WHAT with all the criticisms hurled at Creative Scotland, chairman Sir Sandy Crombie has found an interesting way to relax and unwind.
The former Standard Life boss has been moonlighting as an apprentice shop fitter – as part of a two-man team known as “Team SOS”. It’s all in aid of his daughter, Adele, whose new retail venture ALC had its launch event on Thursday evening.
“The Thistle Street mafia are out in force tonight,” said Crombie – pointing out Tex JMex boss Donald Mavor, costumer jeweller Joseph Bonnar and handbag superstar Anna Somerville of Covet among the guests.
Meanwhile, Lady Margaret was giving customers a guided tour of her daughter’s jeans range. “She knows her stuff. She has got me back into jeans again,” she says.
Optimus shows ‘girl power’
AN OIL and gas engineering firm in Aberdeen has deployed some girl power. Optimus has hired two female graduates – Ciara Mulligan, 25, and Abigail Mshelbwala, 24 – and offered a job to a third chemical engineering student, Francine Chidi, for when she graduates.
In all, the company has taken on seven female graduates in the past six years – 35 per cent of the 20 grads recruited overall.
According to the Institution of Engineering & Technology’s 2012 annual workforce survey, only 6 per cent of the engineering workforce is female. Looks like some more girl power is needed.
Hat-trick for Mark Elliott
THERE should be a prize for people who have racked up enough big roles at the major companies in Edinburgh. So here’s a gong for Mark Elliott, who has landed the treble after he took his latest role as head of communications, business services at the Royal Bank of Scotland.
He can now boast on his CV roles at each of the biggest financial services firms still standing in Scotland following his jobs at Lloyds Banking Group and, until recently, Standard Life. But he’s still pipped by Benny Higgins, who started his career at Standard Life, before going to RBS, then to HBOS, and finally nabbing the top job at Tesco Bank.
Ferguson is ‘music police’
IF MUSIC be the food of love, then someone has to pick up the tab.
Even if you just play tunes in the background to soothe your over-worked, under-paid office staff, you will still have to cough up some cash to the PPL, which collects licence fees on behalf of record companies and performers.
Not all businesses are keen to pay up. In the past, PPL employed people – kind of like music police – to go around premises that use music and ensure they had the appropriate licence.
Now it has taken a different approach. The organisation has hired Laura Ferguson as its first business relationship executive in Scotland, and says she will take a more “collegiate approach”. Watch out, there’s a new sheriff in town…