Turning the Tables – 100 Days as CEO

Paul Jackson: Wherever you are in the world. Welcome to the THEOS Cybernova podcast. My name is Paul Jackson, your host usually. But before we begin, I’ve got a quick favor to ask from you. There’s one simple way that you can support our show, and that is by hitting that follow or subscribe button on the app that you’re listening to the show on right now. It makes a huge difference in helping get the show out there to as many people as possible. So please give us a hand and click that button now.

The Theo Cyber Nova podcast hosted by Paul Jackson.

Paul Jackson: So here we go with episode nine of the THEOS Cybernova podcast. And as I mentioned earlier, I am usually the host. But today the guest on the show is Paul Jackson. Yes, me and I am being hosted by the legend that is Ian Carless. So as usual, we’re digging into the latest trends, challenges and innovations shaping the cyber security landscape and talking to a fantastic mix of leading industry experts.

Ian Carless: And is that me, I believe. In this instance, it’s you, Paul. Paul, welcome to the THEOS Cyber podcast. Thank you so much. It feels really weird being on this side of the microphone, but it’s great having you as the host. Well, just for context, my name is Ian Collis and we produced the THEOS Cyber podcast alongside Paul and THEOS Cyber.

And this episode is going to focus on Paul’s first hundred days as the CEO of THEOS Cyber. So I’m going to kick off right. I’m going to I’m going to rewind. Actually, Paul, we’re going to go right back to the beginning. Okay.

Paul Jackson: And do you think I can remember that far back?

Ian Carless: You might need a few prompts. I’ll hold up some of cards if you, if you need them. Okay. So we’ll go right back to the beginning. Okay. So cast your mind back to what? The late 80s. How did you end up in Hong Kong?

Paul Jackson: What a great question. And look at joking aside, I can never forget that because it was kind of like winning the lottery. You know, I was a student in Liverpool University studying engineering, electronics and telecommunications, but, I’m kind of an outdoor person, so I didn’t see myself at that point in time sitting behind a desk somewhere doing engineering. So I kind of had a notion for joining the police. And I was applying for the Merseyside police of all police forces in the UK. No.

Ian Carless: We dodged the bullet there.

Paul Jackson: We dodged the bullet indeed. And a friend walked into the pub at lunchtime. Because that’s what you do when you’re a student, right? And he slapped a daily Telegraph down on the table and he said, “Oy, Jacko,  you guys, you want to be a cop, right? They said, why not join the Hong Kong police? And, sure enough, in the in the Telegraph, there was an advert for joining there, as it was then the Royal Hong Kong Police, because obviously Hong Kong was a British colony. And yeah, it was simple as that. I tore out the advert, tucked it in my pocket because of course, no internet. In those days I couldn’t send an email and to actually write a letter to apply, and went through the interview processes for both Merseyside Police and the Hong Kong Police got both jobs, got accepted by both within a week of each other. Bizarrely, not a hard choice, right? Hong Kong or Liverpool? So at 22 years old, I hopped on a plane via Bahrain to Hong Kong and never looked back. Fantastic.

Ian Carless: And it’s probably safe to say at that time, I mean, not many people, and certainly not a 22 year old engineering student from Liverpool University, had any inkling about what Hong Kong was like and what, you know, what a way to do, what he what? He stepped off the plane. What were your first impressions? Maybe. I’m not going to say when you stepped off the plane. But if you look back, perhaps just at the end of that first week, what were your first impressions? It must have been a I mean, obviously a culture shock at the time.

Paul Jackson: 100%. So I it was December, so it was freezing cold in the UK. Right. And as you might recall, because you’ve known me a long time, I was doing a temporary job as a gardener outdoors and in December. And so getting on the plane, I had all my heavy gear and stuff and got off the plane thinking, well, it’s must be winter in Hong Kong as well. And sure enough, it was, it was winter in Hong Kong, and there’s people walking around in jackets, but it was still 20 degrees plus and I was amazed at the, at the sort of temperature in the sunshine. But also I was amazed at the mass of humanity, you know, growing up in Yorkshire. Yeah. It was nothing. Nothing prepared you for the really massive humanity that exists in Hong Kong and the energy that runs through the place. And I kind of fell in love with it from that, from the get go. It really has got that energy that keeps you young, keeps you, keeps you full of life.

