July 16, 2025 • 28 mins
While The DEX Show often explores digital transformation and employee experience through a technical or strategic lens, today’s interview takes a more human turn — spotlighting the formative experiences that shaped one of the UK legal sector’s most passionate champions of service excellence, Midge Renganathan, Head of IT Service Delivery at leading law firm RPC.
Midge delivers a moving, candid account of growing up, finding belonging, and discovering a unique talent for customer service and people leadership.
Book your tickets for Nexthink Experience (Boston or London) here: https://nexthink.com/experience
Download Part 1, 'Transformation: Driving Adoption, Productivity, and Change in the AI Era', free of charge right hereÂ
Download Part 2, ‘The Experience Silo: HR, IT, and the Digital Workplace’ here
Get the latest edition of the Gartner Magic Quadrant here (https://nexthink.com/gartner-magic-quadrant-dex)
Midge delivers a moving, candid account of growing up, finding belonging, and discovering a unique talent for customer service and people leadership.
Book your tickets for Nexthink Experience (Boston or London) here: https://nexthink.com/experience
Download Part 1, 'Transformation: Driving Adoption, Productivity, and Change in the AI Era', free of charge right hereÂ
Download Part 2, ‘The Experience Silo: HR, IT, and the Digital Workplace’ here
Get the latest edition of the Gartner Magic Quadrant here (https://nexthink.com/gartner-magic-quadrant-dex)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome It change Makers to the Deck show with Tim
Flower and Tom McGrath. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Hello, change Makers, Greetings from an absolutely boiling hot day
here in London. Hot of them Barbados. The newspapers are
telling us now it might be a you know, it
might be a winter time in Barbados. I couldn't tell you,
but it is certainly hot and we're not well suited
for it. And wonderfully enough, we have a guest himself
(00:33):
based in London for Tim and I are to welcome.
He's mid Ranganathan, head of IT Service delivery for our
PC Mitch. We've been trying to organize this for a
few weeks. Now is great to finally welcome you.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
To the show. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
How are you doing to How are you coping with
the heat over there?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You know it is quite boiling actually, and I've acterally
got to be inside my office as well, so I'm
trying to keep an eye on that and make sure
doesn't attack me at the same time. But other than that,
all it's.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Good, excellent, excellent, and is there the courage you're having
his camera on, which is something I'm not intentionally tempted by.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
But Ja, we've.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
We've we've already had a good long conversation and I
absolutely loved hearing about your story. Was just just so
keen to get you on the show. And I mean,
maybe just just introduce yourself first of all, in your
current role, current current specialism and how he became connected.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Yeah sure, Yeah, Mitch Ranganadan, so head of service delivery
for RPC, you know, focusing a lot more on the
customer experience. So I look after the front end support teams,
that's your operational teams. And that's pretty much been my background.
So I've been in the league industry for about twenty
(01:50):
five years now. I've been been a few big law
firms where I learned my experiences and moved to our
PC about five years ago. Uh, and became a Next
Think partner around the about two years ago. So we
we basically bought into Next Think and on a journey
(02:15):
to improve our current customer experience. So that's the that's
kind of the.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Background, certainly, and we'll pick up on this chapter of
the journey in a bit midch but before we do,
you've got a real journey. You've been on a real
journey yourself. I would say, your life story is something
of a journey and your career story, and it's you know,
I think it's somewhat unique and I really loved listening
(02:40):
to it last time we met. So I think begin
for the listeners by telling us something about your opbringings
and where that journey began.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yeah. Sure, it's taking me taking me back now. So
born in Sri Lanka, a place called Rottenapurah. So it's
it's basically like a tea states. So my memory is
of childhood memories of going to school is walking down
the tea estates and going to school and then climbing
up the mountains to get back home. So my my,
(03:11):
my parents were you know, pretty much a simple family.
Not not much on the on the on the money
side of things, but certainly from the love side of things.
You know, it was quite quite big.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
You know, my my around the age of five, my
dad migrated over to England. So my mom pretty much
brought up my brother and I and we had some
challenges there due to the Civil War so and due
to Sho War. We moved all to England when I
(03:43):
was about ten. So prior to that, my my lifestyle
was in in Sri Lanka, where we had, you know,
a few challenges, you know, particularly particular example is I
remember one time when my mom had to wake my
brother and I up to and take us to a
place for safety, which was a next door next door
(04:07):
to us, just to make sure that we were not
being attacked. So these are you know, these are these
are some of the stories that that basically our roomber
growing up and when you know, when when when I
got to about ten, you know, my my parents were
worried about my brother and I safety and decided to
migrate over over to England. So we moved moved here, Yeah,
(04:31):
pretty much from scratch and yeah, and that's where my
my journey began.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Greatable and what was that? What was that transition?
Speaker 3 (04:41):
Like transition wise? A lot to tell you actually, Okay,
So so when we when we when we moved over,
so we lived with with a family member for a while.
So I started to I started to attend middle school.
It was quite quite a not not not a great memory,
(05:04):
to be honest with you, because in the starting mid
of school, you're new to the country, can't speak a
word of English, no friends, So it took it took
a while to to fit in, I mean our umber.
The times when when I would be dreading the play
times because you know, I just have to sit by
myself because I've got no when hours that would want
to come and play with me. And often people will
take the take make fun out of me because you
(05:27):
know I can't speak English, and you know there were
kids as well, so in the world the how they
know better. Then we moved into accouncil, a council accommodation,
which is quite a rough area to be honest. Uh
this was just just a double bedroom where they had
a double bed and had a bunk bed. So me
and my brother were on the bunk bed and my
parents in the double bed, and you know, used to
(05:48):
look out the window thinking, my god, what kind of
life is this, you know, trapped in a trapped in
a room. Then we were Then I started high school.
