S5. E6. Stuart Rodriguez, CEO Gibro Group

Hello and welcome to the Gibraltar Business Podcast where we meet the individuals running business in Gibraltar. Each episode is like a mini masterclass in business and leadership. I'm your host David Travagliate, whether you've just found us or have been with us since the start, welcome to the show. The Gibraltar Business Podcast is brought to you by the GFSB and is sponsored by Gibraltar International Bank that shares our passion for business. This week we meet Stuart Rodriguez, CEO of the Gibraltar Group. The Gibraltar Group was established in 1975 by the late Brian Beres and has since become a multi-jurisdictional provider of professional services delivered by independent businesses located in Gibraltar, Spain, Portugal and Malta. Later in the episode we hear from Scott Simmons from Legal Balance, a firm that supports legal firms with business development. Scott tells Harriet Seed that the billable hour according to him is dead. I hope you enjoy the show. So Stuart, thank you for joining me on the Gibraltar Business Podcast. Yes, it's a pleasure to be here David. Well obviously, we know each other for the last two years that we've worked together at the Gibraltar Group, but of course all of our listeners don't have that knowledge of view or don't know you. So can you give me a bit of background as to what the Gibraltar Group does? Yes, the Gibraltar Group is a collection of companies and the common ownership and that common ownership been through a family and by extension the group companies come together and work and work in a very interconnected way that delivers to ultimately the clients or the customer delivers a level of service within a holistic branch of services. These services could be legal, they could be corporates, trusts, accounting and being service providers, it's in the client's interest in my view, although obviously I'm a little bit biased saying that, but it's in my view, it's in the client's interest to have all these services under one umbrella. So you'd say you know Gibraltar is known for this kind of work for professional services and there are others in the sector. What is it then that makes Gibraltar Group different? Well apart from being family owned, we like to treat the team leaders and the members of staff of course from top to bottom as if they were family. This means not morally coddling them like something happens in families but in having the benefits of an arm around the shoulder but also having the capacity to be able to sit down like good families do and be able to thrash out tough situations for the benefits of the family which ultimately leads to business success nine times out of ten. So you find obviously that's slight very much about the internal culture. Does that then reflect for clients? That brings that difference to clients as well. We like to feel that but I think we need to ask the client's that question, not myself. So Stuart you were just so that our listeners can get to know who a bit more about your background before Gibraltar. Can you tell us a bit about those early kind of experiences in your route to business? Yes I think since childhood I've always had an adventurous entrepreneurial mind. I do remember many moons ago selling newspapers, I specifically remember it was the panorama newspaper and I used to go selling these from door to door near to where I lived and I used to be very proud of the fact that I was able to generate my own income and that philosophy has always helped me to achieve things and to hopefully get like-minded people to do the same because sometimes people just in a little push in the right direction to be able to fulfill their potential and I think without wanting to speak too much about myself I think I've been able to do that on several occasions. Specifically when I went away to study I used to knock on doors on my return for the summer and I didn't just- I wasn't just able to generate work or get jobs for myself but I was also able to do so for a lot of my friends who can testify to that. On one occasion we ended up doing a whole summer of work hand on a luxury 60 meter vessel in Soto Grande and there were four of us traveling every morning at seven o'clock and coming back in the afternoon and I also distinctly recall one particular summer where I was working as an intern in a law firm from 9 to 5 pm then I was doing pizza delivery work from 7 to 10 pm and then to top it all I was doing security work for a local company from 11 pm to 2 pm at night so in general I think a work ethic was born from a very early age and this has always stood me in good stead I feel and just as a matter of a side interest my son actually he came home with his friend and he said look how much money I've made and I said really how have he done this and he without me prompting him he'd been knocking on some neighbor's door and offering to walk their dogs along with his friend for a small for a small donation and he came home with I think he was 25 pound and he was over the moon with himself and then I asked him what are you going to do with the money and he said well I've got a day of school soon and I'm going to go to the local shop and start to buy accessories for the dogs so I can not just walk their dog but but also sell them some oh wow okay from door to door and you could just it just brought back a lot of these early memories which sometimes you know due to the cycle and the the pressures of work and getting things done and managing people we sometimes forget these routes so seeing my son carry out these these you know unprompted rolls or whatever you want to call them it brought back a lot of these happy memories from from when these small traits start to develop in your character which you then take on to to work life I bet right it must be feeling for you right now proud but also proud and excited to see you in this country entrepreneurial spirit being passed on right well I hope so are you sure you haven't prompted in too much absolutely certain you know so of course look you've got that entrepreneurial spirit you're young you're growing up in Gibraltar you've got these jobs on the go that I think you know the wearing many hats part will resonate with a lot of listeners who might be running businesses or starting out as well why then choose law to go you know you spent a bit of time with law why did you