Ian Carless: I think that was probably one of my first impressions as well, was just that the sheer pace of the city, like you say, the energy. I mean, there’s the old adage it you can’t stroll down the street in Hong Kong, can you? At least not without getting barged in the back by about 17 million people trying to get past you in a hurry. So you joined the police. You get there. I know, obviously, because we’ve known each other a long time. I know you had to go through basic training, but once you got through all that, what was policing like in Hong Kong back in those days?

Paul Jackson: I think it could be summed up in one word. It was an adventure. It really was. So I was very fortunate. I was assigned to be in the marine police straight from training school, and it was like an episode of Miami Vice at times, you know, because smuggling was rampant in the late 80s and early 90s. And so we were, you know, times chasing smugglers on speedboats or at other times dealing with the Vietnamese boat people issue, which was still, you know, continuing in those days. So it was just a real adventure. It was stuff I could never even imagined coming out of the UK. It was just such a fantastic experience. I could write books on, on, you know, all of the all of the adventures that we had during those days, to be honest. So, you know, there comes a time when you need to focus on something. And I had an engineering background, technology background, and in the mid-nineties everything changed. Suddenly, you know, the mobile phone market opened up, the internet became, you know, prevalent. And they needed somebody in policing with my kind of background that could lead teams that were focused on the to, you know, telecoms crimes or tracing cell phones. And, you know, dealing with the problems that were arising from increased use of the internet.

You know, you remember those days back in the 90s, the Y2K bug that we were all terrified of and the I love you viruses and things like that. So it was exciting times and it got me back into technology. And I just, you know, entered it with a passion and really found my feet. Just loved it from the get go. And, you know, moved from the telecoms side of things into computer forensics, which was nascent in the late 90s and no books there was. You had to do all your own research, you had to do all your own fact finding. And I would spend hours and hours and days and months, you know, just researching little parts of forensics just to understand how we could better get evidence.

And that served me well because it gave me that solid foundation for continuing my career in incident response and forensics, you know, around the globe.

Ian Carless: Now, I know you’ve asked this of a couple of other of your guests, certainly the ones that were in, that had a career in law enforcement before moving into the private sector. How difficult a transition was that for you?

Paul Jackson: Wow, yes, it you know what I would went well to backtrack a little bit. You know, I, I was eventually put in charge of the, the technology crime forensics teams in, in Hong Kong. Police and I also worked with Interpol doing training and capacity building around the world for law enforcement and, it was such a great experience, and I was really loath to leave, but times were changing. And plus, I got a really great offer from JP Morgan. And, you can’t really turn down the world’s biggest bank, right? So. But I thought, you know, hang on, I’m just a dumb cop, right? How am I gonna, you know, hold my head up amongst all these brilliant geniuses at JP Morgan? But you know what I got there and what I what I realized was a lot of what I didn’t realize I’d been picked up in the Hong Kong police was leadership skills, was making decisions, was, you know, dealing with the hard stuff. And it’s to me really good stead because, you know, I could walk in and change things and make things improve the way that, they were doing forensics and investigations, etc..

And it got me noticed and I got promoted and moved across to New York as the global head of cyber investigations. So the transition was daunting. But on the other hand, once I started, I quickly realized that the skills that the police had taught me really stood me in great stead for moving into that world.

Ian Carless: And you had a couple of years, didn’t you, with JP Morgan certainly based in the, in the States. And then you, you made the transition back to Asia. And prior to joining THEOS you were, you were obviously managing director of Kroll. Again, what made you make the jump from a huge international, multinational company like Kroll to some, something slightly smaller, shall we say?

Paul Jackson: Yes, although it won’t be for long. If I had my way. No. But, Yeah. Look, this is. Yeah, I have a question. I’ve been asked a lot because I did have other office. I did have other, you know, possibilities. Should I say. But you know what? It. I looked at THEOS, and I, I’ve been hearing about them even when I was at Kroll. You know, we had mutual clients, and their name kept cropping up.

And I could tell from talking to our clients that they really loved what THEOS was doing. They were clearly doing a lot of things. Right. So when Alex Hudelot the founder and in fact, he was our first guest on the on the podcast, approached me when he heard about Kroll withdrawing suddenly from the, from the Asia Pacific market for cyber anyway. He approached me and, and said, hey, if you thought, you know, about joining a locally based company, an APAC headquartered company, because THEOS is headquartered in Singapore with a real focus on this region that you love, you know so much. But you know what? I look back on my time crawling. Yes. It was full of great, growth and, reputation was going through the roof.