Things got to be a little bit better a high
school because I managed to make some friends. Then we
moved to another counter accommodation which was like a masonut flat.
We had a bit more space. Both a very rough
(06:12):
area so you know pretty much would get marked and
attacked on a regular basis, and you know, it was
it was just a norm. You know, it just became
the norm to me. You know, one one particular example,
went for a bike ride into into the park and
you know, it was attacked by this group of group
(06:33):
of boys and you know, attacked me quite badly. But
I couldn't even open my mouth or speak. And my
biggest fear was not about how I get away from them.
It's more about making sure my parents don't find out,
because I don't want them to know and worry about us,
because they were trying to make ends meet, and you know,
they were working full time just to make sure me
(06:54):
and my brother had had a decent life. Yeah, so
it was quite a rough journey to start with. But
you know, as for as for you know, everything else,
it got better as time went on. You know, we
went into high school, you know, managed to manage to
make some friends, you know, and then get get my
(07:15):
get get the roadmap going, and you know, and and
and and so and so on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
It must have been an incredibly intimidating experience. And what
were what were your parents doing for a living they
first came here.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
So my my my family is actually an educational background,
to be honest with you, So it's very academic. So
most of my families are like you know, doctors, accountants
and and and engineers. And unfortunately my father was My
father was an accountant in Sri Lanka and he found
it quite difficult to practice when he came over here.
(07:47):
And my and my mom and dad, you know, basically
done the bare minimum. My mom. My mom was working
at a factory to you know, to make much much
as possible to support us, and my dad would do
the the odd account to the jobs and equally working
at different different places to make sure that financially we
are being looked after.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
So major welcome to the show. You know, we both
or all three of us have been at our careers
for quite some time now, some of us longer than others,
right tom so relative tim. So what I find myself doing,
especially in parts of my career like I've just experienced
(08:28):
this year, traveling, getting to areas of the world that
I've never been to, working with small nimble teams just
starting to build out their operation, working with prospects that
are just starting on a journey. All those things give
me the passion and the energy that I need to continue.
But I also look back at the early parts of
(08:48):
my career, what was it that drove me back then
when I was first starting out. So in those early
parts of your career, what were the parts that really
where you really found that most most passionate energy to
to kind of continue down the path.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So I think efficiency drives me definitely, uh and customer
service and customer service side of things and service extens
definitely drives me too. You know, starting off, I had
many you know, the couple of options, right, you know, Initially,
you know, I was quite technic technical, you know, I
(09:25):
explored that avenue as well to say, be someone great
at servers or networks or configuration, you know, something on
that that end. But automatically, you know, I was more
drawn into them. My passion was drawn into the customer
plant facing side of things because I had a special
way to speak to people.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
I had.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I was more I was able to, uh speak to
introverts and extroverts. I could, I could differentiate the way
I speak to people. And you know, overall, I think
the passion for me around that and and and it's
still lists you know, throughout my roles. I mean, you know,
I've been I've been the law as I said, Jomy.
I've been I've been through about three or four firms now,
(10:11):
and throughout that, I think my always key is how
do I make something better? Uh? And that led me
to have more and more opportunities.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
Yeah, you know, they're along our careers. There are those
key milestones that helped kind of shape your focus, build
your skill set. What in your mind were some of
those key milestones that helped you shape your focus.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Getting my foot through to a global make circle law firm,
that was my career break. In fact, you know that
basically I went there as a as a technician, soon
became a manager, uh and then you know, and then
progress there from from manage to being a global service
(11:02):
delivery lead looking after operational teams. So that was my
you know, that was where I learned. You know, I
learned about how to handle scenarios, how to manage managers,
you know, how to how to make sure something delivered
on time, you know, working under pressure and being a
law firm. You know, lawyers, one thing's done yesterday, right,
So you had to basically adopt and and become you know,
(11:24):
become a person who can be resilient and then you know,
from there, I I think I've done about eleven is
at that At that firm, it was a great firm,
and I got a call from an agent to work
for interested in hiring me for another all you know,
the final that the best thing I say to people is,
you know, you actually don't know how much you know
(11:45):
until you are challenged. So when I went into this
new new firm, it was a you know, it was
basically a global operations role. I was looking after you know, EMEA, Mina,
Americas and Asia. So it was you know, it needed
(12:07):
my time, had to be flexible on time, so which
meant I had to be available in the evenings as well.
And this role was managing senior managers. So you know,
this was again something new to me because I had
to adopt and learn quite quickly. So I went in
there to apply the practices that I've learned, the processes
I learned, you know, getting to a really really good start.
(12:31):
And then the firm came under new management, which meant
that the IT organization was being restructured, which meant that
quite a few leaders were made redundant. And I was
one of the lucky ones who was who was invited
to be on the board to do the restructure, so
(12:52):
which again was a great opportunity for me because I'm
sitting on the board with the CEO at that time.
I learned how to restructure department. You know what, you
know what functions are needed, you know what functions are
not needed. You know some bad bits as well. We
had to you know, let go of people which wasn't
which was the which was the you know, quite the hard, hard,
(13:14):
hard things to do, and equally, you know, creating new
new sections and hiring new hires, et cetera. So that
overall was a was a great kind of experience. I
think that was probably my second, well one of my
biggest marstones as well, because if I hadn't, if I
hadn't taken the step, I would have never landed the role.
