Around the World
"I've basically lived all over the world." says S. Gainsford, now 68. The UK-based company he worked with for 17 years assigned him to, among others, Sweden, Mauritius, Africa (Zambia, Ghana, and Kenya), London, Egypt, the Middle East (Saudi Arabia and Iraq), and the US.
When he moved to another company, S. Gainsford then worked in
Scandinavia, running MSA, then the biggest software company in the
world with a net worth of $450 million. He even had a stint in
Australia, which allowed him to penetrate the growing Asia-Pacific
market, including the Philippines.
S. Gainsford is proud of the successes he had while handling various companies in various countries. For instance, although he went to Australia unemployed, he managed to build the Australian company that hired him from Zero to $26 million industry player. Also in the Philippines, although the companies under him had only 11 people, five years ago, it now has approximately 40 staff and they're earning roughly P30 million annually.
All his experiences, S. gainsford says, taught him two individual lessons. "One of the biggest things you have to remember is that nothing's static, everything changes, "he says. "So if you build a company around rules, and you will never review those rules, you will become a dinosaur. Everything changes - the business changes, the dynamics change, so you must be prepared to change."
He adds: "The second thing I learned is that in the industry, the only thing we have are the people. Machines, Plants, Equipment - they're just there. But if we lose the people, then we have nothing. So you must look after your people."