But there were challenges around geopolitics. The US firm and, also around, you know, the, the global economy with the, the interest rates rise when you held by private equity. This changes a lot of the dynamics as to how you can operate. So, you know, moving to a company didn’t have those constraints really appealed to me. And also a chance to leave a legacy. Obviously I’m not young. Right. So this is now the later stages in my career. And moving to CEO just seemed to be a, a more, of an opportunity to leave a legacy and to build something special in this region because most of the well-known cyber companies are either headquartered in US, Europe, Israel, etc., very few that are headquartered in our region. So it was an opportunity, I thought, to leave a mark.

Ian Carless: And how difficult an adjustment has it been from, say, moving from a managing director role to see to a CEO role? What the what did you have preconceived notions about, perhaps what the role might entail? And I guess the second part of that question is, how is the role so far in the first 100 days differed to say what perhaps some of your preconceptions might have been?

Paul Jackson: That’s a great question. No, I think that’s the answer is yes or no. It  wasn’t, it wasn’t a difficult adjustment. So look, a lot of what I’m doing is the same as leading a big team of folks who are just absolutely brilliant at what they do and getting the best out of them. And, you know, helping to motivate them, helping them further their career, you know, being a mentor to them when needed. And just basically making them feel part of the journey, part of the story. As that was pretty much identical to what I was doing as an MD, managing director, for, you know, for Asia accrual here, though, there’s more responsibility, right now responsible for the company, for the health of the company, for the livelihoods of all the employees and for, you know, the financial performance of the company as well.

You know, no longer about part of a big global piece. This is it, right? You know, I’m directly responsible for, how the company performs. And it’s quite daunting because you know, you look at the pipelines, you look at numbers, and, you know, you need to be thinking, months ahead, you know, even years ahead, rather than just thinking for today, like, I was at Kroll.

So it’s definitely a change of mindset. It’s something that I’m slowly adapting to. There were a lot of challenges, but, you know, I’m embracing them because it’s always good to be continuously learning, right?

Ian Carless: And what would you say would be your most unexpected challenge so far?

Paul Jackson: Well, again, that’s, I would say not unexpected challenge. I think, an unexpected, almost benefit really would, would, would be how we’d been received. Right? Because, you know, we’re not we’re not left Kroll to, you know, basically curtail a number of contracts because of, you know, closing down the, the operations in Asia. And, you know, I wondered how people in the industry would respond to me, you know, whether they would feel let down because, you know, they were obviously appreciating the service and were disappointed when things changed.

And I think one of the biggest surprises to me was how well we’ve been received, how well it’s been received. The news that THEOS is expanding. You know, it’s building out a capability that’s Asia Focus, that’s really local. And it’s been it’s made me feel really good. You know, it’s  kind of, I guess surprised me the response and have been quite humbling in many ways as well.

So, you know, I’d say that’s the best thing. I don’t think so far there’s been no major sort of difficulties or challenges. There’s been a few minor things that have needed fixing, a few tweaks. I’ve looked at sales, for example. I think it’s important. Sales is such a vital component, the lifeblood of the firm. And I looked at how we could do that better. And made a few tweaks there to improve things. Marketing, as you’ve seen. Right. We’ve had many discussions about marketing and, and it’s been so effective in terms of building our brand. And I’ve got to say a big thank you to Poi, who’s our Head of Marketing, who’s done just such an amazing job of raising our brand, brand profile.

And then this the human or the relationship side of things. And, you know, we made a few changes there. Again, another, excellent hire brought in Mikky, who she is just amazing, you know, and it’s not just about internal relationships. It’s about building those relationships outside of the company. And, you know to you know, to basically build our brand and credibility.

But the last, I think the most important thing perhaps I’ve done is, is to step back a little bit. You know, I can’t be client facing so much anymore. I’ve got to learn to step back and trust my leadership bench. And I’ve got in particular on the delivery side. I’ve spoken about some of the support side, but on the delivery side, we’ve got three amazing leaders who are all learning to step up and take responsibility for the for the functions that they manage.

And that’s, Ivan, Nate and Jason, who are just three incredible leaders who are growing into their role. And I’m proud to be helping them in that too, in that, in that process.

