Full Name: Tom Quinn
Position: Head of content for the Mining Indaba, Africa Oil Week and Green Energy Africa at Hyve Group
Main Activity of the Company: Hyve Group is one of the world’s largest providers of industry conferences and exhibitions
Date and Place of Birth: December 3, Dewsbury, West Yorkshire (a coal mining region)
Education: BA and MA degrees from the University of Kent (Canterbury), and a PGCE from the University of Roehampton (London)
First Job: After the paper rounds, washing cars each Saturday morning at a local used-car dealership
Career History Prior to Current Position: Editorial for EY’s World Oil & Gas Technologies magazine; North American conference producer for energy and mining conferences, World Trade Group (Toronto); producer for the Gastech event with DMG Events
Size of First Pay Packet: £10 for washing cars (from 07:00 to 11:00 on Saturday mornings)
First Job with Present Group: Head of content: Mining Indaba and Africa Oil Week
Value of Assets under Your Control: About £23-million (it’s a team effort)
Number of People under Your Leadership: 14
Management Style: Collaborative (I don’t ask my team to do anything I wouldn’t do); aim high
Personal Best Achievement: My two amazing daughters
Professional Best Achievement: Helping to get a youngster from a council estate in London to Cambridge University to study engineering
Person Who Has Had the Biggest Influence on Your Life: My mother – she spent her career as a social worker in a hospice in Leeds. She got me to aim high – has always been there
Person Who Has Had the Biggest Influence on Your Career: The executive who picked me to move to Toronto and showed me there is a big world out there
Person You Would Most Like to Meet: As always, The Chief – Lucas Radebe, the South African football legend and former captain of my beloved Leeds United Football Club. He is still revered in Leeds. One of our Indaba advisory board members lives near him, so I’m getting close
Businessperson Who Has Impressed You Most: Andrew Carnegie, who went from Scotland to America with very little and created an empire and gave away 90% of his wealth (equivalent to $5.5-billion today) to philanthropic causes and institutions from which we still benefit today
Philosophy of Life: Chardi Kala (the Sikh philosophy of unwavering optimism, particularly in adversity)
Biggest Ever Opportunity: My Irish immigrant grandmother helped me to afford to study at university. She arrived in London at a time when there was a lot of anti-Irish sentiment and had to fight for her place in society
Biggest Ever Disappointment: My father died in October 2020; it would have been nice to get to know each other better
Hope for the Future: Society is extremely polarised, and a big part of this is due to social media. Get to know people in real life – we are not so different in our values and aspirations
Favourite Reading: James Salter, Carson McCullers and Dambudzo Marechera. I had the great honour of being taught by recent Nobel prize-winner Professor Abdulrazak Gurnah, who is a superb human as well as a great novelist
Favourite TV Programme: The Wire
Favourite Food/Drink: Indian food (my mother-in-law’s cooking mainly)
Favourite Music: John Coltrane to Goldie
Favourite Sport: Football (Leeds United) and Rugby League
Favourite Website: Twitter
Hobbies: Long-distance running, trekking, and collecting first-edition books
Car: Audi
Pets: Jack, a ten-year-old cat
Miscellaneous Dislikes: Celery, contempt prior to investigation, Brexit
Favourite Other South African Company: Exxaro – their management has been phenomenal and forward-thinking
Favourite Foreign Company: Woolworths (for nostalgic reasons)
Married: To Dr Sasha Dhoat, a consultant dermatologist in London, since 2015
Children: Coralie, 5; Karishma, 3
Clubs: Not stated