitton
I think that was the most confronting thing I've done for a while.

01:09:33:23 - 01:09:37:24
Daniel Franco
Can you explain the the can you explain what you had to do.

01:09:38:02 - 01:09:38:11
Craige Whitton
At, the.

01:09:38:11 - 01:10:09:19
Craige Whitton
End of the course to sort of reflect on your time there? We had to write a poem or a statement called Why I laid. And in a way it almost got a little bit emotional towards the end of it. But and then you had to stand up in front of the 40 members of the cohort and you had to read twice the first time because everyone would be a little bit nervous and and there would have been a few cobwebs and whatever else that you had to get off your chest and and deal with the emotions of getting it out.

01:10:09:19 - 01:10:27:03
Craige Whitton
And then the second time was really to enjoy, I suppose, as much as anything else, getting this out. So yeah, we spent three or 4 hours one day with everybody going through one by one reading out their poems. Mine wasn't so good at rhyming that sort of poetry creative side is not really maybe poetry.

01:10:27:06 - 01:10:28:21
Daniel Franco
Poetry doesn't need to rhyme.

01:10:29:05 - 01:10:37:07
Craige Whitton
Well, it of course you're right. But that was. That was how I was focused when I was trying to do this at like 10:00 at night. Yeah.

01:10:37:07 - 01:10:44:27
Daniel Franco
Hundred. I'm amateur poet. That's the that goes for the rhyming. So why do you lead?

01:10:45:26 - 01:11:11:21
Craige Whitton
Well, ultimately, at the end of that process, that's where my reflection had come to around giving back. And so I'd been lucky enough and privileged enough to learn. We talked about role models over the course of today I've been able to learn from other role models and people have given me their time and their experience. And I think I got to the point of saying, well, you know, I laid to make it a better organization.

01:11:11:21 - 01:11:41:16
Craige Whitton
I lead to make better people within that organization. But now I think I'm going to lead to give more back, give more back of my time, give more in my experience. And like I've already said, I think that's to develop leaders, but it's also to develop better humans. And I want to make sure that includes helping other people, whether in not for profits or whether it's my own children or their friends or, you know, my my wife or whoever to help those people get and do the things that they want to do out of life as well.

01:11:41:16 - 01:11:46:16
Craige Whitton
And I have the opportunity to be able to do that so damn well. That's the way I sort of looked at it at the end.

01:11:48:00 - 01:11:49:20
Daniel Franco
It's not for the faint hearted, though, is it?

01:11:50:01 - 01:11:52:11
Craige Whitton
Well, I think that.

01:11:52:11 - 01:12:17:23
Craige Whitton
It's everyone's different, right? And you always end up having to make some tough decisions along the way and at any senior leadership role. And you can affect course of someone's career or you can affect the course of someone's life almost in a way. So you want to make sure that you've really thought those things through and that you're having conversations with people along the way to make sure they know where they stand.

01:12:17:24 - 01:12:30:00
Craige Whitton
And that can be good, bad or otherwise. You know, I introduced the concept when I was at Oxford to a group of people in one the meetings about a shit sandwich they hadn't heard before, you know, So make sure you've got something good at the beginning.

01:12:30:00 - 01:12:33:01
Craige Whitton
And something good at the end and deliver the message in the middle, you know?

01:12:33:03 - 01:12:40:14
Craige Whitton
So you and of course, that's an Aussie colloquialism, if you like. So that, you know, that went down a treat and as a few people from different countries.

01:12:40:14 - 01:12:41:07
Craige Whitton
Using that now.

01:12:42:07 - 01:13:04:21
Daniel Franco
So as a leader you have been quoted to say that you know you're there to fill the potholes and knock down the hurdles for your team and all of the above. I as a leader and CEO of a of a business as well, have a remarkable team, I think, of which these people are so much smarter than me.

01:13:05:06 - 01:13:05:29
Craige Whitton
Absolutely.

01:13:06:02 - 01:13:20:24
Daniel Franco
So so how do I position myself or how do we position ourselves in the way of removing hurdles when they're already super intelligent and smart and practical and all the above, right? Like, how do you play that role?

01:13:21:19 - 01:13:44:08
Craige Whitton
I think the way to play that role is, is to listen, you know, don't stay at your desk. Now you've got to get out and go to hear from people. What are what's getting in there wise because you can't know everything that's going on in a business every day. So from my perspective, it's about hearing and understanding and and making sure the culture in the environment such that people will tell you.

