Latest / Project Podcast / Back to school: project management in the education sector

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Back to school: project management in the education sector · Project Podcast

• 0:14
  Hello and welcome to the APM podcaster.
• 0:16
  My name is Professor Adam Bodison and I'm the chief
• 0:19
  Executive of APM and your host today.
• 0:22
  We're delighted to welcome to the podcast Dhruv Patel.
• 0:26
  Dhruv is an APM honorary fellow and chief executive and founder
• 0:30
  of the Nissai Group. His company specialises in the
• 0:32
  delivery of online education services to learners around the
• 0:36
  world, particularly to what it calls non traditional students.
• 0:39
  And we'll get into that. I suspect in the conversation,
• 0:42
  Dhruv is going to share his experience of project delivery
• 0:46
  in the education sector, as well as the role of technology and
• 0:49
  hopefully a few leadership insights too.
• 0:51
  So Dhruv, thanks very much for joining us.
• 0:53
  And to kick off, perhaps let's talk a little bit about you.
• 0:57
  Can you give us maybe a sense of your background and your career
• 1:00
  to date? And maybe tell us why you
• 1:02
  decided to found Nissai Group? OK.
• 1:06
  Thank you Adam for inviting me to this broadcast.
• 1:09
  So I in a very traditional way going to a traditional
• 1:14
  education, but then decided to not go in all of my parents
• 1:19
  footstep, my father's footstep in medicine, decided to be an
• 1:22
  accountant and a chartered accountant.
• 1:24
  And after I got qualified, I decided I did enough of it and
• 1:27
  decided to go into business. So decided into what I would
• 1:30
  call training adults in IT and stuff like that.
• 1:34
  And then I found this software which allowed me to teach at a
• 1:37
  distance. So we said, right, great.
• 1:40
  And then fate, as they say, is an amazing thing.
• 1:44
  I came across somebody in Birmingham and they wanted to
• 1:49
  teach children who couldn't go to school because at the
• 1:51
  hospital. And we had the technology which
• 1:53
  allowed us to do this. And when we got into that, I
• 1:56
  thought, wow, this is something. But then the students couldn't
• 2:00
  get education. So we said, right, let's set up
• 2:03
  an online school. And this is going back to late
• 2:06
  2001 in 2002 and that's when we started off.
• 2:10
  So it's been working all this time to basically started off
• 2:15
  with children in medically I'll me and then we started off with
• 2:20
  children with learning disabilities, dis action and
• 2:23
  then carried on from there on. So it is the way we teach, which
• 2:27
  is important. It was how the teachers were
• 2:29
  trained to teach. It was not just teaching online,
• 2:32
  it was engagement and making sure that but also the same time
• 2:37
  what I found was that children were not in the centre of
• 2:41
  learning, they were just a number.
• 2:43
  And you know what technology allowed me to put to was to put
• 2:46
  the learners in the centre of learning and also to help
• 2:51
  personalise their learning because everybody learns
• 2:53
  differently and everybody needs a different way of learning.
• 2:55
  So technology allowed me to do that.
• 2:58
  So we couldn't find any technology, so I had to create
• 3:02
  and write the software with a team of my, my team in software
• 3:06
  and which still exists and we still have our team in Stockton
• 3:09
  which does all these things. But it is a continuous
• 3:12
  improvement. And as we learn more and more,
• 3:14
  we never stop learning about how and what will affect and how we
• 3:18
  have to do things. But it, technology allowed me to
• 3:21
  do that and, and it was quite an amazing journey so far.
• 3:24
  And I love what I do. And then we decided that, hey,
• 3:28
  what we do here is working. So why can't we make this
• 3:31
  affordable education everywhere across the world?
• 3:34
  And so started out in Asia and the more I got involved in the
• 3:39
  Asia side, the more I saw they don't understand inclusion
• 3:44
  because, you know, it's, it's a stigma And how do we overcome
• 3:48
  that? And how do we make this young
• 3:49
  people because they are able to do a lot of good things.
• 3:52
  Why shouldn't we make them happen?
