Job Titles vs. Job Reality: Why They Don’t Always Match

Sean Allen (: 00:00

Welcome to the More Than a CV podcast. I'm delighted to be joined today by Paul Hornby. Paul is currently Chief Digital and Technology Officer at Best Way Healthcare. Paul's experience spans well-known organizations from Head of Digital Transformation. See how Paul's done it then. Right, we'll do that again. I hate tongue twisters. Right, welcome to the More Than a CV podcast. I'm delighted to be joined today by Paul Hornby.

Paul is currently Chief Digital and Technology Officer at Best Way Healthcare. His experience spans well-known organizations and roles from Head of Digital Transformation to Director of E-commerce and more. Welcome Paul, thanks for joining us today. How are you?

Paul Hornby (: 00:41

Yeah, brilliant. Thank you for having me. Nice to see you again, Sean.

Sean Allen (: 00:44

Thank you for joining. It's always a pleasure to catch up with you. So thank you for sparing me the time. But yeah, it's great to have you here. But I guess for people that maybe don't know who you are, it'd be great for them just to hear a bit more about you and your career today, Paul.

Paul Hornby (: 01:00

Yeah, well, say I'm Paul Hornby. live in Liverpool, sat in Liverpool talking to you today. Father of two children, Rosie, who's seven. Well, she's eight very shortly in Theo's five, married to Andrea. I'm an Everton fan, so tough place to be when your city rivals have just won the league.

Like you mentioned, recently started a new role as Chief Digital Technology Officer at Best Way Healthcare. So really interesting role, which I'll probably talk a bit more about at some point throughout this. But yeah, in terms of my background, I've always worked in Ecom, tech, digital for the past 20 odd years. did computer science at university.

came out of university and was fascinated with the whole world of e-commerce because even when I was going through my degree, my degree was like more hardcore software engineering, Java, know, variety of different programming languages. And I just didn't know what I wanted to do. And then in third year of university, we did an e-commerce module and it just, it just clicked. I just loved like the mix of art and science. I loved the mix of how technology

worked with customers, generated money. And I loved that mix of technical and commercial. So come out to uni, started building websites for myself to learn for friends and family and people to start, you're trying to sharpen my steel when you're actually asked to do work for someone. And it's going to go and be used by users. It forced you to step your game up and then ended up.

working for a company which at that point was called Shop Direct, based over in Manchester. Entry level, developer role, like web developer, building landing pages and emails. And then Shop Direct was then acquired by the Barclay Brothers at the same time that Littlewoods, the big Liverpool rival was acquired by the Barclay Brothers and the organizations came together and was relocated to Liverpool. And then I...

Paul Hornby (: 03:13

I spent the best part of 12 years growing up, both personally and professionally in that business. Started to move away from being a hands-on developer at quite a young age. Realized that I was surrounded with a lot of people who were far better at writing code than me and work.

Sean Allen (: 03:30

You

Paul Hornby (: 03:31

it may be a better career trajectory for me to lead these really talented people and that was a translation layer between them and the rest of the org. So I went through managing a development team. I became what we call head of content and I development, which in English was head of front end development. When I was young, I was about 27. and then progress from there into slightly more like commercially slanted roles.

I did some marketing qualifications. I was lucky enough to spend some time at London business school. And then I became head of e-commerce at shop direct, which at that point was still a multi-channel business. We'd sold our stores, but we still had to be catalog heritage. and then moved from that to head of digital transformation with the scope of transforming the whole business. Then went from there to Matalan. That transformation experience had been fascinating because it had given me visibility of the whole organization and a.

It really gave me the desire to go and be able to influence that wider remit of an organization. So I went to Matalan as their Ecom Director when I was about 34. And that was brilliant. It was like a real life MBA for me, responsible for the online P &L. Loved that, did three years there through COVID and then went back to, well, Shop Direct, which at that point was called The Very Group.

and spent four great years there leading the big technology transformation. That role had taken me back into, you know, quite a hardcore tech focused role. didn't have the tech and commercial blend that I loved, but I really wanted to go back and do that job. So I spent four years there and then that brings me to the current role now. So yeah, in short, my background has been a real mix of Ecom, digital product, tech.

data, marketing, and really blending commercial aspects of digital and tech with, you know, more hardcore technology principles. So that's me, bit of a mixed bag, bit of a mixed path.