Ian Carless: Now you talk about pipelines and obviously the long term financial viability of the company. And, in the same breath, we we’ve also talked about relationships. It’s an interesting dynamic, isn’t it? And I just wanted to ask you a little bit about how you think you might manage that, that dynamic between having to step back into perhaps more of an oversight role that a CEO involves, but yet still maintaining those relationships because, I know obviously, from my time in Asia, and, you know, some would say this is true all over the world, but I think in particular in Asia, relationships are so important.

So how do you foresee being able to sort of manage that, that balance?

Paul Jackson: Simple answer less sleep, I think, maybe, it’s difficult because obviously, you know, I’m here to run the firm, but on the other hand, the ultimate goal, the short term goal or the initial goal is to increase revenue and profitability. Right. Without that, we can’t grow as a business, right? We I should step back a little bit because it’s actually a very well-run business. And that’s what attracted me. One of the reasons that attracted me as well, you know, you know, Alex and his, his partner, there’s only two owners of THEOS. And, you know, there’s no other external investors, there’s no private equity or anything. And everything that they put into the firm has been or every profit that’s been made since the initial investment has been reinvested in the in the firm. And it’s grown organically that way. So wonderful position to be in without debts and without, you know, investments or, you know, angel investors or whatever. So, that is, is fantastic. My  goal initially is obviously to grow this revenue of profitability further so that we can invest further to continue to grow and expand within the region. There’s plenty of demand out there, is what I’m saying. But in order to do that, you’re right. You’ve got to be in front of people. You’ve got to knock on doors, you’ve got to do the hard yards. And we brought in the amazing Bill Anderson to head up Business Development and Client Relationships. And he’s working as to the bone because he’s just so well connected. We are traveling. We are knocking on doors. We’re getting in for the people, which you are absolutely right, Ian. You got to do that personal touch in Asia, build that personal relationship and trust. I always look at business as being a Venn diagram of three things. In a way, I think out for anybody you can’t actually see is at the moment.

But a Venn diagram, everyone, a Venn diagram of, basically trust, quality, and value. And we’re at the intersection of all those and trust is possibly the most important thing. And you build that by getting in front of people.

Ian Carless: Perhaps then you could for those for those who perhaps have stumbled across this podcast and THEOS Cyber for the first time, perhaps you could give us a brief overview of the services that the office provides and also where you operate.

Paul Jackson: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. We should possibly have started with I, shouldn’t we? But yeah. But yeah, let me go back to my Venn diagram again because, you know, it’s nice to have the rule of three and we focus on three core areas of business, and we just want to focus on those because we want to do them.

Well. We won’t don’t want to dilute them. We want to give the best possible service to our clients. So those three areas are defence, offense and response. So defence means helping companies protect, helping to monitor and to, you know, to look for threats on their environment, on their computer environment. Offense is all about ethical hackers attacking and testing the security of apps, of systems, of networks, etc. Either by vulnerability assessments, penetration testing, which are the more straightforward kind of tests through to the more complex red teaming which we excel at, in the team do a magnificent job. Red team is basically playing, you know, an adversary and, and, you know, being given remit to break into a company to, you know, to highlight. Well, it tests a lot of things that tests say whether their detection capabilities are picking them up. If they are picking them up, how are they responding to any alerts that are generated from that attack and ultimately how they cascade and escalate and deal with it? So, red teaming is pretty critical for many company, mature companies who really want to test their systems. So that’s the offense side. And then now, since I joined, because my background is all about investigation and, you know, response. So I brought in the response piece and brought in a world leader, you know Nate, who’s from the New Zealand government, sneaky beaky type and, just amazing at his job. Nathan Reid and he leads that team now. And this is the important component that was missing before. So we’re now in a position to help companies when they’re in crisis, basically. And also importantly, you know, having the response capabilities allows clients to engage us with retainers. Retainers are there for emergencies, incident response retainers. So, you know, this is something that pretty much every company now needs, you know, somebody if I have an old standby in case their house catches fire, if you like, as an analogy. But, you know, the beauty of a retainer is that, you know, once you’ve got SLA’s and legal agreements with us, you don’t have to hang around.