(13:34):
And if I had never if I hadn't learned the role,
I would have never had the experience on understanding how
the firm works better, et cetera. Because that actually expanded
my knowledge and you know, it helped me has helped
me quite quite a lot throughout my career. And then
from there as time went on, after a few months,
the role I was doing was being moved to the Americas,
(13:57):
which means my my role became redundant. So that was
a fearful, you know, fearful scenario. You know, you do
that what if don't you like what if I had
stared in my old job? What if I had done that?
If I'd done this right? Because you want to make
sure you're secure. Yeah, So then I left when I
left this firm, so I was pretty much trying to think,
(14:19):
what do I do? You know, at this time, I
had a lot of experience. You know, I always had
a thing for trying something out myself. You know, I
always thought, you know, what if I become a consultant,
you know, I stop, I set up my own firm,
which I did. I set up my or firm and thought,
let me give it a go. Worked in a few
places just going in for like, you know, two three
(14:39):
week contracts just to just to consult and give ideas
on how people can improve their current processing and how
they can be more efficient. You know, my my focus
is more on you know, efficiency, right, you know, it's
not about headcount. You know, you can basically, you know,
get this equal or more with current headcount if you
make you make sure you're pro it's is sufficient. So
(15:02):
I came. I'd done that for a while, and then
the current firm that I'm at the moment, RPC, you know, became,
you know, came came to light and they were entering
for for a contractor you know, something similar to to
run the series, do some other things, just to just
to go in for a month, which I did, went in,
you know, barely enjoyed it. It's a great firm, great culture.
(15:25):
And then it was lockdown. So lockdown was another another
challenge for me. So just prior to Lockdown, I was
offered a perm role which i've which I took and
I've been there since. You know, I liked I like
to say I'm a leader because I'm not somebody who
just instructs, you know. I like to lead from the front,
you know, and if something goes wrong, I wouldn't take
(15:47):
the blame for my team, you know, I'm I'm you know,
I don't necessarily sit back, you know, if if something's wrong,
I like to roll my sleeves up and lead with
the foot with the team. So that's kind of kind
of the leadership I learned from from from her. So
that's that's been my biggest mentorship. Someone I still speak
to actually once I need help to reach out to.
(16:08):
And equally, there's people I've seen where leaders, other leaders
I've seen are in great power and put to myself,
I'm never going to be like that person because that person,
the way they leaders is not the way you know
you want to lead, you know, like being obnoxious or
you know, not giving someone the credit or taking the
(16:29):
credit for someone else's work except right now. So so
that I think mentorship is a big, big, big thing.
I mean, when I'm lucky enough to now mentor other people,
you know, and and when I do mentor them, you know,
I talk from my own experiences and try and drilling
around the management side. You know, yes, you have to
be firm, you have to be effective, and you have
(16:52):
to be honest, and you have to be transparent when
you give your feedbacks. But equally, you know, you need
to understand how to treat people and you know, understand
scenarios and and really grow somebody you know in the
in that low.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
Yeah. So along the way, and we mentioned it a
couple of times, is that the luck plays a big
part in what we do. I was lucky enough to
find not only the new concept of digital employee experience,
but next thick as well. It definitely shaped the latter
part of my career. When did your interest in the
(17:29):
specific that that concept of digital employee experience begin to
take shape? And how has that guided your career path?
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Sure? Yeah, I mean being being in customer service. So
I've always had a service head, as I was saying
earlier on and combining that with technology was something that
you know, it was something that was quite fascinating for me,
you know, starting off, you know, if you if you
(17:57):
look at the BlackBerry times, you know when when we
used to roll out the Blackberries, uh and and ensuring
that it's being configured correctly, making sure the emails are
landing correctly, you know, and you know, small problems that
come out, you know, I want to make sure that
they're dressed quite quickly because the focus is to make
(18:18):
sure that the experience of the user gets with that
BlackBerry is seamless. So you know, that's that's the that's
from a young age. So applying that across to my
whole career. So my focus is purely on the end experience, right.
You know, what I think about is you know, you know,
if you look at a typical person. You know, they
(18:39):
they wake up, they look at their phone, they check
their emails, they'll do what they need to do, go
downstairs or go upstairs, whatever. They log into their laptop.
They especially now with with the work, with their homeworking.
There's a lot of interaction between technology and an individual
and making sure that's smooth as possible. You know, I
(19:01):
remember working when I was working in my first law
law firm, we were rolling out Windows seven desktops, right
and you know me and you know, we had a
didn't we didn't have someone training the users, right again,
you know, these are things, These are things that basically
(19:23):
our question to say, why do we not have somebody training?
Because I think that enhances the experience that the person gets.
So it's it's it's combining all that together, I mean
to be honest. Even now, you know, we're in a
we're in a really state of the art technology place,
but there are still things that can be done to
make it better. Like you know, I often look look
(19:44):
at the you know, the proactive side of things. You know,
how can you proactively fix fix things before someone notices it,
you know, and how can we proactively help somebody before
they come to us, you know, it's it's that kind
of mentality. Yeah, So I think overall it's in the
service head. I guess having the service head has helped
(20:04):
me and still helping me to shape shape this in
the future.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Fantastic manage and looking now ahead to the future a
bit more concretely, First of all, what about new technology?
Which ones are you investing the most time and resources
in presently?
Speaker 3 (20:21):
So if you're in terms of what we're doing now
tom So, we're looking at new laptops. You know, obviously
Windows ten is coming to not gonna be supported from October,
so we're rolling up Indose eleven together with some new laptops.