• 3:54
  And also, why shouldn't the people in the rural areas and
• 3:59
  islands get the same level of education?
• 4:02
  What stops it? So this is what we did.
• 4:05
  So I'm really enjoying it. Yeah, well, it, it, it, you
• 4:08
  know, it's really inspirational and you know, I've had the
• 4:10
  pleasure of coming to see the centre in Stockton as well.
• 4:13
  And, you know, you've got a whole range of different people
• 4:15
  up there. You've got technologists, you've
• 4:16
  got teachers, you've got leaders, all kinds of people.
• 4:20
  And obviously that's grown over time.
• 4:21
  But it's one thing you have in a vision, Dhruv, of, you know,
• 4:24
  education, how you can change the world.
• 4:26
  You've had to get all of these other people to come on board
• 4:30
  and probably do something that was never in their mind to start
• 4:34
  with. You know, how did you, how did
• 4:35
  you get people to kind of lie into your vision and to kind of
• 4:39
  come on this journey with you? It is, as you say, it's a
• 4:43
  challenge, but when you recruit the right kind of people, right?
• 4:48
  And I've been very fortunate, been very, very fortunate in
• 4:52
  getting the right people on board and having a strong
• 4:56
  relationships. But also I think what we are
• 5:00
  doing is people buying into it. And even when you say to a
• 5:05
  software programmer saying, right, you know, you've got a
• 5:08
  choice. You can do programming for the
• 5:10
  big boys or you can do something which can really make an impact
• 5:14
  and you can see the impact. I think they will choose the
• 5:17
  latter because they want to make an impact.
• 5:20
  They don't want to be just a number.
• 5:22
  So, and I had this so many times with the My Software Choice guys
• 5:26
  in the sense that they used to say, right, OK, how got this new
• 5:29
  thing? And I would say, so how is it
• 5:31
  going to affect my learner right now?
• 5:34
  When I come up with a new thing, they turn around and say, so how
• 5:37
  is it going to affect our earners?
• 5:38
  What a change that's progress, you know?
• 5:43
  And that for me, he's saying, OK, I give up.
• 5:47
  They know what they're doing now, you know.
• 5:50
  Absolutely. So we, we talked earlier on
• 5:52
  about the kind of some, some of the students you work with, you
• 5:55
  know, there might not be accessing school.
• 5:56
  You talked about those who are in hospitals before.
• 5:59
  So tell us a bit more about these non traditional students
• 6:02
  and who they are and and also what is it that that you're
• 6:05
  providing that traditional education either can't or or
• 6:09
  won't for whatever reason provide?
• 6:12
  OK, So I think, I think the main thing is that we have lots of
• 6:15
  different learners, right, right from learners with autism at SD,
• 6:20
  behaviour issues, mental health. We have also young people in
• 6:24
  just coming out of the secure states.
• 6:27
  So we've got a whole sort of them, right.
• 6:30
  The key element is that we don't judge them because on what what
• 6:33
  happens when in online, even though we don't usually have
• 6:37
  webcams as well. So it's a level playing field.
• 6:40
  Our teachers don't know which post code they come from.
• 6:42
  Of course they know what their background is, but they don't
• 6:45
  judge. That's the most important thing,
• 6:47
  right? The second thing is we don't
• 6:50
  have a factory model. It's a you we don't have by age
• 6:53
  group. We have ability level.
• 6:55
  We have only 15 in a class, which means we have the same
• 6:59
  ability, 15 in a class. No judgement doesn't make any
• 7:01
  judge. But it's about half hour
• 7:04
  sessions and able to get the pace right, putting the young
• 7:08
  people in the right groups and let them be nurtured.
• 7:12
  We also have a very good team of student support officers in in
• 7:16
  Stockton as well as on the ground.
• 7:18
  We have mentors who go into the houses and support them on face
• 7:22
  to face, but socially, emotionally as well.
• 7:26
  So the idea is to give a whole wrap around service for our most
• 7:30
  vulnerable, but also create an environment where they can
• 7:34
  thrive. So that's the most important
• 7:37
  thing. Give them the environment and
• 7:39
  they can engage and then we can take them on our journey.
