Roy's Monthly Gossip

Lifetime achievement award

by Mark Rowe

Let me start this month’s gossip with a huge thank you. At the end of February while sitting taking photographs at the UK OSPAs (the Outstanding Security Performance Awards) I was given the honour of receiving a lifetime achievement award. And here I am pictured with it, thanks to Di Thomas who was on my table for taking that pic.

I did say that I didn’t feel that I had been in the industry long enough to receive such a prestigious award but at that point Paul ‘Sinnerman’ Sinha of ITV’s The Chase pointed out that my nomination mentioned that I started in 1972. And ok, we can all do the maths. Comments from the judges were put up on the big screen behind me hailing me as an industry stalwart and for my contributions to the wider industry. The magazine’s Security TWENTY (ST) exhibition-conference series has raised tens of thousands of pounds for charities, at pre-event charity dinners, since they began in 2013.

I felt that as we have so many people in the room at ST networking dinners, many as guests of us or others, that we should use the opportunity to raise money for a charity that’s both local to the event and relevant to our industry. And again thanks to you, to all those people that have helped me do that. I was quite emotional and yes, quite speechless, a first for me, as I felt that people like me never win awards. So thank you to consultant Nick Johnson who nominated me, also an award winner, as security consultant of the year. My thanks to Prof Martin Gill of Perpetuity for putting the global awards together and to the judges and my peers in the industry for their kind words and for choosing me over anyone else. I truly love this industry and to answer the question that has been posed to me, no it’s not time to hang up my hat; so yes, I will be around for some years yet.

Talking of awards our very own Mike Gillespie of consultancy Advent IM, magazine editorial board member and regular contributor is a finalist in TWO categories at the National Cyber Awards, including its most prestigious award, Cyber Citizen of the Year. Please join me in congratulating Mike. I believe he is the only person who has made the grade for more than one category. Mike said: “It’s an incredible honour and the shortlists are filled with some extraordinary people. I am really looking forward to the final and meeting some of them.”

Chris Parry has rejoined us; I say us, I mean the industry, he told me just wanted to confirm that he’s recently joined AMAG Technology. “I’ll be working with Mark Williams and Sarah Nicholson, with responsibility for the UK and European accounts,” he has told me.

At DVS, some internal promotions in their sales department, I am told. From April 1 Andy Waters has a new role as head of sales. So, who’s now looking after the external sales reps? Colin Muirhead will become field sales manager and Josh Whitehead takes up as area sales manager – team leader. Matthew Perry has been made internal sales time leader and Kate Morgan becomes sales co-ordinator team leader.

Did you manage to attend ST20 in Birmingham? Over 500 of you did, so I hope that you had a great day. Whether because it’s the first show of the year, or the Midlands location, it’s always a most popular event. We changed the layout and created a new cafeteria area. We had to set some new rules because of the COVID-19 virus but we pulled off a great show, so thank you all for your support. We also raised a whopping £5,000 at the charity dinner for a new charity, called Prost8. Did you know that at least 8,000, and possibly as many as 12,000, men with an early diagnosis, each and every year, are going down the route of more invasive treatment pathways, such surgery and radiotherapy, which is mostly unnecessarily. The charity’s aim is that by the end of this year that no man with an early stage diagnosis will be unaware that he has alternative treatment choices that can provide a better lifestyle after prostate cancer. The new treatment is focal therapy including focused ultrasound (HIFU). You can read more about this on our letters page as Paul Sayer the founder and CEO of the charity has written into us. But make yourself and others aware, you don’t have to endure that awful treatment, if you catch the disease in good time.

Talking about the Coronavirus CO19, it has been causing us some major issues, like so many other people of course. As a result Ifsec have decided to move their massive show to September. It just so happened that was the only week they could do the show around that time, so that they did not clash with Security Essen; and Global Security Exchange (GSX), the ASIS show in the States, in Atlanta this year I see. Ifsec’s new three days of September 8 to 10 was the very week we were running our shows in Ireland.

We have managed to move our shows to the last week in September, likewise avoiding a clash with those other major events. The same venues as before; Belfast will be held on Tuesday, September 29, whilst Dublin will move to Thursday, October 1, giving us all time to move through Ireland, while behaving ourselves at all times on the bus I hope. We have likewise moved our Glasgow event from this month to November 24, and of course the ever popular charity dinners will be held in those venues the nights before. It is going to be a very busy time of the year for events, not only ours but in other sectors; so I hope that you all will understand that it is the health and safety of all our visitors, exhibitors, sponsors and staff that is more important.

Visit https://professionalsecurity.co.uk/security-events-and-conferences/security-twenty-home/ for the full dates and venues and a big button to press to register to attend – it’s free, and the bacon butties are on me!

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