So that's where that's quite a big project that's going
on at the moment. Within within r PC, we're looking
(20:44):
at a secure repn solution, you know, enhancing the way
people work, making more secure, especially with you know, with
digital experiences and you know, and and the way things
are going, you know, in terms of the future, it's
important to make sure that we have a secure way
of working. So that's something that we're looking at. We're
(21:06):
looking at AI a lot of the other firms out there,
you know, we're looking to in this two, we're looking
to building an internal system as a as a pilot,
see to see how that goes. And this is like
these are the main kind of things at the moment,
within within within, within us.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yet and this my, this, my this question I touch
upon some of those min better. What are the challenges
that keep you most engaged and passionate about your work,
both right now and presumably in the years to come.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Sure, I mean the big service delivery is a is
a it's a it's a it's a game that you
can you can plan, but cannot plan, if that makes sense,
because you know, I can I plan my strategies, you know,
weekly to monthly, two half month and a half yearly.
(21:57):
But if something happens where and operational issues raised, then
obviously we drop everything and we need to make sure
it's been focusing on that and we're resuming services as
quick as possible. So yeah, I mean, in terms of
a passion, I mean, I'm highly motivated in terms of
what I do. I mean, I actually love what I do.
(22:18):
So for me, the passions are to feel quite easy.
And also the teams I have, you know, they're great,
great teams. You know, individually, my team. I want to
make sure they're doing quite well, So trying to you know,
making sure they're getting the right support, making sure that
we have the right budget to achieve the projects that
we want to achieve, making sure that we are we
(22:38):
are promising or we're differing what we're promising, and you know,
just improving. You know, it's continues to improvement, isn't it like,
you know, small things you can do to make things better,
you know, focusing a lot a lot around that, being
strategic as much as possible, like equally understanding that operations
have to be something that we be focused on more so. Yeah,
(22:58):
so keeps me, keeps keeps us busy, and challenge as well.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Yeah, I love it. We cover quite a bit of
grammar image but penultomenate question for you with I mean,
how would you characterize the evolution of the IT career
during the span of your own career and where do
you see it as heading next for the wider industry?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Well, okay, that's yeah, so it is growing as an industry.
I mean, it's it's is the future. The future is
going to be a lot more advanced. I mean, if
you do a comparison from ten years before to now again,
you know that's it's a vast, vast difference. So I
(23:43):
think the job market is in the in the coming
years is going to be more looking at things like AI, cybersecurities.
You know, there's be a lot more involvement around the
machine learning side of things, you know, the AI s
out of things and makes lear anything. I think that's
going to that's going to be an industry that's going
(24:03):
to be ever growing specialist skill people. I need where
people are needed to make sure it's being shaped the
correct way. I think there's a big, massive growth there
and a great opportunity for people to learn there too.
And if you look at cyber I mean, cyber is
another one because you know, the the cyber crimes are
a lot more sophisticated now, so we need more cyber
(24:27):
analysts and you know, people in that area to make
sure that the firms are protected. So I think a
lot more skill sets are going to be developing in there,
and it's going be a lot more focuses around that
side of things. Data science is another one. I mean,
if you look at if you look at data, pretty
much all firms are focusing a lot more on data now.
(24:47):
Because if you understand data, then you can shape the
organization's future and really have things in place to god
or to make things better. So a lot more data
analysts are being you know, I think that's going to
be a lot more focused on that side of things. Software,
you know, DEV, software development and engineering. That's going to
(25:08):
be something that is going to grow. Robotics is another
one I think. You know, I see so many programs
around how robots are pretty much doing a lot of
the human tasks that are being done. You know, like
automation is going to be a big part of things.
You know, the repeated tasks are going to be automated,
but equally, you know, they still needs human interaction for
(25:30):
certain things like checking, et cetera. And if you take
you if you take a law film for example, document reviews, right,
you know, it doesn't matter, you know, you can have
a lot of technology applied to that too. So I think, yeah,
a lot of a lots being done in that area.
And I think overall, the IT stector's looking quite promising
(25:51):
and demanding, to be honest with you, especially for the
new people coming coming in, I think they'll be much
better at one's position.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Agredible and what about what about image, whatever remaining ambitions
you have to achieve an his career.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
I've still got big dreams, still haven't still haven't, haven't
given up on that yet. So you know, I think
I've learned a lot so far, gained a lot of experiences,
and I want to apply this and you know, come
you know, go into a toward CIO level firm. You know,
not just be a technology partner, but be a business partner,
(26:29):
being able to shape where the businesses are heading to,
you know. So that's one of the dreams, you know,
going to consultancy, you know, around that, you know, really
really bringing in my experiences around the process driven and
technology driven side of the side and shaping that more.
And I've also got the other passion, which I want
(26:49):
to do some keynote speaking, you know, like talk about
my experiences, what I've learned together with my my own
personal experiences, and you know, encourage people to do better,
you know, like you know, really motivate people and let
them know that there's this more that could be done.
And you know, if there's if there's anything I can
do to to help them and motivate them and encourage them,
(27:12):
then yeah, that's kind of thing that's something I'd love
to do as well, or something I'm looking to at
the moment.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Midge, I'm going to make a prediction on the record
that you're going to go the way to the top.
I don't doubt it, and thank you that's where your
journey will take you eventually. Absolute pleasure to have you
on the show. Thanks for sharing that incredible personal story
with us, and congratulations on all your success. And if
people want to connect with you, I presume LinkedIn is
(27:39):
your place.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
Yeah, absolutely, yeah, LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Yeah, phenomenal, Midge. Been lovely to have you on the
Deck Show. We speak to you very soon, my friend.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
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the number of stars you think the podcast deserves. If
you'd like to learn more about how next Think can
help me improve your digital employee experience, head over to
next think dot com. Thank you so much for listening.
