Sir Ian Wood - Aberdeens Billionaire
 

Sir Ian Wood is one of the most remarkable entrepreneurs to emerge in Britain in the last 60 years. He has been part of nearly every major happening in the Oil & Gas Industry since the Industries humble UK beginnings in the late 1960s. A man underrated, quiet, reclusive, and devoid of ego, he is widely recognised as the human symbol of the British Oil & Gas Industry. ​

 

His Grandfather William Wood (Originally a trawler skipper from Ross shire in North Scotland) moved to Aberdeen around 1904 with Sir Ian’s grandmother Williamina and her 10 children. William started a small fishing boat repair business in the summer of 1912; however, William discovered and purchased an old, abandoned fishing trawler decaying in water in Torry harbour near Aberdeen, he repaired it himself with finance being provided by his business partner Anthony Davidson for repair materials. The company Wood & Davidson was born. Williams youngest son John took over the running of family business after William’s death in 1938, and later bought out his siblings and Williams original business partner Anthony Davidson. In July 1942 John and his wife Margaret, brought their only son into the world "Ian" . Little could they have imagined, Ian would transform that small family business into an internationally recognised Energy Industry powerhouse, and in the process making him the most successful businessman in the history of Northeast Scotland.

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Sir Ian Prologue and Legacy

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Sir Ian’s character is one of continuous progress and striving for achievement. There is rarely a yesterday for Sir Ian, only today and tomorrow. As is true of the great achievers, Sir Ian never felt content with his own achievements. Success and achievement simply opened his mind to the enlightenment that his achievements simply were not acceptable, good enough and that more was needed. Sir Ian has experienced “Gold Medal” syndrome. The Olympic athlete’s gold medal may be placed firmly around the recipient’s neck, and in that moment, they should feel accomplished and fulfilled that they have achieved what they set out to achieve. All winning simply did was open up the reality that one achievement is merely another step on the achiever’s eternal ladder where true success doesn’t have a height limit and is never achieved. A life shall remain a continued pursuit of perfection and unfulfillment.

 

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Sir Ian wasn't like most fathers, he didn’t get the opportunity to spend as much time on the touchline at his Childrens football games than the parents of his children's fiends, nor did he get the time to watch them in the school play often. Sir Ian was constantly at the coal face of his empire, relishing and dealing head on with every challenge thrust in his direction, dealing with politicians, governments, rivals, and his own board. Sir Ian didn't dread challenge, he thrived on it, adversity and challenge made him successful, and his ability to deal with those crisis moments is what set him apart from his wider peer group and those who shared his boardroom. Left with his own thoughts, he remains tormented and torn. He has inadvertently traded off in part, being a husband and a father and friend, to nurture and grow the companies he founded and loved. He is extremely self-aware and perhaps knows that even with hindsight and given the same set of business and personal life circumstances all over again, his life choices may not have been any different to that of the path he chose to walk.  

 

 

 

Sir Ian cannot escape his mind, and is to a degree, trapped within it. A constant stream of ideas and challenges flow through him, whether it’s to make society better, or to help develop the next world saving medical technology, to secure his home city as the renewable energy capital of the world, or in those quiet moments of thought when an idea so unrealistic, so unachievable, so ridiculous. Yet the “What If” so profound if those ideas could come to fruition, dominates his overly active mind. 

 

 

 

I shall quote from one of the world’s great innovators sadly no longer with us, who put it in an understandable way, which is equally applicable to Sir Ian. 

 

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I wish my mind would leave me alone to be normal just once in a while. To stop the chaos, to stop ideas bombarding me from all angles, waking me in the night, prodding, hounding, consuming and devouring. The constant unprompted clamber for life’s next major discovery or achievement, with those around also expecting it from me. Every corner turned, every room entered, and every walk taken, every meeting attended. These aren’t merely destinations I experience during my working day, they are units or opportunities presented to me to “witness” what I can change about all of it, to make it easier, to make life better for all those experiencing the problems I see. All I saw in each new room was the next problem that needed solving that few had seen or had any ability to tackle themselves. I am merely a passenger in the confines of my own mind. He stated, “I wish I could find normality within the utter chaos of my mind”. I wish my mind would offer me respite, from myself, alas it does not. I continue to live in its grip and shall do until I die. Sir Ian Wood is not much different.

