Creative engineer brought wisdom and wit to all he did
Ethique founder Brianne West offers a few insights based on her own experiences of going out in business.
engineer, state services commissioner b October 5, 1923 d February 6, 2021
Playing rugby on the frozen ice of Antarctica and hanging out with the emperor penguins at Scott Base – Bob Norman’s engineering career took him to some farflung places.
Norman, who has died aged 97, was an unusual mix: an engineer committed to finding better ways society could make best use of technology, and an environmentalist who knew that mankind was responsible for its limited planetary resources.
Norman was regarded as legendary in engineering annals in New Zealand. Intelligent, direct, uncompromising. An innovative, creative thinker, hugely knowledgeable about bridge design among many other areas of engineering, and often a thorn in the side of several ministers of works.
During a distinguished public service career he oversaw many assets, including New Zealand’s Scott Base.
Norman visited Scott Base in 1967 in his capacity as Assistant Commissioner of Works. There he connected with Sir Ed Hillary, whose party was in Antarctica and undertaking the first ascent of Mt Herschel. Norman was a founding and longstanding patron of the Antarctic Heritage Trust, which he helped initiate with Trevor Hatherton in 1987 – a role he held for 27 years.
He saw the need for humans to be worthy custodians of the ice continent and to be keenly aware of what we could learn from it.
He loved the emperor penguins and was delighted by work with the dog teams. He was deeply saddened when dogs were banned from the Antarctic in 1994 by what he saw as flimsy environmental logic, all introduced species (except humans and their petrolguzzling snow machines) being barred.
The good times on that continent extended to rather freezing rugby matches, where, in addition to potentially violent wind chill which could swiftly lower the temperature by dozens of degrees, one of the big risks was that the ref’s whistle would freeze.
On his return from one Antarctic trip, Norman apparently turned up to Titahi Bay North School, where his wife was a teacher, in his full Antarctic kit.
Norman’s engineering vision can be seen all over Wellington – the highway up Nga¯ u¯ ranga Gorge, the architecturally lauded overpasses that connect the gorge road with the motorway into the capital, the design of Te Papa.
As head of the once-influential Ministry of Works, and as a former state services commissioner, Norman oversaw big infrastructure projects throughout the country.
The bridges he engineered were radical examples of an innovative ‘‘push bridge’’ construction technique used for the first time in the southern hemisphere.
Norman oversaw their incremental launch design, and persuaded bureaucrats and politicians to get the funds to build them.
He spent most of his working life at the Ministry of Works, joining the Civil Engineering Design Office as a young engineer after World War II.
He recorded some of the MOW’s achievements in his 1997 book You Can’t Win ’Em All – Confessions of a Public Works Engineer.
The book’s title proved to be even more prescient than he could have realised. In his view, the subsequent deconstruction of this powerful and transformative organisation was as shameful as it was illogical.
In numerous letters to newspapers, articles and interviews, he denounced the ‘‘neo-liberal politicians’’ who deliberately let infrastructural progress stagnate.
The current scramble to catch up on deferred maintenance, he and others argued, proved their point. And the slow progress in restoring a shattered Christchurch after a series of quakes added poignant persuasion to his case.
Bob Norman was a Lower Hutt boy, whose parents were originally from the West Coast. After studies at Hutt Valley High and Nelson College, where he switched from the classics to science, he headed to Canterbury College, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering with honours in 1944.
He was shipped out to Egypt with the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force, then to Italy where he was introduced to a life-long love of opera and Italian culture. He later went to Japan as part of J Force, developing infrastructure in a remote village.
He spent two years in the United Kingdom in 1949-50 on a University Travelling Scholarship and, while there, was joined by his fiance´ e, Beverley Rae. They married in 1950 and went on to have five children.
The family settled in Titahi Bay, where they lived for the better part of 50 years.
Back in New Zealand, Norman returned to the Public Works Department as a design engineer and did an honours degree in maths at Victoria University.
In 1956, he headed off for 15 months in the US on a Harkness Fellowship, crisscrossing the States.
On his return, he brought with him a 1957 Plymouth Plaza, and for many years, the huge, finned, red-and-white car was a familiar sight in Titahi Bay, its bench seats readily accommodating the whole family.
The Bay has remained the family’s tu¯ rangawaewae. It was here he built their home, engaged in local theatre and tennis, attended rugby matches, dived into the surf with his kids, and, as a keen fisherman, knew the tides and currents like the back of his hand.
As an admired orator, Norman’s public addresses were many.
He was well-known for his memory, his ability to recite Shakespeare, and to formulate parodic responses to politicians, penned in impeccable italic script.
His colleagues never received a simple email from Norman. There were always at least a few lines of rhyme composed with wit and panache, and a poem his team looked forward to receiving every Christmas.
In 1985 Norman was made a Companion of the Queen’s Service Order for Public Service. For his services to engineering, he was made a Distinguished Fellow of the Institution of Professional Engineers, NZ, in 1997.
He is survived by Geoff, Sally, Alan, Kit, and Simon; by grandsons Tom, Ryan, Jake, Daniel, Joe, and Adam; and by great-grandson Emilio. – By Bess Manson Sources: The Norman family, Nigel Watson (Antarctica Heritage Trust), The Dominion Post (Kerry Williamson)
Is there a more beloved job title than ‘‘entrepreneur’’ at the moment? Entrepreneurs seem to be worshipped as heroes (Elon Musk, anyone?), despite the fact there isn’t a person on Earth who built a successful business on their own.
Because of this, and the current state of the world, being selfemployed has never been more attractive to many people. As someone who has started and run her own businesses for over 10 years, I get the attraction.