01:13:44:17 - 01:14:05:25
Craige Whitton
So walk to the to the customer service center and and hear from those people, see what the waiting time for calls are. Understand why the call was up. Is there a service problem in Melbourne or Sydney or something that I didn't know about this morning? Yeah. And make sure that where you can you eliminate those so that everything else keeps running.

01:14:06:25 - 01:14:10:12
Daniel Franco
And you are you always got the strategy in your head. Is that why you think.

01:14:10:12 - 01:14:23:25
Craige Whitton
You have to. And and I hate bureaucracy and I hate politics I haven't got time for either of those things. I don't mean politics in the true sense of the world. I mean office politics and those things that can go and also get all that.

01:14:24:05 - 01:14:24:27
Craige Whitton
Having said that, the.

01:14:24:27 - 01:14:36:05
Craige Whitton
Water cooler can help sometimes. But but from my point of view, we haven't got time or energy to lose on on politics and bureaucracy. You need to make sure those things don't exist hundred percent.

01:14:37:01 - 01:14:42:04
Daniel Franco
So on reflection, you're saying communication is key.

01:14:42:04 - 01:14:42:21
Craige Whitton
Is king.

01:14:42:27 - 01:14:43:26
Craige Whitton
Is king really.

01:14:43:26 - 01:14:55:06
Craige Whitton
Is it's key. It's king listening and communicating. And, you know, that's how you're going to get change to happen. That's how you're going to transform things that you want to transform.

01:14:55:14 - 01:15:18:20
Daniel Franco
How do you, as a company know, like, you know, we go back to the shiny things that keep popping up left, right and center, you know, And yes, you're right, crystal balling. If you're looking at ten years and above three years, not so much. But do you review your strategy every year and go right or in the moment and you say, actually, we need to change this now?

01:15:18:20 - 01:15:20:24
Daniel Franco
This is just this is things have changed now.

01:15:21:18 - 01:15:47:12
Craige Whitton
If if that happens, yes, we do. For example, we actually removed annual budgeting few years ago because we said it. Things can change, can be quite volatile. You know, we end up having to do a effectively a weekly profit and loss statement in our business so that we know because the volatility can be a five or 10% swing in revenue from one week to the next, because we don't know everything that's going on in every one of our customers businesses, right?

01:15:47:12 - 01:16:05:28
Craige Whitton
So from our perspective, we do a forecast and we update that forecast every quarter so that we can know we've won that work, we've lost that work. We've we you know, this is change that's changed and you can make sure you're you chasing you're chasing a target that's real. Yeah. 12 months down the track or 11 months down the track, it's not the same.

01:16:06:12 - 01:16:19:18
Craige Whitton
So so if we have to, we are very agile in that perspective and we can change, you know, on the spin of a coin basically. And we, we do do that where we need to.

01:16:19:18 - 01:16:53:25
Daniel Franco
So you've been at the helm for 15 years now and gone through what is a global financial crisis in 2008, you then went through COVID and now there's talk of a recession again in 12 to 24 months. What's your experience in this? Let me ask this in a different way. What is your thought on the potential recession that is coming based on your experience?

01:16:54:27 - 01:17:27:00
Craige Whitton
So I like to describe our business as a barometer of what's happening in the economy because if people are buying or if people are having things made or if they're building or they're whatever, they do need items of, tray items, transport or moved around. So I think we're a barometer. Yeah. And when the GFC came towards the end of 2008, when the GFC already hitting other countries, we were still traveling will come the beginning of 2009.

01:17:27:08 - 01:17:48:09
Craige Whitton
It all fell into a heap and what I was able to reflect on there was that people had used up all the inventories they had in their warehouses or factories or whatever else first, and then had just stopped reordering because they weren't having the demand for their goods and services. And so that meant it was lighter to heat and lighter to come back as well.

01:17:48:22 - 01:18:08:08
Craige Whitton
But now what seeing is I'm seeing a definite and covered, I suppose I would say we were a beneficiary in all reality. Yeah, our industry was a beneficiary because the supply chain interruptions and all the other things that happened, everybody ordered more, everybody built more, everybody did more of everything.

01:18:08:08 - 01:18:13:02
Daniel Franco
People weren't going on. The big $30,000 holidays while spending it on around the house, right?

01:18:13:03 - 01:18:26:22
Craige Whitton
That's exactly right. And you could we could say that except for the very first sort of four or five weeks that went from part of March through to sort of close to the end of April 2020. That period of time was a little bit scary.

