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People & Opinion Utility Week community UTILITY WEEK | 28TH OCTOBER - 3RD NOVEMBER 2016 | 7 "We want a regeneration of our expertise in the nuclear industry." Prime minister Theresa May responding to a question on the first nuclear science degree apprenticeships at PMQs What's the most important lesson people should take away from your presentation? I think the most important thing is that good advertising is actually an incredibly skilled business. Communicating and per- suading people is very similar to a part of the jobs we do as safety professionals and yet very rarely do I ever meet anyone who is involved in both. We, the safety profes- sion, can learn a lot from advertisers. What has been your most successful or challenging experience in your career and what did you learn from it? The most challenging experience for me has been, and remains, people. I'm an engi- neer by training: my profession is governed by the laws of physics and chemistry, and the logical truths of mathematics. When things happen, they happen because of these laws, rules and truths. People, on the other hand, are completely variable. They can, and occasionally do, behave in ways that completely defy logic. Managing people has been the steepest learning curve of my career. It is one which I have not yet fully mastered and one I think that none of us will ever master completely. Identify five people you would invite to your dream dinner party and why? I'm assuming that you're looking for famous names, otherwise I'd chose my wife and kids. So… Donald Trump. Only joking. 1. Michael Palin – I'm a big Monty Python fan, plus he's a nice guy and his travel stories would be entertaining. 2. Dara O'Brian – Not only is he exception- ally funny, he's also highly intelligent and I think would make great conversa- tion. 3. Paul Howard – The author of the Ross O'Carroll Kelly books. It's an Irish thing – I'm a huge fan. 4. Pete McCarthy – The late author of McCa- rthy's Bar and Road to McCarthy – I wept laughing when I read them. 5. Professor Robert Winston – His pro- grammes on the human body and medi- cine were fascinating. Name four items you keep on your desk at work that reveal something about your interests/personality. 1. A picture of my kids when they were very young. 2. A calendar with different pictures of my family for each month. This month it is my daughter standing up in a canoe on holiday last year. I'm a keen (but not very good) photographer in my spare time. 3. Piles of papers, magazines, books etc. My desk is not what you'd call tidy. 4. A toy sideboom – a tracked crane that lays pipelines – the tracks and all the pulleys work. It's the little boy in me. Not on my desk, but an interest that I have outside work is skiing. I'm a qualified ski instructor and I teach at the local dry ski slope. I look forward longingly to the short amount of time I get to ski on snow every year. Speaker's Corner Owen Wilson, networks safety manager, Gas Networks Ireland Owen Wilson is speaking at the Utility Week Health and Safety conference in Birmingham on 30 November. For more information, visit: events.utilityweek.co.uk/hs/ "Government and industry will work in partnership to identify and address the challenges and seize the new opportunities that arise from Brexit, meet our carbon targets and deliver an energy market that works for all. This will be an important part of Britain's negotiation to leave the European Union." Joint statement from Energy UK chief executive Lawrence Slade, secretary of state for Exiting the EU David Davis, and energy minister Baroness Neville Rolfe £4m The extra funding the government is providing to the Plug-In Van grant scheme extending the eligibility to larger electric vehicles.