(28:12):
Until next time,
Welcome It change Makers to the Deck show with Tim
Flower and Tom McGrath. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Hello, change Makers, Greetings from an absolutely boiling hot day
here in London. Hot of them Barbados. The newspapers are
telling us now it might be a you know, it
might be a winter time in Barbados. I couldn't tell you,
but it is certainly hot and we're not well suited
for it. And wonderfully enough, we have a guest himself
(00:33):
based in London for Tim and I are to welcome.
He's mid Ranganathan, head of IT Service delivery for our
PC Mitch. We've been trying to organize this for a
few weeks. Now is great to finally welcome you.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
To the show. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
How are you doing to How are you coping with
the heat over there?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You know it is quite boiling actually, and I've acterally
got to be inside my office as well, so I'm
trying to keep an eye on that and make sure
doesn't attack me at the same time. But other than that,
all it's.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Good, excellent, excellent, and is there the courage you're having
his camera on, which is something I'm not intentionally tempted by.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
But Ja, we've.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
We've we've already had a good long conversation and I
absolutely loved hearing about your story. Was just just so
keen to get you on the show. And I mean,
maybe just just introduce yourself first of all, in your
current role, current current specialism and how he became connected.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Yeah sure, Yeah, Mitch Ranganadan, so head of service delivery
for RPC, you know, focusing a lot more on the
customer experience. So I look after the front end support teams,
that's your operational teams. And that's pretty much been my background.
So I've been in the league industry for about twenty
(01:50):
five years now. I've been been a few big law
firms where I learned my experiences and moved to our
PC about five years ago. Uh, and became a Next
Think partner around the about two years ago. So we
we basically bought into Next Think and on a journey
(02:15):
to improve our current customer experience. So that's the that's
kind of the.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Background, certainly, and we'll pick up on this chapter of
the journey in a bit midch but before we do,
you've got a real journey. You've been on a real
journey yourself. I would say, your life story is something
of a journey and your career story, and it's you know,
I think it's somewhat unique and I really loved listening
(02:40):
to it last time we met. So I think begin
for the listeners by telling us something about your opbringings
and where that journey began.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yeah. Sure, it's taking me taking me back now. So
born in Sri Lanka, a place called Rottenapurah. So it's
it's basically like a tea states. So my memory is
of childhood memories of going to school is walking down
the tea estates and going to school and then climbing
up the mountains to get back home. So my my,
(03:11):
my parents were you know, pretty much a simple family.
Not not much on the on the on the money
side of things, but certainly from the love side of things.
You know, it was quite quite big.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
You know, my my around the age of five, my
dad migrated over to England. So my mom pretty much
brought up my brother and I and we had some
challenges there due to the Civil War so and due
to Sho War. We moved all to England when I
(03:43):
was about ten. So prior to that, my my lifestyle
was in in Sri Lanka, where we had, you know,
a few challenges, you know, particularly particular example is I
remember one time when my mom had to wake my
brother and I up to and take us to a
place for safety, which was a next door next door
(04:07):
to us, just to make sure that we were not
being attacked. So these are you know, these are these
are some of the stories that that basically our roomber
growing up and when you know, when when when I
got to about ten, you know, my my parents were
worried about my brother and I safety and decided to
migrate over over to England. So we moved moved here, Yeah,
(04:31):
pretty much from scratch and yeah, and that's where my
my journey began.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Greatable and what was that? What was that transition?
Speaker 3 (04:41):
Like transition wise? A lot to tell you actually, Okay,
So so when we when we when we moved over,
so we lived with with a family member for a while.
So I started to I started to attend middle school.
It was quite quite a not not not a great memory,
(05:04):
to be honest with you, because in the starting mid
of school, you're new to the country, can't speak a
word of English, no friends, So it took it took
a while to to fit in, I mean our umber.
The times when when I would be dreading the play
times because you know, I just have to sit by
myself because I've got no when hours that would want
to come and play with me. And often people will
take the take make fun out of me because you
(05:27):
know I can't speak English, and you know there were
kids as well, so in the world the how they
know better. Then we moved into accouncil, a council accommodation,
which is quite a rough area to be honest. Uh
this was just just a double bedroom where they had
a double bed and had a bunk bed. So me
and my brother were on the bunk bed and my
parents in the double bed, and you know, used to
(05:48):
look out the window thinking, my god, what kind of
life is this, you know, trapped in a trapped in
a room. Then we were Then I started high school.
Things got to be a little bit better a high
school because I managed to make some friends. Then we
moved to another counter accommodation which was like a masonut flat.
We had a bit more space. Both a very rough
(06:12):
area so you know pretty much would get marked and
attacked on a regular basis, and you know, it was
it was just a norm. You know, it just became
the norm to me. You know, one one particular example,
went for a bike ride into into the park and
you know, it was attacked by this group of group
(06:33):
of boys and you know, attacked me quite badly. But
I couldn't even open my mouth or speak. And my
biggest fear was not about how I get away from them.
It's more about making sure my parents don't find out,
because I don't want them to know and worry about us,
because they were trying to make ends meet, and you know,
they were working full time just to make sure me
(06:54):
and my brother had had a decent life. Yeah, so
it was quite a rough journey to start with. But
you know, as for as for you know, everything else,
it got better as time went on. You know, we
went into high school, you know, managed to manage to
make some friends, you know, and then get get my
(07:15):
get get the roadmap going, and you know, and and
and and so and so on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
It must have been an incredibly intimidating experience. And what
were what were your parents doing for a living they
first came here.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
So my my my family is actually an educational background,
to be honest with you, So it's very academic. So
most of my families are like you know, doctors, accountants
and and and engineers. And unfortunately my father was My
father was an accountant in Sri Lanka and he found
it quite difficult to practice when he came over here.