Freedom to work where and when you please, creativity to build a product you have dreamed of, an opportunity to change the world and build a team of people as passionate as you are to do it.
As a commitment-phobe, I loved the idea of a freer lifestyle with no two days the same and I was driven by the idea of changing the world for the better.
But I think sometimes people skip over how hard it is and focus only on the glamour of entrepreneurship, without the realities of running a business being contemplated.
Most people know that most small businesses fail – 20 per cent of them within the first 12 months and over 70 per cent within a decade.
The fear of failure should never be a reason to completely discount the idea of striking out on your own, as the rewards can be immense and failure shouldn’t be viewed as the worst thing that can ever happen. But it should be an indicator that entering business takes preparation.
Of course, eight years ago when I started Ethique, I didn’t think like this. I had just sold two other businesses (micro, micro businesses) that I had started in my late teens/early 20s and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do.
Without question, I didn’t want to work for anyone else (though I was completing a science degree at the time, I couldn’t see myself trapped in a lab all day either). And I have always wanted to spend my life protecting our environment.
So Ethique was born from my firm belief that business is the best vehicle to create faster, longerlasting positive change. Government is slower as they have so many more hoops to jump through before achieving anything.
The Ethique story is one you can find in plenty of places should you care to look, so I won’t detail it here. Instead, I thought I would share some of the pieces of wisdom I collected from much cleverer, much more experienced people than myself over the early years.
Be different
This always blows my mind, but so many people start businesses that have no definitive difference from others in the market.
This is even worse in a supercrowded market, and yet I see it all the time. I get asked to mentor people and I love to do it, but this is one of the first questions I ask and easily 50 per cent of people cannot give me a real reason why I should buy from them and not their competitor.
If you, as the founder of your company, cannot articulate why you are different, how on earth is your potential customer going to (note I say different, as better is a matter of perception)?
A difference doesn’t have to be something major, like some grandiose purpose or an innovative product. Even something like price works well (there are plenty of examples of massive brands that market themselves exclusively on price). It may not be as persuasive to some buyers, but you need to think about this in terms of your target audience (and no, a target audience is not 20-40 year old women – narrow it down).
Have a purpose
A purpose doesn’t have to be grandiose, a` la Patagonia, who are ‘‘in business to save our home planet’’. But if you have a purpose, beyond just padding out your wallet, you will engender greater customer loyalty, inspire a team (a business’s number one asset) and ensure media have much more to talk about.
Ethique got a lot of press from all over the world in the early years (and still does now). Why? We are bold about our purpose, deadset on our values and very authentic.
Reading about a bar of shampoo is boring. Reading about a company that wants to rid the world of single-use plastic and inspire other businesses to think the same way has much more cut-through.
Protect your brand
Want a big brand? Plan for it now and start building some foundations for it.
You may not have the money to start investing in trademark protections around the world, but take it from someone who learned the hard way, it’s much harder to fix it years down the track. There are several ways of securing your intellectual property (IP) for the future, so have a chat to an IP lawyer for a couple of hundred dollars.
Plan!
It’s odd that I am saying this because I vehemently hated the word up until about three years ago. I remember thinking a business plan needed to be a staid 50-page document.
A plan can be as simple as one page outlining what you want to do and why. Corporates like vision and mission, but I am a huge fan of the Simon Sinek ‘‘golden circle’’.
Picture a dartboard with three circles. The innermost circle is your ‘‘why’’ (refer to point number two – this is your purpose). Out from that is ‘‘how’’, this reflects point number one, what makes your business different. And the easy one is ‘‘what’’. Start from your why and work your way out.
For example, Ethique believes business is the way to lead faster, more sustainable change that is better for all people and the planet equally (our ‘‘why’’).
‘‘How’’ is the multitude of differences between us and our competitors, like being palm oilfree certified, carbon neutral, home compostable and donating 20 per cent of profit to charity.
‘‘What’’ we do is the simplest – we sell plastic-free solid cosmetics like shampoo, conditioner and body lotion. Most companies can nail the what and the how. Fewer can articulate their why.
Get support
My last big point is sometimes a bit counterintuitive. Get support, but be careful who you listen to.
Loads of people will offer their help and this is a very sweet gesture. I don’t know if it’s a uniquely New Zealand thing or if people just like helping entrepreneurs, but you will be overwhelmed with people who want to give you advice based on their life experience.
Listen to it and take what you want to, but don’t discount everything you fundamentally believe to be true just because someone with more experience (possibly) says things can only be done one way.
We have been told from day one that many of the things we do are impractical or impossible. That home-compostable packaging won’t stand up on retail shelves, that donating 20 per cent of profit is unsustainable, that I need a bigger board and that I shouldn’t use equity crowdfunding to raise capital.
None of this advice (and much more) has ever panned out to be true.
If something someone is telling you is fundamentally in opposition to what you believe, you don’t have to do it. It’s tempting as an inexperienced person to simply take advice blindly, but no one knows your business and your goals like you do.
Don’t get bogged down in planning and research. You can have the best product and the best business plan in the world, but if you don’t actually get started, it will go nowhere. And many people get stuck at this point. What do I do first? How do I actually start?
And here I always go back to my favourite famous expression: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.
Start with something small you can tackle, like building a website or reaching out to a colleague to get some feedback (though be careful with your IP). Once you have taken that initial step, you will grow in confidence to take the next, and so on. If a task seems monumental, break it down into pieces so it’s achievable.
If you are starting a business in 2021, I wish you all the best!
So many people start businesses that have no definitive difference from others in the market.
Brianne West is the founder and chief executive of Ethique, the world’s first zero-waste beauty brand. Ethique is vegan friendly, palm-oil free, and cruelty-free (with the certifications to prove it).