| "Robert Crawford, Chief
Executive of Scottish Enterprise is to resign in June 2004…Scottish Enterprise is now
geared towards helping Scotland meet the many new challenges it faces,...'The time will be
right for me to pursue new challenges elsewhere', he said." BBC
NewsOnline 6th June 2003 Dateline:
June 2004
It was his last day. Robert Crawford was moving on. At the door of the Scottish
Enterprise building he paused and looked back. It had been a hard shift, he reflected.
Four years work to turn the behemoth he’d inherited into a
dynamic-customer-facing-learning-organisation-fit- for-the-purpose-of-making-a-real-impact
on the nation’s economic development. Who knows, he pondered, at some point in the
future, Scottish Enterprise might actually meet a target that had been internally agreed
and not then missed by a mile.
Jimie the caretaker stood ready to lock up the building, Robert glanced at his
watch, 2.30 pm – home time. Jimmie offered the keys to Robert who locked up for the
last time. Don’t look back, he thought to himself as he strode away from the building
that had been home for the last four years. As he continued to stride away, not looking
back, he missed seeing the building creak, bend and then collapse in on itself.
Out on the Clyde, Robert’s new charge sat bright and solid on the
glittering water. They’d said it couldn’t be built, this new transatlantic liner
that was his new home. "Titanic Two" a state of the art tribute to the best
brains that Scottish Enterprise could muster. |
Robert supervised clearing the
lines and the mighty ship moved slowly into the deep channel, heading out into the North
Atlantic. What could go wrong? Robert thought to himself. Days later,
and as the spine of the ship finally gave way under the pressure of the million ton
iceberg Robert thanked God that he’d hurriedly resigned as Captain just after the
lookout had reported the presence of the big white thing to starboard.
He settled back into the last remaining lifeboat and wondered what the future
would bring and then something good happened. A hand appeared over the gunwale clutching a
copy of The Herald Appointments pages. That’s handy Robert thought as he grabbed the
proffered paper.
Too bad there wasn’t room on the lifeboat for the owner of the hand he
reflected, but sometimes outplacement just had to be seen as an opportunity…
Time for a change, Robert reflected, somewhere away from the "goldfish
bowl" of scrutiny. Fair do's, not many goldfish got paid £200k a year just for
swimming around, but still…
His eye was caught by an ad for consultants to work with Scottish Enterprise.
Robert smiled quietly to himself: time to make some serious money. |