• 7:42
  It's and it's a journey which matters.
• 7:45
  If you get the right journey, they'll get their end game.
• 7:48
  If you don't put them on the right journey, they will never
• 7:50
  get there. So it's very much a, a holistic
• 7:53
  kind of service that you that, that you're offering there now.
• 7:56
  And now I know as well as Nisi group or as part of Nisi group,
• 8:00
  there's also the Nisi Education Trust, which is kind of AIII
• 8:03
  hope I described this in the right way, the charitable arm of
• 8:07
  Nisi. Can you tell us a bit about what
• 8:09
  NET is and what it does, what its priorities are?
• 8:13
  Right. So the Nisi Education Trust was
• 8:15
  created by my wife and I to make sure what we are doing can be
• 8:20
  amplified, you know, in terms of making.
• 8:24
  And again, it's the objective of that is to give people.
• 8:29
  An. Ability to see what can be done
• 8:32
  right and also to disseminate, disseminate information and
• 8:38
  values of learning online. But more importantly, that there
• 8:41
  is a light at the end of the tunnel for some of the young
• 8:44
  parents and parents who are in this situation, not only in the
• 8:47
  UK, but around the world. And we have done some amazing
• 8:50
  webinars and success seminars, live hybrid events and for
• 8:55
  example in last November, December, we did an event in
• 9:00
  Brunei which was all about inclusivity in education but
• 9:03
  inclusivity in workplace. So neurodiversity is to make
• 9:08
  people aware that this is there and that we have to have an
• 9:12
  inclusive world, right? And make sure that whatever we
• 9:18
  are doing, and we have now got this UKTRI grant to allow us to
• 9:22
  have a a person in Stockton to be a research doctor person to
• 9:29
  research all the outcomes which you have, how they can impact,
• 9:32
  what is the impact value of it. And that is also supported by
• 9:37
  Staffordshire University. So having those kind of stuff
• 9:41
  with us, we can hopefully use it to reform education not only in
• 9:48
  the UK but elsewhere, make it much more informative about how
• 9:52
  we can in make impact to those young kind of learners, not
• 9:55
  sideline them, but bring them into the mainstream.
• 9:58
  Because if you've got 20 to 25% of your class in this group,
• 10:03
  that's a major group. And then you got on top of that
• 10:07
  the COVID and mental health, we're coming to 30% of the
• 10:11
  class. That's a hell of a human
• 10:13
  resources which are not being deployed effectively.
• 10:17
  Yeah, wow. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 10:19
  And and so, Drew, there will be people who are, who are watching
• 10:22
  or listening to to this conversation who might want to
• 10:24
  find out more about the work that Nisai's doing, either the
• 10:29
  education side or the charitable side.
• 10:31
  Is there a website they can go to to find out more?
• 10:33
  Sure, it says www.threews.nisai.com.
• 10:38
  That's it. Simple Nisa i.com.
• 10:42
  OK, well, we'll, we'll let people have a look at that.
• 10:45
  It's funny, the www.wheneveridowebsites.
• 10:48
  And I would say that my children say, Dad, you don't have to say
• 10:52
  www.anymore only, only, only old people say that, they say.
• 10:57
  And I'm like, oh, I didn't know I was in the old category now,
• 10:59
  but. Hey, join the club.
• 11:02
  Yeah, I think you and me both OK, Well, so, so, so, so we'll
• 11:05
  talk a bit about this. Let's talk a bit about project
• 11:08
  management now. How would you say project
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  management has played a part in your career, for example in
• 11:14
  developing your business or or enabling the kind of delivery of
• 11:18
  some of the services to your learners?
• 11:20
  Has project management kind of been a part of that and can you
• 11:23
  tell us a bit about that if it has?
• 11:25
  In a way, yes, very strongly. And this is what I like about
• 11:28
  when you formalise the project management.