(07:47):
And my and my mom and dad, you know, basically
done the bare minimum. My mom. My mom was working
at a factory to you know, to make much much
as possible to support us, and my dad would do
the the odd account to the jobs and equally working
at different different places to make sure that financially we
are being looked after.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
So major welcome to the show. You know, we both
or all three of us have been at our careers
for quite some time now, some of us longer than others,
right tom so relative tim. So what I find myself doing,
especially in parts of my career like I've just experienced
(08:28):
this year, traveling, getting to areas of the world that
I've never been to, working with small nimble teams just
starting to build out their operation, working with prospects that
are just starting on a journey. All those things give
me the passion and the energy that I need to continue.
But I also look back at the early parts of
(08:48):
my career, what was it that drove me back then
when I was first starting out. So in those early
parts of your career, what were the parts that really
where you really found that most most passionate energy to
to kind of continue down the path.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So I think efficiency drives me definitely, uh and customer
service and customer service side of things and service extens
definitely drives me too. You know, starting off, I had
many you know, the couple of options, right, you know, Initially,
you know, I was quite technic technical, you know, I
(09:25):
explored that avenue as well to say, be someone great
at servers or networks or configuration, you know, something on
that that end. But automatically, you know, I was more
drawn into them. My passion was drawn into the customer
plant facing side of things because I had a special
way to speak to people.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
I had.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I was more I was able to, uh speak to
introverts and extroverts. I could, I could differentiate the way
I speak to people. And you know, overall, I think
the passion for me around that and and and it's
still lists you know, throughout my roles. I mean, you know,
I've been I've been the law as I said, Jomy.
I've been I've been through about three or four firms now,
(10:11):
and throughout that, I think my always key is how
do I make something better? Uh? And that led me
to have more and more opportunities.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
Yeah, you know, they're along our careers. There are those
key milestones that helped kind of shape your focus, build
your skill set. What in your mind were some of
those key milestones that helped you shape your focus.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Getting my foot through to a global make circle law firm,
that was my career break. In fact, you know that
basically I went there as a as a technician, soon
became a manager, uh and then you know, and then
progress there from from manage to being a global service
(11:02):
delivery lead looking after operational teams. So that was my
you know, that was where I learned. You know, I
learned about how to handle scenarios, how to manage managers,
you know, how to how to make sure something delivered
on time, you know, working under pressure and being a
law firm. You know, lawyers, one thing's done yesterday, right,
So you had to basically adopt and and become you know,
(11:24):
become a person who can be resilient and then you know,
from there, I I think I've done about eleven is
at that At that firm, it was a great firm,
and I got a call from an agent to work
for interested in hiring me for another all you know,
the final that the best thing I say to people is,
you know, you actually don't know how much you know
(11:45):
until you are challenged. So when I went into this
new new firm, it was a you know, it was
basically a global operations role. I was looking after you know, EMEA, Mina,
Americas and Asia. So it was you know, it needed
(12:07):
my time, had to be flexible on time, so which
meant I had to be available in the evenings as well.
And this role was managing senior managers. So you know,
this was again something new to me because I had
to adopt and learn quite quickly. So I went in
there to apply the practices that I've learned, the processes
I learned, you know, getting to a really really good start.
(12:31):
And then the firm came under new management, which meant
that the IT organization was being restructured, which meant that
quite a few leaders were made redundant. And I was
one of the lucky ones who was who was invited
to be on the board to do the restructure, so
(12:52):
which again was a great opportunity for me because I'm
sitting on the board with the CEO at that time.
I learned how to restructure department. You know what, you
know what functions are needed, you know what functions are
not needed. You know some bad bits as well. We
had to you know, let go of people which wasn't
which was the which was the you know, quite the hard, hard,
(13:14):
hard things to do, and equally, you know, creating new
new sections and hiring new hires, et cetera. So that
overall was a was a great kind of experience. I
think that was probably my second, well one of my
biggest marstones as well, because if I hadn't, if I
hadn't taken the step, I would have never landed the role.
(13:34):
And if I had never if I hadn't learned the role,
I would have never had the experience on understanding how
the firm works better, et cetera. Because that actually expanded
my knowledge and you know, it helped me has helped
me quite quite a lot throughout my career. And then
from there as time went on, after a few months,
the role I was doing was being moved to the Americas,
(13:57):
which means my my role became redundant. So that was
a fearful, you know, fearful scenario. You know, you do
that what if don't you like what if I had
stared in my old job? What if I had done that?
If I'd done this right? Because you want to make
sure you're secure. Yeah, So then I left when I
left this firm, so I was pretty much trying to think,
(14:19):
what do I do? You know, at this time, I
had a lot of experience. You know, I always had
a thing for trying something out myself. You know, I
always thought, you know, what if I become a consultant,
you know, I stop, I set up my own firm,
which I did. I set up my or firm and thought,
let me give it a go. Worked in a few
places just going in for like, you know, two three
(14:39):
week contracts just to just to consult and give ideas
on how people can improve their current processing and how
they can be more efficient. You know, my my focus
is more on you know, efficiency, right, you know, it's
not about headcount. You know, you can basically, you know,
get this equal or more with current headcount if you
make you make sure you're pro it's is sufficient. So
(15:02):
I came. I'd done that for a while, and then
the current firm that I'm at the moment, RPC, you know, became,
you know, came came to light and they were entering
for for a contractor you know, something similar to to
run the series, do some other things, just to just
to go in for a month, which I did, went in,
you know, barely enjoyed it. It's a great firm, great culture.