01:18:26:24 - 01:18:28:05
Daniel Franco
It was a deer in the headlights almost.

01:18:28:06 - 01:18:46:01
Craige Whitton
That's wrong. Everybody was a bit like that. But really, from May 2020 onwards, you could just see the volumes changing. We had we got customers who do home gyms and you can just imagine the volumes of work that we were doing for them. And we're doing work for a rice company. You know, you just can't imagine how much of that was being moved around toilet paper.

01:18:46:24 - 01:19:07:06
Craige Whitton
Yeah, exactly. So that was just so much of those types of volumes. Now I look at it, there is no question that there are a drop in the volumes going in and out of the ports across Australia. And so the importing and exporting volumes are definitely lower than where they were, but I think they've already hit the lowest part of where they're going to go.

01:19:07:06 - 01:19:37:27
Craige Whitton
So from my perspective, I think I think interest rates will stay where they are for the time being. The inflation genie is not quite in the bottle, but it's not not far off. I think find come 2024 that things will slowly start to improve. I don't think it'll be a quick turnaround, but I think that the once inflation's under control, interest rates can start to be cut again rather than increased, and I think that'll generate and stimulate the demand that that'll require.

01:19:37:28 - 01:19:57:06
Craige Whitton
I can already, you know, the building industry generally is still in construction, industry is generally still pretty strong. I think retail is probably suffering the most. And you know, it'll be interesting to see how the Christmas season goes in line with that and what they do around sales and discounts and otherwise to keep their volumes in demand going as they can.

01:19:57:07 - 01:20:01:15
Daniel Franco
What makes you think that it's at its now based on what data have you got for that?

01:20:01:15 - 01:20:33:13
Craige Whitton
So that's really based on the comments. I'm saying that based on conversations we're having with customers and based on the conversations that we're having with competitors and other people across a range of different industries to understand where they think it's at for their business. And and, you know, I had lunch with a customer on Tuesday and some of the you know, they're in the manufacturing space and from their perspective, they saw a drop in May, in May and June, but they've seen a peak up May, June and July, I should say.

01:20:33:19 - 01:20:44:26
Craige Whitton
They've seen a pick up come August and September. And I can reflect that in our own volumes and numbers going through our go through our business. So it seems to be like it's already started to slightly turn a corner.

01:20:45:16 - 01:21:06:11
Daniel Franco
So you're far optimistic than some people that I've spoken to in this book. There are some some people and I haven't had them on the show, but there are some people that believe it's coming in 12 to 24 months. I a bit further out. Yep. Given what you know, how would you prepare for a recession if it was to come?

01:21:06:11 - 01:21:08:17
Daniel Franco
How would you guys be thinking about it?

01:21:08:23 - 01:21:34:07
Craige Whitton
Well, from our perspective, it's really just a matter of making sure you've got the basics right so that even if your own customers volumes not the same as what they were, what you don't want to do is lose any customers in that process and you want to be able to be there for when the times are good or the times are better and the meantime just continue to push the organic sales growth to make sure that you can keep adding more customers to the pipe.

01:21:34:27 - 01:22:14:25
Craige Whitton
And at the same time, you know, have a look at all your overhead costs and systems and make sure that there is clean and and manageable as they as they can be. So, yeah, from our point of view, we've often been a bit countercyclical in that space too. Sometimes when things have been tough, we've found that we've generally our industry hasn't had the same pain that maybe some others have, and our strategy has been deliberate, that those customers are in all geographies so that if there is a downturn in one state, say, a mining downturn, that might affect way more than other places, that only has a small impact on us and equally all industry

01:22:14:25 - 01:22:26:18
Craige Whitton
sectors. So if retail is a bit off, the other sectors will still be going okay. So as a general rule, that keeps us in good stead other than the likes of GFC, when everyone in every industries in a world of pain.

01:22:28:19 - 01:22:34:14
Daniel Franco
For for those who aren't really essential service. So what's your advice to them?

01:22:35:22 - 01:22:36:09
Craige Whitton
Prefer your.

01:22:36:09 - 01:22:36:23
Craige Whitton
Customer.

01:22:36:23 - 01:22:43:16
Daniel Franco
Professional services like where those sort of services will get cut because they're nice to have as opposed to a must have?