Sean Allen (: 05:33

No, it's really interesting. And it's interesting just there in there, because you hear titles, don't you? And then actually the breadth that some of those roles had as well as the depth. that much broader organization impacts and buying and influence. Whereas often when we think of these sort of techie roles, they just sit within tech and yeah, you may have that, how's the current role then? obviously you've not talked too much about that and congrats, by the way.

Paul Hornby (: 06:00

Thank you.

Sean Allen (: 06:01

I don't know if you're still in the honeymoon period or you're out of that now, but how is this different to the past roles? It sounds like a much bigger, broader role, but that could be me just perceiving that.

Paul Hornby (: 06:14

Yeah, no, it definitely is a big, a broader role. So to answer your question, I'm really enjoying it. I don't know, two and a bit months in, two and a bit months in. I've started to play the new boy card less, getting to the end of my 90 day plan. So I'm starting to play the new boy card less, but no, look, I'm really enjoying it. It's a new industry for me. I've never worked in healthcare. It's probably worth giving a bit of context on who Best Way Healthcare are because it's not.

Sean Allen (: 06:26

Yeah

Paul Hornby (: 06:41

you know, a well-known, we don't trade from that brand name. So Best Way Healthcare is a really complex business that spans B2C pharmacy retail. So you've got, they own Well Pharmacy. So Well is the second biggest bricks and mortar pharmacy behind Boots in the UK. We refer to it internally as the biggest pharmacy that no one's ever heard of.

And so that's got a brick, big bricks and mortar proposition. It's got an online proposition and via that online proposition, you know, customers can manage prescriptions. They can buy what we call an OTC over the counter product. it's like, you know, an econ proposition. They can manage services, be that, you know, services where they get advice from a qualified medical professional and can get.

different types of drugs and treatments prescribed. We run a weight loss program. Again, that's all run by, by a qualified pharmacist. So you've got a really interesting digital health ecosystem growing there and it's a multi-channel business. We've then got a few other customer facing brands, chemist.net, bethpharmacy.co.uk. We've got a lovely business down in London called John Bell and Croydon. If you've never been down there, when you are down there, it's worth popping in. It's a, it's a lovely business. It's got a pharmacy at its core, but you know, really.

really like luxurious setting for different types of health and beauty products. So we've got that part of the business. We've then got a completely separate wholesale part of the business. So Bestway Med Hub, we've got Lexon, we've got Wardles, a nice supply of variety of pharmaceutical products to pharmacies, well and others. And then we've got some really interesting businesses that float around. Like Key Pharma is basically like an R and D.

pharmaceutical business. We've got a business called Farm Data who aggregate and share industry information, market data. So it's really interesting and a few others as well, like really interesting multi-brand business. And my role as Chief Digital and Technology Officer, I'm responsible for what my, me and my team obviously are responsible for the digital P &Ls for the digital parts of the business.

Paul Hornby (: 09:01

We've got what's called a distance selling pharmacy in Stoke, is a, you know, think about it like a clinical fulfillment center where hundreds of thousands of customers come and manage the prescriptions on world.co.uk website or app. obviously we have a, you know, I suppose it is like a clinical fulfillment center really, where those scripts can be managed by professionals and sent directly to your home.

So my role is to be responsible for that and the digital PNLs and the digital teams, but then also responsible for technology change data across the group. So definitely broader than I've done before, but I felt like my previous roles and experiences had given me the core skills that are needed to do that. So that's been really interesting. It's obviously multi-channel. I've worked in multi-channel before at Matalan, but it's really interesting to do it again.

But you the big learnings for me are I've never worked in healthcare before. So that has been fascinating, you know, working in a business that really can save people's lives, make it such a genuine difference to people's lives and learning all about how that vertically integrated business works. And then also B2B, you know, I've never worked in B2B before and our B2B business is really sizeable. So fascinating, John.

Really enjoying it. People have been lovely. Enough commonality with what I've done in the past to be able to put the pieces together, but loads and loads of new things to learn. And I'm still at the bottom of the mountain when it comes to learning about this industry, but I am honestly, I'm really enjoying learning about something new, really enjoying it.