(15:25):
And then it was lockdown. So lockdown was another another
challenge for me. So just prior to Lockdown, I was
offered a perm role which i've which I took and
I've been there since. You know, I liked I like
to say I'm a leader because I'm not somebody who
just instructs, you know. I like to lead from the front,
you know, and if something goes wrong, I wouldn't take
(15:47):
the blame for my team, you know, I'm I'm you know,
I don't necessarily sit back, you know, if if something's wrong,
I like to roll my sleeves up and lead with
the foot with the team. So that's kind of kind
of the leadership I learned from from from her. So
that's that's been my biggest mentorship. Someone I still speak
to actually once I need help to reach out to.
(16:08):
And equally, there's people I've seen where leaders, other leaders
I've seen are in great power and put to myself,
I'm never going to be like that person because that person,
the way they leaders is not the way you know
you want to lead, you know, like being obnoxious or
you know, not giving someone the credit or taking the
(16:29):
credit for someone else's work except right now. So so
that I think mentorship is a big, big, big thing.
I mean, when I'm lucky enough to now mentor other people,
you know, and and when I do mentor them, you know,
I talk from my own experiences and try and drilling
around the management side. You know, yes, you have to
be firm, you have to be effective, and you have
(16:52):
to be honest, and you have to be transparent when
you give your feedbacks. But equally, you know, you need
to understand how to treat people and you know, understand
scenarios and and really grow somebody you know in the
in that low.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
Yeah. So along the way, and we mentioned it a
couple of times, is that the luck plays a big
part in what we do. I was lucky enough to
find not only the new concept of digital employee experience,
but next thick as well. It definitely shaped the latter
part of my career. When did your interest in the
(17:29):
specific that that concept of digital employee experience begin to
take shape? And how has that guided your career path?
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Sure? Yeah, I mean being being in customer service. So
I've always had a service head, as I was saying
earlier on and combining that with technology was something that
you know, it was something that was quite fascinating for me,
you know, starting off, you know, if you if you
(17:57):
look at the BlackBerry times, you know when when we
used to roll out the Blackberries, uh and and ensuring
that it's being configured correctly, making sure the emails are
landing correctly, you know, and you know, small problems that
come out, you know, I want to make sure that
they're dressed quite quickly because the focus is to make
(18:18):
sure that the experience of the user gets with that
BlackBerry is seamless. So you know, that's that's the that's
from a young age. So applying that across to my
whole career. So my focus is purely on the end experience, right.
You know, what I think about is you know, you know,
if you look at a typical person. You know, they
(18:39):
they wake up, they look at their phone, they check
their emails, they'll do what they need to do, go
downstairs or go upstairs, whatever. They log into their laptop.
They especially now with with the work, with their homeworking.
There's a lot of interaction between technology and an individual
and making sure that's smooth as possible. You know, I
(19:01):
remember working when I was working in my first law
law firm, we were rolling out Windows seven desktops, right
and you know me and you know, we had a
didn't we didn't have someone training the users, right again,
you know, these are things, These are things that basically
(19:23):
our question to say, why do we not have somebody training?
Because I think that enhances the experience that the person gets.
So it's it's it's combining all that together, I mean
to be honest. Even now, you know, we're in a
we're in a really state of the art technology place,
but there are still things that can be done to
make it better. Like you know, I often look look
(19:44):
at the you know, the proactive side of things. You know,
how can you proactively fix fix things before someone notices it,
you know, and how can we proactively help somebody before
they come to us, you know, it's it's that kind
of mentality. Yeah, So I think overall it's in the
service head. I guess having the service head has helped
(20:04):
me and still helping me to shape shape this in
the future.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Fantastic manage and looking now ahead to the future a
bit more concretely, First of all, what about new technology?
Which ones are you investing the most time and resources
in presently?
Speaker 3 (20:21):
So if you're in terms of what we're doing now
tom So, we're looking at new laptops. You know, obviously
Windows ten is coming to not gonna be supported from October,
so we're rolling up Indose eleven together with some new laptops.
So that's where that's quite a big project that's going
on at the moment. Within within r PC, we're looking
(20:44):
at a secure repn solution, you know, enhancing the way
people work, making more secure, especially with you know, with
digital experiences and you know, and and the way things
are going, you know, in terms of the future, it's
important to make sure that we have a secure way
of working. So that's something that we're looking at. We're
(21:06):
looking at AI a lot of the other firms out there,
you know, we're looking to in this two, we're looking
to building an internal system as a as a pilot,
see to see how that goes. And this is like
these are the main kind of things at the moment,
within within within, within us.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yet and this my, this, my this question I touch
upon some of those min better. What are the challenges
that keep you most engaged and passionate about your work,
both right now and presumably in the years to come.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Sure, I mean the big service delivery is a is
a it's a it's a it's a game that you
can you can plan, but cannot plan, if that makes sense,
because you know, I can I plan my strategies, you know,
weekly to monthly, two half month and a half yearly.
(21:57):
But if something happens where and operational issues raised, then
obviously we drop everything and we need to make sure
it's been focusing on that and we're resuming services as
quick as possible. So yeah, I mean, in terms of
a passion, I mean, I'm highly motivated in terms of
what I do. I mean, I actually love what I do.