01:22:44:06 - 01:23:10:12
Craige Whitton
I think you've got to know your customer and you got to know what's going in your customers business so that you can if there are those changes coming for your customer, what can you do to provide them? If it's professional services, what can you do to provide them the advice, the support, the run, the project or otherwise know what's happening with them and be ahead of the game with them so that you're providing them the support the whole way through.

01:23:10:13 - 01:23:29:21
Craige Whitton
You almost want to make it that that you are part of that team, even if you're an external. I agree and understand that it can an easy, easy cut or an easy saving to go about that. But ultimately you need to make yourself be part of that team, even from the outside that they need to rely on to deliver that.

01:23:29:21 - 01:23:54:25
Daniel Franco
Yeah absolutely beautiful. Yeah. I am conscious of your time so we're going to start to to wrap. I just I do want to ask a couple of questions in regards to I mean we touched on it earlier in regards to family and, and mental health. How do you switch off? What do you do for yourself?

01:23:56:08 - 01:24:25:22
Craige Whitton
Look, first of all, I've got a great family that helped me do that by, you know, just having interest in what the other people in your own family are doing, understanding what what. Yeah, you girls and in my case and your kids are up to and you are for matter in your broader family, great, great mates. You know there's there's a bunch of guys that we have a heated, heated tennis with supposedly once a week on the worst ten day of of all of them and they remind me of that from time to time.

01:24:26:18 - 01:24:46:15
Craige Whitton
But just making sure that, you know, I love I love football, I love sport generally. My kids have played a lot of basketball and a lot of netball. I've tried not to miss a game and, you know, I do things that most other people do in terms of my own exercise, even though it doesn't look like it. I actually do exercise most days.

01:24:46:24 - 01:24:47:10
Daniel Franco
In the same boat.

01:24:47:11 - 01:24:48:27
Craige Whitton
And that's.

01:24:48:27 - 01:24:50:22
Craige Whitton
The hardest thing I could get right to talk about a.

01:24:50:22 - 01:24:54:13
Craige Whitton
Management gel.

01:24:54:13 - 01:25:05:16
Craige Whitton
And so yes, I do my own exercise and that that to me is a great place that takes you to a great place. When you're exercising it, you don't concentrate or anything else but what you're doing at that point in that time.

01:25:05:17 - 01:25:10:25
Daniel Franco
It's almost a force was a form of meditation in its own right.

01:25:10:27 - 01:25:34:01
Craige Whitton
It's totally agree. And then other things, you know, whether it like I said, whether it's sport, whether it's even reading or gardening or otherwise, you know, there's all of those sorts of things. And I only had a coffee yesterday with Nick Lee and Tom Namie from Healthy Minds. And, you know, those guys are got some great content and producing some some wonderful things that we're looking at, including in leadership programs.

01:25:34:24 - 01:25:55:13
Craige Whitton
And, you know, just to provide people with the opportunities to to understand that, you know, yesterday was our UK day. So you have those conversations and have those discussions. And whilst it's a little bit gimmicky when it's around a particular day like that, if that's what it takes to force people to have those conversations and look out for other people, then so be it.

01:25:55:13 - 01:25:57:18
Craige Whitton
It's it's an important part of what we all need to do.

01:25:57:23 - 01:26:15:09
Daniel Franco
Yeah, I think it's one that you should ask yourself too. I don't think it was a great day for reflection for little ladies in looking at themselves and the way in which they apply. I think I know I did or my daughter actually played by the subsides of basketball yesterday and I took the day off to spend with her.

01:26:15:09 - 01:26:23:29
Daniel Franco
But yeah, there was a lot of reflection and then actually being on the tools and yeah, you're like, What do I need to do to get my health in order here?

01:26:23:29 - 01:26:40:04
Craige Whitton
And what you just said is so important. Having that day with her at that game, you never forget that you will always remember. And that's one thing I've learned is you have to you have to be there. You have to be part of it because, you know, being a parent is not not you're not doing it from the as a bystander.

01:26:40:04 - 01:26:41:28
Craige Whitton
You've Got to be there to be part of it.

01:26:41:28 - 01:26:43:28
Daniel Franco
Yeah, well, that's our first job right.

01:26:44:06 - 01:26:44:24
Craige Whitton
It is really.

01:26:45:09 - 01:26:47:04
Daniel Franco
Thing. And later a business is your second.

01:26:47:04 - 01:26:47:25
Craige Whitton
Job a very.

01:26:49:03 - 01:26:56:21
Daniel Franco
Very good right. Just before we jump into some quickfire questions, what does excite you about the future then?