• 11:30
  We've been using project management in an informal way,
• 11:34
  right, because we've got lots of tasks, a lot of things, but the
• 11:36
  things we forget that sometimes, you know, if you have a really
• 11:39
  good structured way. And we were with Fortunate
• 11:43
  because I was with Fortunate, I was able to utilise the project
• 11:47
  management tools within the technology side because we had
• 11:51
  to have that for our software delivery and we use it and the
• 11:55
  teams use it more often. But a knife see that the project
• 11:58
  delivery, project management delivery should be in every
• 12:01
  session, everywhere where you got cross teams working because
• 12:04
  you are a team, right? And for me, it's every, you
• 12:08
  know, you've got to make sure the baton passing is correct
• 12:12
  within the teams. And if you're doing a complex
• 12:14
  work like we do in our children learning, right, because now
• 12:18
  we're only just teaching, we're also supporting them.
• 12:20
  We're doing things, you know, and everything has to meet and
• 12:23
  on time. So it is something which is
• 12:25
  needs to be done right. And I think one of the things
• 12:29
  which I've been doing recently is asking people, OK, don't I
• 12:34
  think project management is a big, but make it as part of your
• 12:38
  routine. Don't think of it as a separate,
• 12:41
  separate. Just make it as part of your
• 12:43
  daily work routine and see how you can bring it to compare,
• 12:47
  right? Because I think we tend to
• 12:50
  again, put it in a box. I'll do a project management,
• 12:53
  right? No, it's you're doing it all the
• 12:55
  time. Yeah, it's really interesting.
• 12:58
  So, so it sounds like tell, tell me if I'm misinterpreting what
• 13:02
  you're saying here. It sounds like you're saying,
• 13:03
  look, we we're using project management in two ways here.
• 13:06
  Partly it's about delivering change and and so on as a
• 13:08
  business. But actually we're also kind of
• 13:10
  taking a more kind of projectified approach to our
• 13:14
  day-to-day work as well. And and you found that that
• 13:17
  helps with managing the kind of interdependencies and the
• 13:20
  complexities of of the nature of the work that you do.
• 13:23
  Is that is that fair? Yes, it is.
• 13:25
  And also you know, we aren't working in 12 different
• 13:27
  countries and lots of time zones, right.
• 13:31
  So that's a challenge on his end.
• 13:32
  And and one of the things again, I've got a lot of my managers
• 13:35
  who are task orientated and they have their checklist and I said
• 13:39
  great, now start putting that together and see how where are
• 13:42
  the problems are. So it is, it is getting that,
• 13:46
  how do I say it's trying to build that into the whole value
• 13:50
  chain, into the business. Yeah, that makes sense.
• 13:53
  We, we, we have a bit of a mantra here at APM and you may
• 13:56
  well have heard me say this before.
• 13:58
  True, I'm sure you have, which is that when projects succeed,
• 14:02
  society benefits. So we have this kind of linking
• 14:05
  together of the project profession and kind of societal
• 14:08
  impact. And I'm really interested to to
• 14:11
  kind of get your sense of the the potential that projects have
• 14:15
  to change the world. For example, I think about
• 14:17
  something like the UNSDGS, the sustainable development Goals.
• 14:20
  You and I have had many conversations about them in the
• 14:22
  past. What's your sense of, of this
• 14:26
  capability, a capacity of projects to change the world?
• 14:30
  Well, let me just give. You an example potentially.
• 14:33
  So we have we should be getting a project in Thailand, right?
• 14:36
  We're dealing with schools and for learning with children out
• 14:42
  in the rheumatory areas and stuff.
• 14:44
  But that would involve us to put together a teaching centre in
• 14:49
  one of the regions in Thailand and train them up and bullshit.
• 14:53
  So for that I've created a project management office in in
• 14:59
  Bangkok, right And it's I've got a good project manager.
• 15:04
  He used to, he worked on the building of the second terminal,
• 15:08
  Suvanaguhumi Airport. But to deliver, you know, the,
• 15:13
  the pilot and then deliver that right across the island, right,
• 15:18
  Train the teachers, recruit staff, get the space, all the
• 15:23
  equipment, got everything. Make sure everything is working,
• 15:26
  make sure that technology is working.