Sean Allen (: 10:40

It sounds like you can hear it in your voice and think you've had whoever does your onboarding for you to be able to remember everything they do. I know it's obviously part of your role but there's a lot clearly to that organisation to remember.

Paul Hornby (: 10:54

You know what though, I, um, you are right. The, the organization and the people within it have been really welcoming and I had a brilliance onboarding and I was given advice at the start, which was, you know, like take this opportunity to go and learn about the business, get out, see people, see customers. We've got different sites. are quite geographically dispersed across the UK, across the different business units, but you know, go out and try and be inquisitive, understand.

what the different parts of the businesses do, know, where there could be opportunities for them to work together closer, understand who their customers are. And it's been brilliant because you know yourself, once you get into the job, sometimes the ability to go and be really inquisitive and do that starts to reduce. So I have tried really hard to make the most of my introductory period and get out there and meet people and that's what I'm saying. I've loved, I've loved learning about it all.

Really interesting.

Sean Allen (: 11:54

It's nice to hear and it's what I really like is the from your background that you've talked about being able to play to all your strengths and bring that experience to them. And to be fair, you know, there's a big advocate for that cross sector industry knowledge because you get people that are thinking and challenging things in a different way. So are we doing the right things or can we look at this differently? But then that ability to keep up skill in yourself and keep pushing yourself within the role as well, because it's given you new

Paul Hornby (: 12:08

Mm-hmm.

Sean Allen (: 12:23

new strings to your bow, new elements to sort across. So obviously you've done that throughout all of your sort of career. You've taken on those challenges as you've mentioned and found the bits you enjoy and you're clearly very good at. But obviously how did you find the job market when you were exploring new opportunities? Because you mentioned earlier, you know, one of the job titles you had, but then you

explain straight away what that actually would mean in a general market because it had its own internal company title, which let's be honest, companies can give us things just sound like their own, but externally, like what does that even mean? So how did you find that?

Paul Hornby (: 13:08

Yeah.

You know what? It's such an interesting topic and I feel like I've felt both sides of the coin over the years. So, you know, as you mentioned earlier, like my, my first role was my first role title was e-commerce content coordinator. Now you would assume that that is a marketing role. are, you know, a content writer, content editor.

lopment team. This is in late: 2000

in the world of experimentation when experimentation was quite nascent in UK retail. But we called that team the eye development team, like the interaction development team. So you had, we had interaction designers and these are interaction developers. So then we ended up with a group of really talented engineers who were known as I devs and nobody knew what that meant because it sounded like an apple. And my role was head of content and I development and nobody knew what that meant either. Now that was fine. And then moved from that role to.

Sean Allen (: 14:22

you

Paul Hornby (: 14:31

of e-commerce which was normal you know a relatively logical role although we then what was then shop directing now the very group became a pure play business which then raises the question when you're head of e-commerce in the pure play business what does that mean when it is a pure play business matalan was far more straightforward i was e-comm director and then when it came back to the very group the role title was digital customer experience director now

If you search for that on LinkedIn, I don't think anyone else has had that job title. Not that I've seen. And I used to get bombarded with emails and calls around our contact centers because you digital customer experience. think the view was the customer experience part suggested that I set out, you know, I sat on top of our contact centers and our support centers. Whereas actually, you know, the organization had gone on a journey.

Sean Allen (: 15:03

Hahaha.

Paul Hornby (: 15:24

of moving from a central IT tech function to a tribal function, similar to the Spotify model. And there was a tribe that was responsible for the digital customer experience, all technology, you the product UX, engineering, delivery, BAs, digital analysts. And it was called the digital customer experience tribe. And my job is to lead that. And so it was quite interesting actually because

When you then start looking at the market and thinking about your next move, you know, know yourself when people are going to go and start looking for candidates. If you want a chief digital officer, you can probably look for other chief digital officers or digital directors. If you want a chief product officer, you'll probably do the same. So unless you know someone and somebody knows you and knows your skillset and knows you like the breadth of your experience, I found that it

I mean, it ended up actually being fine, but I definitely worried that it may preclude me from being in the shop window for the types of things that I wanted because you could end up getting bucketed into the wrong pots, basically. So it is a dead interesting one. Like it is a really, really interesting one. And I do think it can be a problem at times.