01:26:57:03 - 01:27:21:14
Craige Whitton
Oh, look, just where where we as a business going and the things that we've got planned to help us grow and develop that include some technology, include some optimization programs and other things that really just going to make us a better business, make us a stronger competitor and allow us to sort of grow and develop and fly. So, you know, I love what I do.

01:27:21:14 - 01:27:27:11
Craige Whitton
I've loved every bit of the last 19 years and, you know, I'll continue to love it into the future.

01:27:27:22 - 01:27:32:24
Daniel Franco
Really, what your personal aspiration look like then?

01:27:33:17 - 01:27:34:24
Craige Whitton
Well, I think that's a bit.

01:27:36:11 - 01:27:59:21
Craige Whitton
You know, from my own point of view, first of all, about being a better person, right? So that being a better leader and that comes from that. But being a better person, being a better husband, being a better parent, being a better son, that's probably the one area I've you know, Dad's in Perth is 86 years old and I don't get to see him as often as anyone whose parents in the same state as them.

01:27:59:21 - 01:28:16:00
Craige Whitton
Right. So, you know, I definitely would like to think I could be better there and better as a as a son in law as well to my parents in law. So, you know, that's part of that giving back that I was talking about before. I think that there's there's a time and a place now for me to do more of that.

01:28:16:23 - 01:28:28:15
Craige Whitton
And, you know, make sure that the business is steady and strong and provide that stability in the leadership and and and provide that platform really to take it to the next level.

01:28:28:15 - 01:28:32:25
Daniel Franco
I love it. I think we all need to think about the last time we've caught our parents.

01:28:32:25 - 01:28:35:14
Craige Whitton
And it's a tough gig.

01:28:35:15 - 01:28:49:05
Daniel Franco
Absolutely right. So quick questions where big rate is here in creating synergy, personal development and growth is is core to what we do. I mean, what is there anything you're reading right now that's of interest.

01:28:49:24 - 01:29:15:09
Craige Whitton
This is two on the nightstand at the moment. One is called a bone effect which is written. It's a autobiography of David Walsh, who's the the guy who is the Tasmanian gambler who built and funded the mine, the Museum of Natural Art in Desy, and also a ride of a lifetime, Bob Iger from Disney. And he's CEOs and that's that.

01:29:15:09 - 01:29:25:16
Craige Whitton
I'm only partway into that. But that's a that seems like a great book. And we've taken the kids to Disneyland and Disney World a few times, so it's really connectable from my perspective.

01:29:25:16 - 01:29:37:04
Daniel Franco
Yeah, don't get onto that. Absolutely. Is there any book that you feel that stands out from the crowd, like from a personal growth and development point of view, something that you may have gifted more often than not?

01:29:38:04 - 01:29:46:01
Craige Whitton
Something that really came through to me was a book called The Resilience Project.

01:29:46:01 - 01:29:46:15
Craige Whitton
I don't know if.

01:29:47:22 - 01:29:48:20
Daniel Franco
I've seen them live.

01:29:48:20 - 01:29:49:09
Craige Whitton
Yeah, Oh yes.

01:29:49:09 - 01:30:04:20
Craige Whitton
Of oh, and we took the whole family and we bought some books. And he's just a real knockabout bloke who, you know, the way that he talks about empathy and gratitude, you know, he's just incredible really. I mean, you know, not taking for granted what you've got in front of your face.

01:30:04:20 - 01:30:05:03
Craige Whitton
Yeah.

01:30:05:21 - 01:30:28:22
Daniel Franco
Yeah. But that going back to my day with my daughter yesterday and the reflections that I had gratitude was one of those in which I need to sort of practice more. Right. So I, I used to do it all the time off the back of the Resilience Project. Actually was write three things down a day. And when I started that again this morning.

01:30:28:22 - 01:30:30:24
Craige Whitton
So yeah, yeah.

01:30:31:21 - 01:30:34:13
Daniel Franco
What's one lesson that is taking you the longest to learn?

01:30:34:29 - 01:30:38:04
Craige Whitton
We've talked about it a couple of times already today it's the being versus doing.

01:30:38:04 - 01:30:38:19
Daniel Franco
Yeah.

01:30:38:19 - 01:30:47:15
Craige Whitton
How do you not get sucked into being caught up in everything going on day to day. And that's the old adage of being on the business, not in the business.