choose the legal route rather non-trapenarial and can they be the same thing I think there's a bit of taboo in mixing those with each other but I I think that I don't really agree with with them being separate and distinct I think being entrepreneurial and being a lawyer work very well handy in hand because law is a wonderful profession that you can just extend to many facets of the finance centre which we're very grateful to to have on our doorstep and coming back to the question of why law and how did that happen well it's it's another of the stories that that I sometimes discuss within family circles and and this goes back to to an earlier memory when I went up fishing with my father and my sister and it was a horrible rainy day and after an hour or so we called it a day my father dropped my sister off at at home and he took me for for a coffee as to remember the place where it was and he just issued I think you should be a you should be a lawyer I think that's that profession suits you he was a a police officer at the time so he loved law and and he really instilled that idea in me and from that day on and I was 10 years old well from that day on there was nothing else that I really wanted to be other than obviously footballer but then you'll be able to realize your limits so you come back I think you're looking at your timeline you know and kind of what your career trajectory has been you start off very much in those entrepreneurial days in 1999 you're appointed to the board of the gypro group in 2015 you were appointed as its CEO what were some of them key milestones in that journey well just to clarify I was appointed to the board in 99 but I became a very young managing director in 2002 so essentially I was a de facto CL from that point. officially I became CEO some seven or eight years ago but that was due to a structural change of the titles within our organization. So that journey was a wonderful journey and it still is of course but it's a journey that started with me getting to know my mental, the late Brian Perez and forging a I think a very wonderful team with a clear vision on growing a business and not just growing it locally but he had the four sides of opening up a law office in Spain which I think was the first of its kind back then some 25 years ago but he always had the vision I had the the can do attitude I'd like to think and the hard work perseverance and I think the capacity to bring people together and and achieve goals and this essentially has been my lifetime project and bringing in together handpicked leaders with different specialities has helped us to grow and create what we have now which is a multidisciplinary group of companies and a family ownership working together like a family and I think this is what distinguishes us locally. Okay so as we've worked together I know I know the GIPRO group it's multigerestictional as you say which translates as has an international presence as you say you've you've handpicked leaders that must have its own kind of challenges or bring its challenges for you as a leader how do you overcome challenges and what are some of them? Yes I think business per se is relatively easy the hard part is dealing with people and the business really or the success is defined by how you treat these people be they staff managers fellow directors and most importantly the clients because without this last group of people you have nothing retaining good people and recruit and recruiting good people too I think is fundamental to the success of any business and this challenge has overcome by being honest be be it's in good or not so good situations and also changing along with the times because without changing evolving and adapting your business with either die very slowly or relatively quickly. So GIPRO has over the years done that right it's diversified and changed I think any successful business in any day and age has to do that it has to look at itself know what can improve and also be enabled to identify areas that can generate growth and and lead you to you know to to achieve your your goals and success okay so as to many people listening might not know this but you are once chair of the Gibald defederation of small businesses in fact you're not the first chair to come and be as a guest on the show what was your what are your memories of the time as chair of the GFSB and how do you feel businesses changed locally yes well firstly it was an absolute honor to be to be chairperson of the GFSB I had been on the board for I would say around 15 years watching great people lead the federation and be part of the boards I learnt a lot from a very early stage in in my career my profession career and working with you know wonderful people like the likes of Marie Lugarreira and her passion and her energy was was a site to behold to be honest and recently I caught up with her and had a very nice lunch and you know she still had that that fire and that passion in her which was wonderful to see in terms of the business landscape well Gibraltar really has changed dramatically beyond recognition the finance center is a resounding success story for Gibraltar PLC for a little town which is also a nation with a unique unique sets of quirky characteristics it is truly amazing to see what has been achieved we are now a truly international cosmopolitan prosperous peaceful territory that in my view should be the envy of the entire world and this without mentioning how we live together in harmony regardless of religion faith or orientation and to add to that I think we're only a safe cross-border treaty away from turbocharging our economy to levels that really fuel us can only imagine conversely and I have to say this the other side of the coin is that if we if that this is not achieved we could enter stagnation or indeed worse I think it's true that resonates with a lot with myself and a lot of people and a lot of my guests over the last few seasons actually we are waiting on the outcome we are operating under uncertainty but I do think that Gibraltar's business is a resilient just because of the nature of that so so fingers crossed it happens I want to change that completely now and then I want to bring in one of your other interests and passions which I know is football you're a Liverpool FC supporter you'll never walk alone it's true I'm not going to hold that against you but as a keen