Sir John Harvey-Jones - a good egg

I think it is appropriate to raise a glass this evening to Sir John Harvey-Jones.

Sir John was a good egg.

One of the few business books that I have read from cover to cover was his "Making it happen - reflections on leadership". It starts with him as a young man in the navy, supervising the dismantling of a dockyard in Germany. His job was to take everything back to the UK as reparations. But he expressed his exasperation at such a stupid act, which actually "cleared the decks" for the German industrial renaissance, while saddling us Brits with shedloads of antiquated cack which was difficult to use.

Sir John was an absolute genius in bringing the business world down to earth and giving it a bit of flair. Margaret Thatcher hated him - which is an added attraction.

I wrote to him once I had read "Making it happen" to correct him on a point he made about King Canute. He said that Canute thought he could turn back the waves. According to legend, of course, he didn't. His courtiers thought he could and he sat in front of the waves and told them (the waves) to go back, in order to prove to the courtiers that he couldn't turn the waves back. I received a very genial reply from the great man.

One of my favourite little clips from BBC2's "Troubleshooter" was when Harvey-Jones visited a china factory - Churchill China. Despite oozing bonhomie, he found out the minute size of their annual design budget and, gob-smacked, announced "Right - let's go down the pub". This particular episode is now recalled with affection by the Chief Executive of Churchill China, Andrew Roper:

We were pretty scared,

But in came Sir John with his big grin, and we were instantly at ease.

His people skills would be the thing I remember him most for - he always liked a bit of a laugh.

He was also very perceptive. We were a good business when he first came, but we only had one person in our design department.

Sir John blew his top about this, and then said 'come on lads, let's go for a pie and a pint' [and talk about it].

We've got 22 in our design department now, so he must have been right.

He was a great man. It is very sad news to hear of his death.