(22:18):
So for me, the passions are to feel quite easy.
And also the teams I have, you know, they're great,
great teams. You know, individually, my team. I want to
make sure they're doing quite well, So trying to you know,
making sure they're getting the right support, making sure that
we have the right budget to achieve the projects that
we want to achieve, making sure that we are we
(22:38):
are promising or we're differing what we're promising, and you know,
just improving. You know, it's continues to improvement, isn't it like,
you know, small things you can do to make things better,
you know, focusing a lot a lot around that, being
strategic as much as possible, like equally understanding that operations
have to be something that we be focused on more so. Yeah,
(22:58):
so keeps me, keeps keeps us busy, and challenge as well.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Yeah, I love it. We cover quite a bit of
grammar image but penultomenate question for you with I mean,
how would you characterize the evolution of the IT career
during the span of your own career and where do
you see it as heading next for the wider industry?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Well, okay, that's yeah, so it is growing as an industry.
I mean, it's it's is the future. The future is
going to be a lot more advanced. I mean, if
you do a comparison from ten years before to now again,
you know that's it's a vast, vast difference. So I
(23:43):
think the job market is in the in the coming
years is going to be more looking at things like AI, cybersecurities.
You know, there's be a lot more involvement around the
machine learning side of things, you know, the AI s
out of things and makes lear anything. I think that's
going to that's going to be an industry that's going
(24:03):
to be ever growing specialist skill people. I need where
people are needed to make sure it's being shaped the
correct way. I think there's a big, massive growth there
and a great opportunity for people to learn there too.
And if you look at cyber I mean, cyber is
another one because you know, the the cyber crimes are
a lot more sophisticated now, so we need more cyber
(24:27):
analysts and you know, people in that area to make
sure that the firms are protected. So I think a
lot more skill sets are going to be developing in there,
and it's going be a lot more focuses around that
side of things. Data science is another one. I mean,
if you look at if you look at data, pretty
much all firms are focusing a lot more on data now.
(24:47):
Because if you understand data, then you can shape the
organization's future and really have things in place to god
or to make things better. So a lot more data
analysts are being you know, I think that's going to
be a lot more focused on that side of things. Software,
you know, DEV, software development and engineering. That's going to
(25:08):
be something that is going to grow. Robotics is another
one I think. You know, I see so many programs
around how robots are pretty much doing a lot of
the human tasks that are being done. You know, like
automation is going to be a big part of things.
You know, the repeated tasks are going to be automated,
but equally, you know, they still needs human interaction for
(25:30):
certain things like checking, et cetera. And if you take
you if you take a law film for example, document reviews, right,
you know, it doesn't matter, you know, you can have
a lot of technology applied to that too. So I think, yeah,
a lot of a lots being done in that area.
And I think overall, the IT stector's looking quite promising
(25:51):
and demanding, to be honest with you, especially for the
new people coming coming in, I think they'll be much
better at one's position.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Agredible and what about what about image, whatever remaining ambitions
you have to achieve an his career.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
I've still got big dreams, still haven't still haven't, haven't
given up on that yet. So you know, I think
I've learned a lot so far, gained a lot of experiences,
and I want to apply this and you know, come
you know, go into a toward CIO level firm. You know,
not just be a technology partner, but be a business partner,
(26:29):
being able to shape where the businesses are heading to,
you know. So that's one of the dreams, you know,
going to consultancy, you know, around that, you know, really
really bringing in my experiences around the process driven and
technology driven side of the side and shaping that more.
And I've also got the other passion, which I want
(26:49):
to do some keynote speaking, you know, like talk about
my experiences, what I've learned together with my my own
personal experiences, and you know, encourage people to do better,
you know, like you know, really motivate people and let
them know that there's this more that could be done.
And you know, if there's if there's anything I can
do to to help them and motivate them and encourage them,
(27:12):
then yeah, that's kind of thing that's something I'd love
to do as well, or something I'm looking to at
the moment.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Midge, I'm going to make a prediction on the record
that you're going to go the way to the top.
I don't doubt it, and thank you that's where your
journey will take you eventually. Absolute pleasure to have you
on the show. Thanks for sharing that incredible personal story
with us, and congratulations on all your success. And if
people want to connect with you, I presume LinkedIn is
(27:39):
your place.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
Yeah, absolutely, yeah, LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Yeah, phenomenal, Midge. Been lovely to have you on the
Deck Show. We speak to you very soon, my friend.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
To make sure that you never miss an episode, subscribe
to the show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite
podcast player, And if you're listening on Apple podcasts, make
sure to leave a rating of the show. Just tap
the number of stars you think the podcast deserves. If
you'd like to learn more about how next Think can
help me improve your digital employee experience, head over to
next think dot com. Thank you so much for listening.
(28:12):
Until next time,
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Cardiac Cowboys
The heart was always off-limits to surgeons. Cutting into it spelled instant death for the patient. That is, until a ragtag group of doctors scattered across the Midwest and Texas decided to throw out the rule book. Working in makeshift laboratories and home garages, using medical devices made from scavenged machine parts and beer tubes, these men and women invented the field of open heart surgery. Odds are, someone you know is alive because of them. So why has history left them behind? Presented by Chris Pine, CARDIAC COWBOYS tells the gripping true story behind the birth of heart surgery, and the young, Greatest Generation doctors who made it happen. For years, they competed and feuded, racing to be the first, the best, and the most prolific. Some appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, operated on kings and advised presidents. Others ended up disgraced, penniless, and convicted of felonies. Together, they ignited a revolution in medicine, and changed the world.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.