How it all began - 'I got into HR completely by accident'

It was 1986 and the young Stripe joined BAE Systems (British Aerospace), little did he know he would be there for the next 18 years. “I started out in engineering and then moved to manufacturing systems design utilising lean methodologies and approaches – programming this into software,” he tells me and then like many CPOs before him the unplanned occurred, “I got into HR completely by accident.”

Stripe’s line manager diktat was to get some people management experience to secure a management promotion. He was duly seconded to HR for a six month stint, “I went in and never came out,” he laughs. Those early years were peppered with the ‘feast and famine’ that defined defence in the late 90s. “There was huge amounts of restructuring work to be done and a lot of it involved simplification and closing plants,” he says explaining that eventually that ran its course, and he moved to a new role in which he worked upon restructuring, shared and managed services, overseeing reward, pensions and payroll and everything in between

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A highlight was working on the Hawk Aircraft Manufacture, which is the aeroplane the Red Arrows fly, “We reduced 4,000 people to 2,500, it was a big organisational restructure,” says Stripe – at this point he didn’t know that he would be the kingpin of re-sizing headcount. Yet, there was a thirst – the one that comes with youth and a yearning for ‘what’s next’ so while it was good there was more to be seen and experienced.

Nestle and its confectionery beckoned – ‘it was my least favourite job’

The next stop was Nestle and the confectionary division – potentially a ‘Willy Wonka moment’ yet a very strategic one. It was 2006. The business was not performing and in came Stripe who did what he had become skilled at – he re-structured it. Yet, as ever there was more on the cards, “Then I moved to Switzerland as the Assistant Vice President for HR for the Centre – there were around 3,500 people and 50 different languages,” he remembers.

Reflecting, Stripe says that he ‘loved’ living in Switzerland as a family and in that moment, you get a very real flavour for the HR professional that he is – highly skilled yet wanting to balance his life. He tells me later that he is an ‘introvert’ – perhaps, but one that keeps his people close and cares deeply about the ones he does interact with. Yet, despite the outdoors lifestyle and all that it gave his family he admits it was, ‘his least favourite job’.

Knowing that, he returned to the UK as the HR Director for Head Office in the UK and Ireland. It was a business with a £6.4 billion multi-category product range spanning from coffee to confectionery. He did that role for the next five years and absolutely ‘loved it’. He says, “It was probably the most fun I have had for five years.” Amongst his highlights was establishing the Nestle Academy which ran apprenticeships with students gaining a degree qualification by the end of the programme. “What I am particularly proud of is that 74% of our apprentices were first generation to go to university, so from a social diversity perspective it was brilliant. I did that for five years and then I went to Paris,” he says.