• 15:28
  Hey, it's got to be something. But by the time we have
• 15:32
  delivered that we'll make a big impact, right, for those young
• 15:36
  people in the rural areas who would not get education because
• 15:40
  we would have something, a centralised teaching centre
• 15:42
  doing English and Thai curriculum, right?
• 15:46
  But that's where he starts making big impact.
• 15:50
  And I've just got another one. I hope they've agreed in
• 15:52
  principle in, in Malaysia, right, a similar 1.
• 15:57
  So you could see how and then you bring in rolling the and and
• 16:02
  this is part of the nobody left behind a gender on the SDG as
• 16:06
  well, right? And you if you get the education
• 16:08
  right, you get the poverty, you get the health, you get all
• 16:11
  those things, right. It's all the 17 sustainable
• 16:13
  development goals are all connected.
• 16:17
  It's education, as they say, you know, it's education stupid.
• 16:22
  You know, that's what is acquired, you know, and, and
• 16:26
  that's what I see how this thing makes it happen, you know?
• 16:31
  Yeah. So it's interesting to I, I
• 16:33
  probably in my kind of career which as, as you know also with
• 16:36
  an education background, I've been into hundreds, probably
• 16:40
  thousands of schools and trusts and so on.
• 16:42
  And, and I was thinking before our conversation today, I can
• 16:45
  only think of two out of all of those that where they had, you
• 16:50
  know, actually employed a project professional within the
• 16:53
  school or within the trust. Why?
• 16:56
  Why don't you think, you know, that schools and, and trust see
• 16:59
  the value of, of, of, of that kind of professional?
• 17:04
  Is it, is it a money thing or is it, I don't know what, what do
• 17:06
  you think? I think I.
• 17:08
  Think it's a legacy and this is my beef with education right
• 17:14
  now. We're still in that
• 17:15
  manufacturing age, right? So we are manufacturing people
• 17:19
  boom, boom, boom, boom. But now we're in a digital age.
• 17:23
  We're in a different age, right? Our children need to work
• 17:28
  flexible, but we're still getting them in that silo.
• 17:32
  So when our kids come out of school, they don't have a clue
• 17:35
  about, but they're playing on games and playing on games on
• 17:40
  that, which are very much critical thinking, critical
• 17:43
  resources. And you know, that's project
• 17:46
  management, but nobody in the school understands that, right?
• 17:50
  Whereas we need our future employees to be much more
• 17:54
  flexible working right and understand how everything fits
• 17:59
  together and what project management.
• 18:01
  And This is why you and I know that we should be bringing kind
• 18:04
  of project management into schools, right, right.
• 18:07
  As a, as a way to say, hey guys, this is the way you will be
• 18:12
  working and this is how it's interconnected.
• 18:14
  The world's going to be whether you have this current wave of me
• 18:18
  alone society, right? You still will be included,
• 18:22
  right? It's got to be in connected
• 18:23
  world. Yeah.
• 18:24
  And it needs to be brought that across.
• 18:26
  And This is why I just do not understand why the schools don't
• 18:29
  have it. I think it's just the way the
• 18:31
  education is right now. It's so manufacturing based.
• 18:36
  It's interesting, isn't it? Just as you were talking and I
• 18:38
  was thinking that, you know, if you think about people's
• 18:41
  personal lives, if you think about business, if you think
• 18:44
  about almost every other sector, you know, healthcare, you know,
• 18:48
  things have changed dramatically over the past 100 years.
• 18:51
  If I look at education 100 years ago to now, it hasn't changed as
• 18:56
  much as IT as other sectors. You know, it's still quite
• 18:58
  traditional in that sense. Yeah, we're still.
• 19:00
  In the industrial revolution mode, you know.
• 19:05
  We. Are you just think about it?
• 19:08
  Yeah. Well, OK.
• 19:09
  So you talk about the kind of the technological era or the
• 19:11
  digital era, I think was the word that you used.