football fan and former owner of a local football club can you draw any parallels between leading a business and managing a football club I certainly can because from a very young age I was obsessed with reading football managers autobiographies or biographies in particular I think I've read most of them regardless of which team they represented and in fact I think the Alex Ferguson one is one is one of my my favorite I was going to ask you who stood out yes well that one did Brian Kloff's walking on water Bill Shankley bought Paisley the de Gleish the Gleish owners won all of them stand out and the psyche in managing leading whether it's football or business is very similar in football you need a good goalkeeper a strong spine which is through your your central defender then your center midfields and then your striker you name it you normally tends to to concentrate on building that spine and then the rest develops naturally or compliments the spine but business is really no difference you need to have key leaders in the right positions whether it's a small business a medium or a large one and you need to allow those people to flourish to have the confidence and your trust that they can do the job whilst whilst they're out they're on the pitch or whilst they're out there in a team meeting or with clients it's it's essentially the same and I think this this precise point is is hammered home very well by using again Alex Ferguson's sir Alex Ferguson's example where he he rewrote part of his main autobiography and he he changed the title to leading and he was invited by the Harvard Business University to talk about leadership and it was fascinating to see how how many of these principles transcends normal business and why should it be your leading people you have an idea you have a plan you have your objectives and you need to achieve them is it any difference to to business I don't think so when you when you think of the psychologists you say team dynamics and we're talking about some of these teams are elite they're worth billions in terms of their operations so I think it's it's about time that it looked to for leadership and how to pull teams together so so it's not a surprise to me I asked my listener is it a surprise to you wanted to kind of go back to to jibro and can you tell us about a recent initiative or project that the jibro group has undertaken under your leadership that maybe and and see if we can mix it up have you where you've used any of those football dynamics to achieve success well I'm not sure whether any football analogy here would be applicable but one particular project which I'm particularly proud of is when three or four years ago we spotted a gap in the markets I mean traditionally we were lawyers company trust managers etc but we saw that there was an opportunity to create our own accountancy arm and we're part of an international network kind of of the Comtons. And actually, we're one of the few at the time that didn't have a fully fledged accountancy practice. So we decided to create what is now known as New America Accounting Services to provide in-house services to our client base. And I'm very pleased to say that these few years later, we now boast five qualified accountants. And there's plenty room for growth. And it's one of these additions that we make to a group of companies that ultimately creates a team that is stronger than the sum of its parts. And that is what I think have helped to achieve in all these years. - Yeah, and I came across that on your site. You know, it's very much a team you can trust. And I do think that reflects what the Gibraltar Group is. Stuart, looking forward, again, you know, keep on going back and forth, but what trends do you see shaping the future of business and finance? - Well, technology is a big one and the way that clients and customers interact will surely change. With, again, with the use of technology, which in some cases are steps forward and in other cases, I'm not too sure whether they are. Artificial intelligence is becoming, you know, a subject that is on the tip of everyone's lips. And when you look into what artificial intelligence can create, it can be quite scary. With that, ever replace the interpersonal nature of a face-to-face meeting, maybe not now straight away, but, you know, trends are changing very drastically. You only have to look at your own children to see how they communicate, to realise, you know, that that is the client of the future. And you have to cater for what client's demand, again, going back to the analogy of having to adapt and evolve over time. And I'm sure that that will come, not just through social media and good PR, but also in the way that we interact. And I think COVID has accelerated a lot of these trends. The working from home culture, Zoom meetings, and the like, you know, are reshaping the way that we work. - Yeah, actually later on in this episode, we meet Scott Simmons, who is from Legal Balance, and he's got some ideas about how AI impacts legal services as well. So, so, listen to that one. You mentioned, obviously, I think, if you're looking at innovating and adapting, Gibra was going to be celebrating its 50th year in business in a couple of years' time. So, it's obviously being able to do that quite successfully. What are your hopes and goals for the future, for the next 50 years? - Well, it's a very good question. People sometimes you cannot look too far ahead, as they say, "Man plans and God laughs." - That's true. - But having said that, you always need to have a plan, a clear vision going forward. And for that, it is finding new ways of generating income, new ways of diversifying the services of the group in a way that complements the group, being greater than the sum of its parts. And that is where we are at the moment, trying to identify these opportunities, and being able to grow in a sustainable and profitable manner. - So, last question. And it's one day I tend to ask most of my guests a variation of at least. And you may have already given us the answer, but reflecting on your career, what's been that most valuable piece of advice or lesson so far? - Yeah, I think there's one that really sums it up for me. And that was that, when I first started off, I had a job offer of sorts from a large Gibraltar law firm. And then I had one from the smaller law firm at the time, which is where we