Sean Allen (: 16:47

How did you, so I'll probably want to probe you around how you look at it when you're on the hiring side, because I know you've hired a lot in your, that's for your teams, but how did you sort of get around that then? Because I assume you were dealing with, you know, recruiters, both in-house and agency. When you're speaking to them, did you have to really emphasize where you could identify synergies? You know, so you talk about your current role.

Paul Hornby (: 16:53

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sean Allen (: 17:17

you know, picking on one part about, you know, being responsible for the PNL and then you've done that in the past. Did you have to almost like go through and make sure that everything they were looking for where you could meet it, had to sort of tailor and really hone in on or how did you over?

Paul Hornby (: 17:33

Yeah, you know, I had a mixed bag. So I spoke to a few recruiters and then also just spoke to people in my network. And obviously people in your network, it's easier because they know you, they know how you operate. They've got context on what you have and haven't done in the past. So that part was always easier because you would a few steps up right away and then you could add some color for them and they go, okay, I get that. And...

But then there was some other recruiters who had talked to and just couldn't get past it. Just couldn't get past it. or just couldn't get the head around it. And I had quite a few comments of like, you need to be one or the other. You either need to be like a chief digital officer or you need to be a chief product officer or you need to be a CTO. Like you have to choose a box. I was like, but

I'm not sure if that is necessarily true because there can be opportunity for organizations and starting to bring some of these areas together where there are really tight adjacencies. So I had a mixed experience, Sean, if I'm completely candid.

Paul Hornby (: 18:47

And yeah, I mean, how did I get out of it? Well, I suppose I got out of it by leaning on people and you having conversations with people who were willing to come and meet me and find out more about me and put more context on the role and then obviously do a good job of representing me accordingly. And then typically what I found is once I could actually have a conversation with an organization, it all came together. But as you know, you know, the market out there is tough for a lot of candidates at the moment.

And so, you know, I'm recruiting for roles now and I'm really conscious of it when I'm recruiting for roles and I've got CVs coming into me to not bias myself based upon the job titles and really try and get under the weeds of what do I actually think they've done in that role? Like what working environments have they been in? Was it a, you know, a really highly commercial role? Was it quite a technical role?

What type of change have they delivered? What type of pace was that working at? Have they owned the P &L before? What type of technology would they have experienced in that role? Would it have been more modern? Would it have been more traditional? Would there have been on-prem? I can find myself now trying to see the title, but go deeper. But I can also see why in a market where you've quite a lot of senior people looking for roles, it can be quite easy to go, no.

don't know what chief digital officer is, no, or don't know what digital customer experience director is, can't work out what this pot, what this lad is in the bin.

Sean Allen (: 20:18

It's nice to see how it's influenced your thinking though around it, know, from your own experience. think there's, there is that partisan there when it's a employer driven market, you know, it's easy for us as recruiters or hiring managers to, you may be, you know, time poor, um, you know, and overwhelmed overworked, whatever. you, you inherently just go for.

Paul Hornby (: 20:21

Mmm.

Paul Hornby (: 20:38

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sean Allen (: 20:48

actually these five people look great. So we'll start with them and then work backwards. Whereas when it's the other way around and it's a candidate driven market, it's amazing how flexible everybody can become and take that extra time to find stuff out because, you know, it's like pulling hen's teeth to try and find the people that you may be after. Obviously from your herring at the moment, it's been like that. But have had a similar approach in the past when you've...

Paul Hornby (: 20:59

Yes.

Yeah.

Sean Allen (: 21:17

scale teams before where there's been that flexibility, not just on title, but sometimes the skill sets that you're bringing in. Cause I know you've run like at Berry, for example, what you talk about as a massive team. You might go, actually we've got loads of people with that skill set, but perhaps lacking well, we're lacking here. So if we can get someone who can bring that in, we can sort of up skill, you know, everybody, have you sort of had those approaches in the past or how have you sort of tackled that?

Paul Hornby (: 21:43

Yeah, I mean in different ways at different times. So I would say early on in a shop direct very group journey when we were growing the e-commerce team out every 12 to 18 months, we were hiring a role and skillset that we'd never hired before because you you go from desktop to mobile or you go from having creative designers and then you need an interaction designer.

Sean Allen (: 22:00

Okay, nice.