You know, if you’ve got an emergency, we see to it right away. And that’s the important thing, having SLA’s, in place so that we respond quickly. So retainers were not possible without having that response capability. And that’s probably the most in-demand solution, if you like, that we offer because companies see the value even if they don’t have a crisis, they can use the funds they put towards a retainer for a pen test, or for a red team test, or for a tabletop exercise or a board briefing.

So many other things that we can deliver. So it’s really, you know, about finding the needs, listening to clients what they need and filling those gaps with quality. So we just focus on those three core areas. Oh, you guys talked about where, where didn’t you? So I did. Yeah,

Ian Carless: I know you focus on APAC.

Paul Jackson: Correct. So we’re headquartered in Singapore and, but we have a big operation in Manila. That’s because young talent here, very good talent. And obviously helps us keep the costs down. It’s a low cost jurisdiction, but really, it’s about the talent. Honestly, the people we have here are absolutely amazing. And it’s a huge country with loads of young talent.

But we also have offices and people in Hong Kong and KL as well. So those are our four main locations where we actually have offices. But we’re nimble. We’re you know, we’re always on the move and we can really service any, any location in know in our region.

Ian Carless: And is the intention just to perhaps stay focused on the AP region or, is world domination in the science?

Paul Jackson: Of course, world domination is in our sights. But actually, it’s funny you should say that because, yes. Whilst we’re always going to remain, I believe, Asia headquartered in Asia focused, it there’s no reason why, anybody from any other country can’t use our services. We’ve got the right talent. You know, most of our services can be delivered remotely. The Pen testing, etc. and the monitoring. We can do that remotely. And as a going back to those three, the Venn diagram, we could do it with trust, quality and value importantly so we can operate out here in Asia with much lower cost base, and we can pass those savings onto clients, you know, so they get the same quality.

So wherever they are in the world, they can come to us and get the same quality. But at a, you know, more value for money.

Ian Carless: So just focusing back on to you and your role as a CEO. What were your initial goals when you first walked through the your store? I know most CEOs probably have some short term, goals that they want to achieve. And then obviously the mid and longer term ones. So what were your initial short term goals?

Paul Jackson: Well, I’ve already touched on it really. The focus has been on increased, you know, client base and hence increased revenue and profitability and doing the hard yards, you know, getting out there. But in order to do that, we also need to build the branding. So, I’d be focused a lot on the brand building and knocking on doors and the, the, my initial goals as to get THEOS as a recognized company, not a small player anymore because we move from that phase now. We’re now a serious player in the market. And this is what we call THEOS 2.0. And it’s ensuring that all the team, you know, getting because it’s not just me doing this right.

This is a team effort. So everybody has to play a part. So it’s motivating the team. I was just on a big marketing call today with the team. And you could see the buy in. You know you could see the energy everyone wants THEOS  to succeed is as a company. So these are my initial goals and I think we’re well on the way 100 days in. And I think we’re well on the way with that.

Ian Carless: And what would you what would you say THEOS is doing differently, perhaps from some of your other competitors?

Paul Jackson: I think, you know, I’ve seen you know, I’ve been on both sides of the table. Obviously I’ve said, you know, as a, as, you know, corporate world and, and in government world and I’ve seen too many vendors that will sell you something based on, you know, a leader that’s in there. And he comes with all the bells and whistles and promises. When they actually deliver, they send the B-team or, you know, a bunch of graduates coming in and they don’t really engage with the client and they don’t really view it as a partnership. It’s more just, let’s make a bit of money off them. We’re the opposite, right? We want to build that.

We  have very sticky with clients here. We have more than 90%, retention rate with clients. You know, they keep coming back to us because of this. You know, where we operate, we operate putting the client first. We build the relationships. We want to be a partner for the long term. And we don’t we don’t we don’t hire graduates. Well, we do we don’t hire graduates to be client facing, you know, and, we help them build graduates and help them in their career. But then if we are sending folks to do work with clients, they have got years of experience behind them. They know what they’re doing and they treat the client well. So I think that’s the main differentiator.

But it’s also the talent that we’ve got. You know, I look at the people, it’s just incredible, you know how good they are. And I think clients come to value this, you know, once they get to know us.

Ian Carless: I just want to circle back to, again your role personally and there’s a lot of talk amongst leadership teams at the, you know, the executive table about leadership style. How would you describe your leadership style?

Paul Jackson: Wow, that’s a great question. So, I’ve got a lot to thank the Hong Kong police for. As I said earlier, I didn’t really realize at the time how much that taught us because don’t forget, I was 22 right when I when I moved to Hong Kong and you joined as an inspector.