• 19:15
  One of the challenges I certainly find is that trying to
• 19:19
  kind of stay ahead of the the, the rapid advances in
• 19:23
  technology, especially if you're in business in a technology
• 19:26
  business like you are, that's really hard to do and probably
• 19:29
  get harder the the kind of deeper you go.
• 19:31
  How? How do you stay ahead of all the
• 19:34
  change that's happening in the technology space?
• 19:37
  You know, the famous Moore's law that it will compound every
• 19:41
  year, right? I think you've got to take a
• 19:43
  step back from that in my opinion, because I, I was a bit,
• 19:48
  a friend of mine who really ran, ran at tech company.
• 19:51
  And you know, do you remember the old days?
• 19:54
  We had National Grid here and we had all those plethora of
• 19:58
  learning management systems and everybody had a learning
• 20:00
  management system in the schools, right?
• 20:03
  How many of those providers exist very small because they
• 20:07
  could not keep up? And the price of technology and
• 20:11
  thing goes down and down and down, right?
• 20:13
  And the cost of creating goes more.
• 20:15
  And everybody comes up with new thing.
• 20:16
  And there's another new thing. And it, it, it's a constant
• 20:19
  battle. But also our human brains are
• 20:22
  not capable of growing that fast, right?
• 20:25
  And having technology. So for example, I've still, I've
• 20:28
  got the Samsung 24. I don't know how to use it.
• 20:31
  I just know how to make a call on it, right?
• 20:34
  My brain doesn't compute. So I feel that we need to have
• 20:39
  the human side as a blend on it, right?
• 20:43
  And, and then I think that you need to let the, the technology
• 20:48
  and the, the, the, the human side work together, right?
• 20:51
  Rather let technology run away. And this is what we're doing in
• 20:54
  our side. You know, we're not running away
• 20:57
  with any new things coming up and saying, right, let's go, go,
• 20:59
  go. Think.
• 21:00
  Even with the AI, what, what can, how can we use AI, right?
• 21:05
  We're not going to use it for teaching, but let's see you how
• 21:07
  can we use it for data collection?
• 21:09
  Let's see how we can use it for analysis.
• 21:11
  Let's see what we can do it for other things, right?
• 21:14
  OK, but let's us be in the control, not the technology.
• 21:19
  Human should be in control and that's my mantra.
• 21:23
  That makes sense. And just for balance, I should
• 21:25
  say I've got an Apple, not a Samsung as well.
• 21:29
  There you are, but. You know better than I do I
• 21:32
  can't use it well, I. I'm sure there'll be a debate
• 21:36
  about whether or not I can use mine as well.
• 21:39
  So you talked a bit about AI there and, you know, that's
• 21:42
  something that as a kind of leader of an organisation, you
• 21:46
  know, I spend quite a bit of time thinking about at the
• 21:48
  moment. You know, you know, the big
• 21:49
  question to AI or not to AI and if you do, in what areas what
• 21:54
  you, you kind of talked about AI there as as an opportunity, I
• 21:58
  think. Are there any kind of threats do
• 21:59
  you think from from AI? Should we be worried about this
• 22:02
  in education? We can use, we're going to be
• 22:05
  using data AI for our data analysis and also allowing our
• 22:11
  teachers to have to interpret that OK and help them with that.
• 22:14
  So we don't, we, we are looking at how teachers, students before
• 22:18
  they fail, we are there to get pick them up.
• 22:20
  Where I get worried is when we are using AI for everything,
• 22:25
  right? AI is very good at looking at in
• 22:27
  in health situations, looking at a whole lot of data and coming
• 22:31
  out with simple thing, right? That's really good.
• 22:35
  But in the East, there is a big push for, oh, AI will do this,
• 22:40
  AI will do that. Don't worry about it.
• 22:41
  We'll have people, AI can take care of this particular job,
• 22:44
  right? And then I sit back and I think,
• 22:46
  right, OK, has anybody in technology teams sat down and
• 22:50
  thought, what the hell are we going to do with these people
• 22:53
  who are going to be replaced? Right.