Paul Hornby (: 22:12

Then you decide that you want to launch an app and you need to go and recruit a native app engineer. Or we decided that we wanted to start bringing in UX researchers to get closer to customers. built a UX lab or we wanted to double down on experimentation. And so you needed to bring people in who could help plan experiments, run experiments.

statistically evaluate experiments. So we had quite a number of these scenarios where we were having to recruit the type of skill that we never recruited before. And so we didn't have a boilerplate. You know, like sometimes if you've, you know, if you've got react engineers and you need another react engineer.

you've got a boilerplate to say this is what we need. This is the type of things they're going to do. This is how it's worked in the past. We're to go and try and find another gem in the market. Whereas if you're trying to recruit a UX researcher for the first time, you haven't got that same muscle memory. So yeah, we had a few scenarios there where we were really trying to focus on.

Like what type of skills and experience are we looking for? And we recruited, you know, different types of researchers, people with psychology backgrounds. You know, when we were going and building the experimentation team, that was similar. I definitely had similar at Matalan because we did quite a bit of like refreshing and scaling the team at Matalan where we brought people in with different backgrounds. But yeah, I always think and I feel it now.

Like bringing people in is the hardest part of the job because you want to create an environment for them. That to be great. You want to make sure you're bringing someone in and setting them up for success. There's always a risk when you're bringing new people into a team, but there's always a massive opportunity as well. So I think you have to try and put a disproportionate amount of time and effort into it because sometimes, well, if you don't put the effort in, you're far less likely to get the right outcome.

Sean Allen (: 24:12

Yeah, yeah. No, it's nice to hear and it's interesting because that makes it that that risk is two way, right? Like, you know, so, you know, you taking on a new opportunity like you have now, you know, going to a new industry, slightly different role to what I've done before. There's a there's a risk there, but the flip side is if on that other side, they're laying out, this is where we are. This is where we're going. This is what the culture is like here. You know, this is what we expect. Then if you

Paul Hornby (: 24:20

is definitely too late.

Sean Allen (: 24:40

decided that wasn't for you or a candidate decides that's not for you. You've been given all of that information upfront, having you to be able to opt out. But at the same time from your side, going, this is where we're trying to go. And this is exciting bit. So building out a UX lab prime example, we don't have this, right? So this is our, this is what we think we're, this is where we're going, but we need someone to drive that. And ultimately you can have in your mind, can't you? This is exactly how we want it to go. And it's probably going to take twists and turns.

Paul Hornby (: 24:43

Yeah.

Paul Hornby (: 25:06

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Sean Allen (: 25:08

on that way, but by getting that right person and they help drive all of that for you, right? Which I guess as a leader, higher up is what you're looking for when you're bringing those people in. It's not just the technical skills, is it? I guess it's that, say that soft skill side of it.

Paul Hornby (: 25:12

Yeah.

Paul Hornby (: 25:20

massively. Yeah, massively. Well, yeah, it's, you know, leadership skills, you know, the ability to, to motivate and coach and develop a team, high emotional intelligence, low ego, a desire to learn, you know, someone who doesn't come in and think that, you know, at all, you know, someone who is collegiate and wants to.

support the wider organization, know, all these things, but it's all they're the bit. It's so difficult to glean that from a piece of paper from a CV, you know, especially when you're recruiting for a senior leader. Um, I mean, like I say, I'm doing some recruitment now and I'm just trying to squeeze in as many half hour intro calls as I can.

to at least get that initial feel to go, to be fair, to nail exactly points that you just made, to be completely transparent about the reality of the role, to empower that candidate to either vote in or vote out. And also just to work out if we hit it off, like what feeling do we both get before we then progress and have a proper first stage interview where we go through someone's CV, understand that a far more granular level of detail, what they've done.

and how they believe they could transition those skills and experience to our business.

Sean Allen (: 26:36

How do you lead large teams? How do you instill that across your colleagues that are building out their teams within your, I guess, function? I don't know how else to describe it, but you can't hire everybody, right? You've got your leadership team, haven't you? How do you instill that through them as a leader?

Sean Allen (: 27:07

I guess it's different if you're somebody in that you're particularly bringing that in skilling with to influencing where you may be people maybe don't put that time into it or very much look at it as a tick box exercise.