01:30:47:26 - 01:30:50:06
Daniel Franco
What are you going to do in that space then?

01:30:50:21 - 01:31:10:10
Craige Whitton
Well, I've already started to change the way that I prioritize and change the way that I allocate my time in the calendar. So there are blocks of time allocated when I will be either in my office or I'll be wherever I need to be to be able to spend more time planning, thinking, strategizing, whatever room and whatnot.

01:31:11:21 - 01:31:15:16
Daniel Franco
If you could have coffee, one current or historical figure, who would it be?

01:31:16:01 - 01:31:21:27
Craige Whitton
Well, I'd have to toss up between a couple. Really? I'd love to have a coffee with Barack Obama.

01:31:21:28 - 01:31:27:10
Daniel Franco
I am. He's probably one of the most that we've recommended. I would say, yeah.

01:31:27:18 - 01:31:31:03
Craige Whitton
I probably the most impressive public speaker I've ever.

01:31:32:17 - 01:31:33:11
Daniel Franco
Him recently.

01:31:33:23 - 01:31:55:04
Craige Whitton
Well, now I listened to all of you that I loved on live to the casual. Yeah that's just a terrific terrific I'd love to have been there but and for me it's also really hard to go past. I'm a huge fan of Coldplay, so. Chris Coldplay. I'd probably rather have a drink with him than a coffee, but I reckon he's a he's a great guy.

01:31:55:06 - 01:32:00:20
Daniel Franco
I'm a prize, like my favorite. But they come only to Perth.

01:32:01:10 - 01:32:02:03
Craige Whitton
That's it's.

01:32:02:03 - 01:32:02:29
Daniel Franco
So frustrating.

01:32:02:29 - 01:32:05:01
Craige Whitton
It is, but we've secured tickets.

01:32:05:13 - 01:32:05:27
Craige Whitton
The concert.

01:32:06:00 - 01:32:09:19
Craige Whitton
So I get to go and see Dad in Perth and I get to go and see Coldplay.

01:32:09:19 - 01:32:11:17
Craige Whitton
Twice and sneaking in a trip.

01:32:11:17 - 01:32:12:28
Craige Whitton
To Margaret River while I'm there. So.

01:32:13:05 - 01:32:13:21
Craige Whitton
Well if you.

01:32:14:01 - 01:32:19:04
Daniel Franco
If you know anyone that can get me some tickets, I will be forever in your debt. Okay, I'll.

01:32:19:13 - 01:32:19:24
Craige Whitton
Get back.

01:32:19:24 - 01:32:19:28
Craige Whitton
To.

01:32:21:22 - 01:32:24:18
Daniel Franco
What is some of the best advice that you've ever received.

01:32:25:16 - 01:32:49:07
Craige Whitton
I think probably the single biggest advice again, I've already touched on in their conversation, but when my dad said to me, I think you're enjoying life a bit too much, I think it's time you got real and studied part time and worked full time to understand the privilege ahead of studying and and and really also the value of working and earning money and sort of paying for yourself on the way through.

01:32:49:07 - 01:33:00:09
Craige Whitton
So it I'm sure it wasn't an easy conversation for Dad to have with me, but it certainly resonated. And and I listen to him. I followed follow his advice and don't look back.

01:33:00:09 - 01:33:05:11
Daniel Franco
He's going to listen to this podcast and he's going to claim it all I was this is all me. This is the way.

01:33:05:16 - 01:33:10:00
Craige Whitton
I'll have to teach him a lesson. Yes, that's true.

01:33:10:00 - 01:33:12:12
Daniel Franco
Well, it's one habit that holds you back the most.

01:33:14:05 - 01:33:19:23
Craige Whitton
This would be of this could be quite comic around the office. Some people would say it's lunch.

01:33:21:12 - 01:33:22:11
Daniel Franco
I with you on that.

01:33:22:26 - 01:33:23:18
Craige Whitton
Some of the others.

01:33:23:18 - 01:33:24:20
Craige Whitton
Might say it's selective.

01:33:24:20 - 01:33:29:07
Craige Whitton
Hearing. At least maybe my family would say that. Yeah. Yeah.

01:33:29:12 - 01:33:43:03
Craige Whitton
Because that takes up time. Even though it's really important a lot of the time because you're doing it with customers. Staff Yeah, as you know, it's that connection I've been talking about. So yeah, it's just managing your time around it and I'm sure that's not helping the exercise habits I was talking about before. Well, I.