are now, which really had just one lawyer who'd recently departed. So I was looking to step into those shoes. And I had both opportunities, and I went to see my grandfather, who was a very wily old Scott, full of life stories and uncanny advice. And he was probably my best friend at the time. And I used to go for him for advice. And when I set out both opportunities, and I put it on the table, and I said, "Grand, what would you do, Granddad?" You know, I'm not sure what to do here. And he just summed it up perfectly by saying, "You can either be a very small cog in a big machine, "or a very big cog in a small machine. "And I don't think I look back following those words. "It was clear to me what I wanted to do, "which is to get a project that was small, "but take it somewhere, "rather than just be maybe a number in a bigger firm, "hadn't to cut your teeth at that level. "Was I right or wrong? "I'm not sure." - Well, it's from where I'm sitting. It sounds like you're right. Yes, and that advice has always stuck in my mind because it was outstanding advice at the time. - I think it sends a message, you know, from your father telling you, "Look, be totally legal career." To your grandfather giving this advice about, I guess what he's saying there is, think about what you want, and that decision comes through, right? - Yes, and ultimately it's down to family. - Family is super important, it's you work at Giverwitch's family, and Stuart, thank you so much for your time, and that's it, they're up. And thank you for putting up with me. (laughs) ♪ That's new, you better ♪ - Hello, Scott. Thank you so much for joining us today. Can you please tell us a little bit about legal balance? Who is it, and what does it do? - Hi there, Harriet. Thank you so much for having me. So legal balance, when we describe ourselves, we say that we are a toolkit for turning lawyers into rain makers. So what we do is we provide lawyers with the tools, tips, and techniques to get out into the marketplace, give clients the best advice and win more work. We coach clients on subjects around leadership, mindset, culture, and habits. We train clients on how to sell and cross sell, how to network confidently, and with purpose, and how to give the kind of presentations that people really enjoy and make other lawyers jealous. And then we consult for law firms, provide them with strategies that they can take out into the marketplace to help them build organically as the foundation for the future of their business. Now, our market is lawyers, but everything that we teach, actually, cuts across all professional services. And I suppose what we'll talk about in the moment is changing. (laughs) I'm not going to leave that, but that will how it impacts all of professional services in the future. - Well, you have a segwayed in quite nicely into the next session. What is new with legal balance? - Right, so, as I sort of just mentioned, one of the things that we do is we provide training courses and the big one that we provide is called the BD Breakthrough Blueprint. And it's a two-day course and it covers all of the things that we talked about just now. And what we're finding is the changing way in which people are learning, means they want to do their own pace and they want to be able to get access to whenever they want. And so we are turning the BD Breakthrough Blueprint into a digital course. And it's going to be coming out, all things being equal. It's coming out at the end of October. We're really excited about it because it breaks down really nicely and really simply, the selling is not difficult. It really isn't. I used to be a lawyer. So I know what it's like to have that dual conflict of winning the work and doing the work. And sometimes we have this view that sells people like Jordan, Belford, you have to be the Wolf of Wall Street. But actually, that's not the case at all. Lawyers aren't taught how to sell and it creates this idea in the mind, in the minds that they can't do it, but it's beyond them. But actually, selling is really simple. You start from a place of wanting to help and everything else just falls into place. And with the sort of coming now of AI, AI is going to change everything across all of professional services. It's going to do the work that traditionally, lawyers, accountants, wealth managers, you name it. Any professional who saw their remit as, in certain areas, like research or drafting or something like, AI is going to do it all. And so for lawyers and across all of professional services, they have to reevaluate who they are and they are and always have been advisors. We seem to have forgotten that, that we are advisors. And so whatever it is that AI can and will do, and I've already seen some amazing things that AI can do in the legal profession. But whatever it can do, it's an aid. It's going to make us better at being advisors And that's really exciting. And if lawyers want to go into the 21st century, and really? Mae'n gwneud gweithio gweithio i'n gweithio, mae gweithio gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweithio i'n gweith o'r Ligall Balanced.co.uk. I'm on Instagram if I'm a little bit on TikTok. The website is www.Ligall Balanced.co.uk, but you will find me every single day on Liggin. I'm on there, I'm starting conversations, I'm commenting on other people's posts, I love being on Liggin, I think it's the most amazing platform. So if you're on Liggin and you want to have a chat, you'll find me on there. So please do come and find me. Okay, thank you very much for coming, to talk to us today, Scott, and I wish you all the best with your launch. In the October, yeah? Yes, perfect. Thank you so much. And that's a wrap for this episode of the Gibraltar Business Podcast. Thank you to our guests, Stuart Rodriguez from the Gibraltar Group and Scott Simmons from Ligall Balanced. Thank you to the team at the GFSP, our sponsor the Gibraltar International Bank, and to everyone who contributes to the project and keeps the podcast going from strength to strength. Thank you, of course, to you for tuning in. Without you, the show wouldn't exist, so thank you. I hope you've enjoyed listening. If you want to contact the show, please do so on any of our social channels or directly via the GFSP. So it's a good bye from me for another week. In the meantime, keep your eyes on the prize and reach for your goals. See you next time.