Paul Hornby (: 27:21

Yeah, it's really good question, isn't it? It's a really good question. How do I, you know, I don't know if I do instill it. It's really forcing me to reflect on it. Because what I do say, well, I'd like to think I'm not a micromanager. I would like to think people who've worked for me in the past would say I would leave them to it.

My belief is that our job as leaders, and this goes right through the organization, is to try and hire people who are better than you. And it is a cliche, but it's such a bloody true cliche that if you surround yourself with people who are better than you are in their field, your job as a leader is to create the environment within which they can be great. So I tell that to all the theme.

But, you know, I wouldn't come in and start sitting on interviews and stuff like that. I will always just empower the team as their team. You know, it's their team. It's for them to work out what type of skills and experiences they think they need. And for them to go on that journey themselves and look at times like we all have. People make decisions that doesn't, that don't work for one reason or another.

But yeah, I I suppose the way in which I instill it is just to try and give them the responsibility and accountability for building their own team because they're then responsible for the success of that themselves, but also for rectifying any problems. If, if it happens on their watch, I suppose.

Sean Allen (: 28:58

Yeah, yeah, no, that's like it's a nice way to look at it, you know, and I think there's there's that bit isn't there I guess of you showing up in the way you are every day, you know, I guess they'll see that right, whether you're highly visible to them or not, you do see you do see how your leaders show up on a day to day basis, don't you? So I guess you that part of leading that way as well, which is

Paul Hornby (: 29:10

Mm-hmm.

Sean Allen (: 29:23

almost silent in a way because you don't realize you might influence someone a certain way just because how you are day to day and they pick up on that.

Paul Hornby (: 29:23

Yeah.

Paul Hornby (: 29:32

And the reality is nobody wants to hire a bad person into the team. Like nobody wants to do that. So even when people are feeling pressured and needing to bring people in, nobody wants to bring somebody in that's either not going to work for the candidates. Cause that's always really sad. If you ever bring somebody in and they make a change, you they've got a life, they'll have bills, they, you know, they will make a change and then it doesn't work for any reason.

but it's not helpful, it's not helpful to the candidate, it's not helpful to the team that they come into. So then my belief is just always that, you know, leaders and managers within my teams when they're making hiring calls, the person who is the, who is tied into it needing to work the most is the hiring manager. So if they're just really clear on it's their choice, they know the team, they know what they need, they know the direction that we're moving in.

They know the culture that we're trying to build as a team. know, the one thing like, know, me, the one thing more than anything else I am really passionate about is building a good culture within the team. You know, I will always bang on about wanting to try and create an environment that gives my team both personal and professional satisfaction culture does come from the top. what I mean by that is you need cultural change agents throughout your team. And it's typically.

But your cultural change agents won't necessarily be at the top. your most senior leader needs to encourage the right culture. Because you can have the change agents trying to build a good culture further down your structure. But it can very easily be killed from the top. So I will always try and create that culture. So it's for the hiring managers. They know that. So they know what they're looking for. And then so I just trust them to do their job.

Sean Allen (: 31:26

It's nice. You're right, that cultural piece, we often talk about organization cultures. I was speaking with somebody recently and actually you often find, especially in LIGO organizations, departments will have their own sort of almost subculture because they may be doing completely different things in one or every business to another. So you may tie into the overall values and culture and mission. You you're talking about Esway Healthcare and you could see you're passionate about their mission and what they do for their customers.

Paul Hornby (: 31:54

Yeah.

Sean Allen (: 31:55

But actually within that, what you're building may then have its own culture within that team. Because it's maybe completely different to maybe people in the stores or people in marketing or wherever it may be,

Paul Hornby (: 32:09

And we've definitely had that in the past. know, the e-commerce team that we had at what was then Shop Direct. I think, you know, we, I think we've built a great culture and I say we, it wasn't me. There was a, you know, there's a group of us, know, Jonathan Wall was our director at that time. There was me, Sam, Sam Barton, Reece Billington, Chris Howard as a leadership team and then amazing people throughout that team. And we, we collectively built a brilliant culture and in some ways it...

It was probably a culture that was a little bit different to the culture in other parts of the business. We definitely had it at Matalan. You know, when I went to Matalan, again, we as a team, you know, great, I had a great leadership team there, me, Danny Clay, Kat Cowan, Andy Poole, Marcus, Fairbrother, and then latterly, a few other people, Sarah Veach, and Laura as well. Laura joined us. We...