01:33:43:03 - 01:33:49:27
Daniel Franco
Think it's, it's also I know this is a real first world problem, right? But it's the one that goes with that one Lives is the.

01:33:50:03 - 01:33:50:18
Craige Whitton
Very much.

01:33:52:28 - 01:33:55:00
Daniel Franco
So. What's one of your biggest pet peeves?

01:33:56:20 - 01:33:59:09
Craige Whitton
Generally? I'd call it whingers.

01:33:59:15 - 01:34:00:21
Craige Whitton
Yeah, or.

01:34:00:21 - 01:34:03:08
Craige Whitton
People that come with problems and don't bring.

01:34:03:08 - 01:34:03:20
Craige Whitton
Solutions.

01:34:03:28 - 01:34:05:26
Craige Whitton
And then expect you to provide it for.

01:34:05:26 - 01:34:06:24
Daniel Franco
Them. Or worse.

01:34:06:24 - 01:34:07:05
Craige Whitton
Yet.

01:34:07:19 - 01:34:15:25
Daniel Franco
It actually creates I reckon it creates anxiety when they do that because you just think that because my brain goes straight into problem solving.

01:34:15:25 - 01:34:17:03
Craige Whitton
Yes, Correct. Yeah, Correct.

01:34:17:03 - 01:34:29:27
Craige Whitton
And that's actually that's one of the things I'm trying to improve is your reaction to those actually not your problem. Most standard answer these days is what would you do? What do you think we should do?

01:34:29:27 - 01:34:30:13
Craige Whitton
Yeah, what.

01:34:30:13 - 01:34:37:08
Craige Whitton
Would you recommend, you know, so that that people actually then stop coming to you with just a problem they come with the solution as well.

01:34:37:08 - 01:34:44:07
Daniel Franco
Yeah, 100%. If You pay someone to do one of your chores. What year would it be?

01:34:44:22 - 01:34:53:14
Craige Whitton
Well, our house at least it's got a driveway that's about 40 or 50 meters long. So from my perspective, the emptying the bins.

01:34:53:22 - 01:34:55:05
Craige Whitton
Someone someone to take.

01:34:55:05 - 01:35:00:03
Craige Whitton
Them down the road and someone to bring them up again, because that in that sense, it be my gig on a Wednesday.

01:35:00:03 - 01:35:04:01
Daniel Franco
Me the long driveway. What's one word that you absolutely hate?

01:35:04:16 - 01:35:05:29
Craige Whitton
I don't like the word pivot.

01:35:06:05 - 01:35:12:01
Daniel Franco
Oh, yes. That's by far the most pivot and robust, I think.

01:35:12:07 - 01:35:16:06
Craige Whitton
Always give it to me is another word for failure. Yeah, I'm saying.

01:35:16:06 - 01:35:30:17
Daniel Franco
That we need to pivot. Yeah, I actually catch myself it now and I'm like, Oh, no, just forget that. I say the word pivot. What's the first thing you could do? It's a bit of a creepy question. What's the first thing that you could do if you became invisible?

01:35:31:21 - 01:35:33:08
Craige Whitton
Yeah, this could get really weird.

01:35:33:09 - 01:35:35:18
Craige Whitton
Could this one. But I think it.

01:35:35:18 - 01:35:39:28
Craige Whitton
Would be traveling first class on apply.

01:35:40:10 - 01:35:42:09
Craige Whitton
Following Coldplay on a so.

01:35:42:18 - 01:35:43:20
Daniel Franco
Yeah, that'd be cool.

01:35:43:21 - 01:35:45:11
Craige Whitton
Yeah, I reckon that's what it would be.

01:35:45:18 - 01:35:47:03
Daniel Franco
But you wouldn't want to be invisible.

01:35:47:03 - 01:35:49:16
Craige Whitton
Which I'm not. But I guess you'd want the food and drink.

01:35:49:29 - 01:35:50:07
Daniel Franco
Yeah.

01:35:52:11 - 01:35:54:21
Daniel Franco
So what's the most useless talent you have?

01:35:55:04 - 01:35:59:03
Craige Whitton
These go hand in hand air, guitar and air drumming.

01:35:59:25 - 01:36:00:27
Daniel Franco
Listening to Coldplay.

01:36:01:25 - 01:36:02:24
Craige Whitton
And for Father's Day.

01:36:02:24 - 01:36:11:04
Craige Whitton
I just got a just received from the from the girls and Justine A and they want an electronic drum kit so that I can actually turn it from air.