• 22:55
  In the West, we are OK. We've got a lot of greater good
• 22:58
  social services and safety net in developing countries.
• 23:03
  We don't have that. There'll be a lot of people who
• 23:05
  will be made redundant. They won't have any jobs.
• 23:08
  They won't have any way to put their foods on.
• 23:11
  But yes, there'll be other jobs there.
• 23:13
  But when you have moved a lot of people out of the rural areas
• 23:17
  into urban areas for industrialization, they're
• 23:23
  really going to go back to their homes.
• 23:25
  So you're talking about the fact that the, the, the impact of AI
• 23:28
  will be felt differently by different parts of the world.
• 23:31
  That's a really, really interesting view.
• 23:34
  Let's talk about leadership. I was hoping we get a few kind
• 23:38
  of leadership gems and insights from you.
• 23:40
  What would you say, Dhruv, are the attributes of a really great
• 23:44
  leader? For me, I, I, I think that
• 23:48
  picking a good team is really important and then let it get on
• 23:50
  with it. And I think it's for me, I've
• 23:55
  had lots of discussions or robust discussions with my team
• 23:58
  and they really put me down when they need to put me down.
• 24:00
  But that's great because that's what, listen, I don't have the
• 24:06
  monopoly on ideas. And my role now is to facilitate
• 24:12
  people right, to come up and then make it happen.
• 24:18
  Because what, what you do need is giving that empowerment, but
• 24:24
  also have them coaching and having the, because I, my job
• 24:30
  has changed dramatically over the last 3-4 years.
• 24:32
  You know, where I used to be the centre of the universe, now I'm
• 24:35
  one of the, you know, I'm out, right?
• 24:38
  But the centre of the universe is a team.
• 24:42
  So it's how you actually work with the team.
• 24:45
  Yes, you, you know, there are days when I'm feeling what the
• 24:48
  hell is this all about, right? But then something happens and
• 24:51
  I'm back up again. You know it.
• 24:55
  It is about understanding and also leading from the front to a
• 24:59
  certain extent, right? But giving the young people and
• 25:03
  the people around you the ability to be best for
• 25:07
  themselves and they will be best for you.
• 25:09
  Empowering other people, empowering other people, it's
• 25:12
  come across very, very clearly. So I think we're almost, almost
• 25:16
  at the end. But I just one final question
• 25:18
  for you, Dhruv. And in fact, before I get into
• 25:21
  the question, let me congratulate you on your EPM
• 25:25
  honorary fellowship that you received earlier this year.
• 25:28
  And my final question kind of relates to that is I wanted to
• 25:31
  ask when you found out that you were going to have this honour,
• 25:34
  what was what was your reaction and where were you at the time?
• 25:38
  Well. I was, where was, I was in
• 25:41
  Stockton when I got it and I thought, right, I think
• 25:44
  somebody's pulling my chain, right.
• 25:47
  I, I don't, I never have had any awards like this.
• 25:51
  And I thought, wow. And then, you know, really, you
• 25:56
  know, it was the real moment. Is that really true?
• 25:59
  Right. And that was great.
• 26:00
  And it was fantastic to be recognised by you guys, you
• 26:03
  know, I mean, that's awesome. So I was really happy about
• 26:07
  that, you know? Fantastic.
• 26:09
  Well, we're, we're we're blessed to have you.
• 26:11
  And you know, I'm, I'm sure lots of people listening to this will
• 26:15
  will want to reach out and find out more about it.
• 26:18
  So thanks very much, Drew for joining us and to everybody
• 26:22
  who's listening or watching as well.
• 26:24
  We'll be back in a couple of weeks, but in the meantime, if
• 26:26
  you've got any comments or feedback, you can always e-mail
• 26:29
  us at apmpodcast@thinkpublishing.co.uk.
• 26:33
  Or if you're a Spotify, you can leave a comment directly in the
• 26:37
  app. So that's it for this episode.
• 26:39
  I'll see you next time. Thank you, Drew.
• 26:41
  Thanks. Adam, thank you very much and
• 26:42
  thanks for having me.