We did, I think we did a great job. think the team did a great job of really transforming the culture of that e-comm team. You know, my perception of that e-comm team at Matalan when we walked in, I think e-commerce was viewed with like a bit of mystery, bit of skepticism, bit of confusion. It was a store based business. It didn't really know what to make of this e-comm team. It kind of viewed it as just another store. And so, and that, that energy propagated into the team. So.

I think we went on a really good journey there and did a good job with that team. But again, you've needed cultural change agents and I think it has to come from the top.

Sean Allen (: 33:48

It's nice just to see your passion and how much weight you put into it, Paul, if I'm honest, because it shows you're not just saying it because it's the right thing to say. believe this is one of the first things I need to make sure is in a good spot. I guess for conscious of time.

Firstly, thank you for sharing your advice and your experience, but your personal journey as well from your recent move. it's refreshing to see that there are people out there that look beyond buzzwords and job titles and what's on a bit of paper. think, you know, it's often a way that, I guess it's quite an old thing as a CV, isn't it? But we still put so much weight onto it, rightly or wrongly in times. But is there any...

Paul Hornby (: 34:19

Hmm.

Sean Allen (: 34:41

advice or tips that you give to our listeners, either going on that journey as a candidate themselves actually, or if they're hiring, how to just look a bit more than just, you know, ticking, yeah, they've got Java, yeah, the CI CD, whatever, do you know what I mean? How they can get past that.

Paul Hornby (: 34:59

Yeah, yeah. I think, you know, I think my advice, it's so simple that I almost don't want to give it. Like you just have to, you have to like pound the pavement and have the conversations, build your network, get out there and meet people. You know, I had a few months off after Vary and took that opportunity to just get out there and meet people.

Sean Allen (: 35:07

You

Paul Hornby (: 35:22

build my network, know, reestablish my network. You know, the reason why we're doing this is that we had the time to reestablish and reconnect and get out there and find out what's out there, be inquisitive, talk to people, build. I never had a recruiter network because all of my jobs I'd got by my own network. And then I realized, and know, I actually ended up getting this job I'm in from my network as well.

But I realized like I didn't have a recruiter network really. You know, people who are new, people who are trusted, people who I could lean on, people who could trust me. And so I took the time to start doing that, you know, contribute positively to groups and forums. And that would be it because then when...

person. I just think like in: 2025

Sean Allen (: 36:39

We talk about technology a lot, And, you know, AI is obviously a topic there. I think, you know, we see technology, it's an enabler, I personally see it when I've worked in talent acquisition or in recruitment. How can it make my mundane tasks easier so I can spend more time speaking to people? Because that's when I hired teams, that's the skill set I'm going for is their market knowledge and their networking and them being able to engage with people.

Paul Hornby (: 36:51

Mm-hmm.

Sean Allen (: 37:09

don't care how good an admin they are. I'm going to try and remove all of those mundane tasks as much as possible. That's where tech plays its part so that you can do what you're talking about and actually have that free time to have a conversation with another fellow human being, right? No, I love that. And how can people connect with your contact you pool if they want to just.

Paul Hornby (: 37:12

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Sean Allen (: 37:32

find out more about what you've discussed today or you've mentioned your hiring as well, find out about the opportunities in your team as well.

Paul Hornby (: 37:40

Yeah, we've got a few vacancies in the team and we'll probably have more coming up, which is good. Just reach out to me on LinkedIn. yeah, have a little search on LinkedIn, reach out to me on LinkedIn. It'd be great to have any followups. Like I say, I am still trying to even know I'm now.

getting to the end of my 90 days, I am still trying to carve out time to have great conversations like this, build my network, reestablish my network, because honestly, having that little bit of time away has made me realise how important that is.

Sean Allen (: 38:15

So I'll make sure I share your LinkedIn in the show notes so it makes it easy and accessible for people just to click and connect. But from me, as always, Paul, I love speaking with you. So it's a pleasure and thank you for your time. I know you're a busy man, obviously meeting so many people in the business and also getting your plan in place as well. So thank you. Appreciate it.

Paul Hornby (: 38:40

No problem. Thank you for having me. Lovely to see you as always, mate. See you soon. mate. Bye.

Sean Allen (: 38:42

Awesome. See you soon,