01:36:11:04 - 01:36:11:14
Craige Whitton
Into it.

01:36:11:21 - 01:36:12:29
Daniel Franco
You can actually hit something, correct?

01:36:12:29 - 01:36:15:18
Craige Whitton
Yeah. And apparently it'll be a good workout for me at the same time.

01:36:15:23 - 01:36:18:14
Daniel Franco
Fabulous. What's your favorite Coldplay song, by the way?

01:36:18:20 - 01:36:32:23
Craige Whitton
Oh, gosh, there is just so many. Yeah, I'm probably a big you know, if you if you go back I was always a big fan of yellow. Yeah yeah. But there's so many like it appears in every, every Spotify playlist I've got.

01:36:32:23 - 01:36:33:29
Daniel Franco
Yeah. And simple.

01:36:34:26 - 01:36:35:24
Craige Whitton
Fix use another good.

01:36:35:26 - 01:36:36:17
Daniel Franco
Excuse. My phone.

01:36:36:18 - 01:36:37:01
Craige Whitton
Is a pretty.

01:36:37:01 - 01:36:37:29
Craige Whitton
Hard one to go past.

01:36:37:29 - 01:36:41:17
Daniel Franco
That fix you is by far and away the song that I probably.

01:36:41:17 - 01:36:44:03
Craige Whitton
Just need a little bit longer to think of. Yeah, that I probably say that.

01:36:44:05 - 01:36:45:28
Daniel Franco
Yeah. And scientist, I don't mind.

01:36:46:00 - 01:36:55:11
Craige Whitton
I recommended a rip song. Yeah, just trying to think of the song that I've got on my alarm, but I think this is a great song. Major minus.

01:36:55:11 - 01:36:57:26
Craige Whitton
I don't know if you know that one, but it's a ripper.

01:36:57:26 - 01:37:08:21
Daniel Franco
I'll probably know the song, but not by title. Imagine minus are beautiful. And last but not least, my favorite question of this whole podcast is What's your best joke?

01:37:09:24 - 01:37:15:10
Craige Whitton
These are usually shockers that night and I get a call of absolute flogging from my family.

01:37:15:10 - 01:37:27:23
Craige Whitton
For most of these, you know, most of them are sayings more than jokes. But if I had to say a joke and this gets about inside the company from time to time, but and Dean Moore, who works for us, one of the boys.

01:37:28:08 - 01:37:29:02
Daniel Franco
I used to play cricket.

01:37:29:02 - 01:37:31:25
Craige Whitton
Against. Oh, yeah, you would have. Absolutely. Was there Kensington.

01:37:31:25 - 01:37:33:12
Daniel Franco
Brands? It was Torrance.

01:37:33:15 - 01:37:34:18
Craige Whitton
Northline, still a sponsor.

01:37:34:18 - 01:37:35:18
Craige Whitton
Of the Kensington brand.

01:37:36:24 - 01:37:39:18
Craige Whitton
You know, what's the best time to go to the dentist?

01:37:40:09 - 01:37:41:08
Daniel Franco
Oh, I don't know.

01:37:42:09 - 01:37:43:21
Craige Whitton
I'd say 30 to 30.

01:37:44:03 - 01:38:07:21
Daniel Franco
Brilliant. It's fun. I say to my daughters all the time. Brilliant. Thank you so much, Craige, for your time today. It's it's been a remarkable chat. Great journey. Your your journey over the years is is one and you lessons that you've learned over the time. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us. It's it's been it's been profound kudos to you and the team at northline, 40 years.

01:38:08:06 - 01:38:15:02
Daniel Franco
You can hang your hat on that. That's an amazing, amazing stuff. You know, we continue to watch you guys grow over the over the coming years.

01:38:15:14 - 01:38:17:03
Craige Whitton
Excellent. Thanks to Nick. Thanks for having.

01:38:17:03 - 01:38:35:17
Daniel Franco
Me. Appreciate it. Thanks, everyone. We'll catch you next time. Cheers. Thanks for listening to the podcast. So you can check out the show notes if there was anything of interest to you and find out more about us at Synergy IQ dot com. So to you. I am going to ask though, if you did like the podcast, you would absolutely mean the world to me.

01:38:35:17 - 01:38:46:10
Daniel Franco
If you could subscribe, write and review, and if you didn't like it, that's all right too. There's no need to do anything. Thank you, guys. All the best.