So you’re thrown out of training school after nine months leading a team of 30, 40, 50 guys. Well, you know, guys and gals and, you’re 23 years old, right? And, you either sink or swim kind of thing. You learn the hard way. Yes, you make mistakes, but as long as you keep learning from them, you keep developing. And I think there’s very few roles in this world other than perhaps military, where you can get that kind of leadership experience at such a young age and, and learn and develop from it. So I’ve always learned the hard way. In many cases, you have to trust you guys and you have to train them well with respect. So I think my leadership style is all about, you know, that giving respect, giving opportunities to people, not taking the glory, you know, giving credit where it’s due to the right people listening as well.

Very important to listen and, hear the issues that the, you know, the teams are facing and be responsive to you don’t just pay lip service. You know, actually, you know, try and do something about it. You can’t always do something about it. But if you can’t, try and explain why, you know, you can’t. And it really does come down, I think, to communication and treating people right.

And I think, as I said, I’ve got a lot to thank the Hong Kong police for in that regard.

Ian Carless: Yeah. You touched on some interesting points there because, you know, I think from, from my experience, one of the, the best traits that I see in some of the best leaders is also humility, you know, is I think being able to acknowledge in cases where, you know, you’ve made a mistake and put your hand up in the air and take responsibility for it. But also, I think, you know, another, another good skill. And I think it’s related to the humility angle as well as it’s being confident in your own ability and not feeling threatened by those around you. You know, I mean, I, I know from some of my roles in the past that, I know that the best way to get what I want for either my team or my company is to employ the best possible, people available for the job. And that often means employing people who are far more skilled than I am. But, you know, that’s fine, because at the end of the day, we share a common goal, isn’t don’t we? Which is basically the benefit for both the company and everyone on board. So rather than see that as a threat and, and I’m sure we’ve all worked in environments where leaders we know leaders who see people like that as a threat, and not an asset.

And I so I think, you know, that that whole element of humility is a, is a really important one to take forward.

Paul Jackson: 100% you should never be the smartest person at the table when you’re running a, you know, running teams. And, I’ve always lived by that. So I’ve, I’ve been fortunate to hire some of the most gifted people in the world in my teams.

And, you know, I never once feel threatened. It’s, you know, you they make you look good ultimately. And I can never understand any. Right. I’ve seen so many leaders who do this, but I can never understand leaders who just hire yes men or, you know, will folks that are not going to challenge them in any way to make them feel good.

And yes, we see it all too often. Sadly.

Ian Carless: Yeah, I totally agree. What’s been your most rewarding moment so far?

Paul Jackson: Yeah, yeah, I think, yeah, I think I’m lucky and I’ve already touched on this and I think the most rewarding feeling is being appreciated. You know, having all these, you know, formal connections and clients come and say, well, we’ve seen you, you know, you’ve resurfaced and this this is amazing news.

You know, we’re so glad. And, you know, we trust you. You know, we really want to work with you again. And, I just think it’s, you know, that’s a reflection on the all the good things that, you know, we’ve managed to achieve down the years. And, you know, I feel really proud about that.

So, Yeah, I think that’s right. Now is the most rewarding thing. And just to have, you know, an equally gifted team now to, to deliver to them in the same level of quality. And I am just surrounded by excellent people, which is amazing.

Ian Carless: Speaking of excellence, there’s one area where we know you’re perhaps not so excellent in and don’t excel in. I know taking you back to your Hong Kong police days. Dragon boat racing this past time of yours, possibly to varying degrees of success or otherwise. You’re doing a route. Elaborate?

Paul Jackson: Not really, but. Okay, I’m going to. Yes. You know, you’re very familiar with this story, of course, because you were in Hong Kong at, that time. And these are crazy times, right? There were fun times. I’m going back now to, you, I think it was 1991. Well, 1990, I can’t remember which, but, I was based in Tai O and for anyone who knows Hong Kong, what a place to be. I mean, it’s a fishing village that’s on stilts. Basically, it’s. And it was in the middle of nowhere.

It’s on Lantau Island, where they’ve now built the airport. But in those days, it was a backwater. You could only get to it by boat. And I was in charge of half the island and living in Tai O Police Station, which is now a boutique, beautiful boutique hotel. But yes, I had this great idea of integrating with the community, you know, being the young, energetic inspector that I was at.

I told my team, right, we’re going to participate in the Tokyo annual Dragon Boat Race competition, but we’re already great. We don’t need to train. Right? So, for those who know Tai O, it’s a very narrow sort of bay. You go into the river, and so they could only race two boats at a time. And we got pitched against a bunch of 14, 15 year old secondary school kids in one boat. And we turned up with all these, you know, big police officers in the other boat. And, we got in for what could possibly go wrong.

Ian Carless: What could possibly go wrong?

Paul Jackson: Our drummer hadn’t got a clue. We hadn’t got a clue. So we all started rowing in different directions, and that water gradually filled up, filled up the boat, and to the delight of the watching villagers, they watched as our boat gracefully sank into the logging in the in the middle of Tai O Bay.

A most humiliating moment, but I think it taught me a couple of lessons. First of all, teamwork is important, right? You’ve got you’ve got the teamwork. And don’t go into anything unrehearsed. Right? You’ll always, always practice before you take on something. But then I was, what, 23, 24 at the time? And I thought I knew better. So, yeah, I’m sure they still tell stories about that in Tai O, but to think,

Ian Carless: oh, well, they do that. This is how you’ve entered the, the, you know, the TAIO folklore. Well, before we wrap up, Paul, I know you always ask your guests at the end of a podcast about music. Oh, yes. I’m familiar with some of your musical tastes over the years. Dubious some of them might been in country music being one of them. But come on, for the for the listeners. What are you listening to right now? What’s on your turntable?

Paul Jackson: Oh, okay. So actually I can see it because my turntables in front of me and, I can see the, the packaging as well. What I have been listening to fairly constantly lately is the Orb Collection Orboretum. Which is a beautifully packaged, although very hard to get the vinyl records out of, collection of remastered versions of their you know, best known songs down the years. It’s just beautiful

Ian Carless: Little fluffy clouds.

Paul Jackson: Little fluffy clouds indeed. But I tell you what, you know, over the last 2 or 3 years, the one record that always resurfaces and constantly finds its way back onto my turntable, bizarrely, is The Voltarol Years, which I kind of resonate with by Half Man Half Biscuit, which is to the why you’re laughing, but it’s truly magical.

The lyrics, out of this world and it just amazing music. And as I say, it never fails to find its way back to my turntable somehow. So there you go.

Ian Carless: You have you have to provide just a little context for the listeners to so that they know what Half Man Half Biscuit is, just a little, well.

Paul Jackson: I suggest you go on Spotify and listen for yourself. The Voltarol, Oh yes. I mean, what a title. I mean, they’re obviously of an age, so I think that title sums it up. And it just the cleverness of the, the lyrics. The late, great John Peel described them, I think is the jewel of English musical words to that effect. And, he wasn’t wrong. I mean, they’ve entertained as down the years, but their latest album is, to my mind, their finest. And as I say, I’m almost wearing out already after a couple of years. So there you go.

Ian Carless: Awesome. And before we wrap up, a slightly more serious question just to finish up, you’ve done 100 days now as the CEO Theo’s. Yes. What are you most looking forward to in the next hundred days?

Paul Jackson: Well, apart from getting some sleep, I would say to be honest, it’s about now locking up these deals, you know, getting the clients in because as you, as, you know, you know, doing business is, is not an immediate thing, right? You start talking to clients, letting them know what you’re about and rebuilding the trust and confidence, to when you, you know, you get them as a client and win the deals and that’s happening already and we’re going to see that accelerate, I believe, during the next 100 days, 200 days, etc.. And I am very bullish on the growth of this company. I think it’s much needed in the region. We’ve got the right attitude. Clients like it, and I am very confident that it will be a success. So, yeah, looking forward to those 100 days, and that are coming up. Very much so brilliant.

Ian Carless: We’ll Paul, thank you for joining me on your own podcast, the THEOS Cybernova. And we look forward to you and your next guest.

Paul Jackson: This podcast was presented by Ian Carless for a change with myself, Paul Jackson as a guest. The studio engineer and editor was Roy D’monte. The Executive Producer was myself and Ian Carless. And this podcast is a co-production between THEOS Cyber and the amazing W4 Podcast Studio in Dubai.

The TEHOS Cybernova podcast.