 

 

 

Sir Ian didn't have the ability as a person to lead a normal life as most of us do. His calling was always higher than where he was at a given point in time. Tomorrow, not yesterday. The idea of lounging around for an hour watching TV, or simply going out and washing the car for therapeutic reasons was never an option for him. His mind simply could not stay away from his business through fear of its failure, his constant pursuit of perfection and of fear of his own personal failure. Money was never a driving force behind anything he did, and its importance was little to him. There are no private jets, glamorous foreign holiday homes, or things in his life which could in any way demonstrate wealth. The idea of displaying wealth makes him uncomfortable, awkward and is a trait which is not part of his personality. Money was only of interest to Sir Ian to allow him to grow his company and take it to the next level, personal enrichment was never an aim, goal or an end game, his goal simply to succeed. Whether he would allow his veneer to admit it, to follow up on the “Gold Medal” syndrome statement made previously, Inside, he never felt anything he achieved was quite good enough, or that it was at best average. Throughout his life he has needed to prove he was good enough, whether on the sports field, or in the boardroom staring at an annual report with annual sales at his beloved Woodgroup hitting $7bn. Sir Ian was never arrogant enough to consider himself a success, he simply felt he had done ok, but there is always the next mountain to climb. The concept of “we have arrived” simply never existed. This writer had an opinion of Sir Ian before I started this book. It had been formed through ignorance, and in part from what I had read or been told, much of it I believed in the absence of any real information from any source of truth. My opinion was, a hugely financially successful, but a distinctly average man, whose success had been built off the back of others. An arrogant, ill informed, baseless characterisation formed by little more than internal opinion. This author ignorantly failed to correlate that the role of a great leader is to do “Just That”, to bring the best people together and set off mutually to collect the fruits of success generated by the collective group. My journey through his life and his achievements has changed my opinion of him completely. My opinion now has no bearing, no resemblance to the one I had at the start of this book. Sir Ian declined to participate in the writing of this book, which denies the book the full richness I would have wished this book to deliver. However, it uncovers one of the most astonishing personal and business stories of our age. Sir Ian is hugely charismatic, but in his own way, devoid of ego, and introverted, but secure and confident at the same time. He is without doubt amongst the greatest business leaders in any company in any country at any time in history. His is a story of huge risk taking, detailed strategy, a steady rock-solid hand on the company ship's wheel, guiding his business through success, tragedy, and failure and above all applying a huge amount of personal dedication and hard work, focused on the right direction to make his companies a success. If you judge overall success through the measurement of riches alone, he may not be as financially successful as Bill Gates, John Rockefeller or Andrew Carnegie. If you measure success by achievement, by tenacity, out manoeuvring of competitors, hard work, an ability to build and lead teams which have changed the way entire Industries operate, Sir Ian has few peers. Sir Ian wood casts the same shadow of greatness equal to any of those great names I have listed above. His humbleness combined with his infamous thriftiness and his roots in his home city of Aberdeen will prevent him from being recognised and talked about in the same breath, but Sir Ian need not look over his shoulder for the tap of greatness coming from beyond his own achievements. His achievements are remarkable, and as the research and information I was able to gather for this book demonstrated, his business achievements are as great as any in History.

 

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Sir Ian never turned his back on his home city, and despite a wider perception to the contrary, he has been handed nothing on a plate. None of his success came easily. It was fought for through his ingenuity, perseverance and the overcoming of the many obstacles which were constantly put in his way. 

 

 

 

Sir Ian retains a deep affection for Aberdeen, not simply for the riches it had provided his companies, himself, his employees and the wider city, his affection stems from the gratitude he now appreciates from the opportunity he had to work with the many great people and teams that have come and gone within his companies over the last 50 years. Aberdeen owes Sir Ian Wood a far greater debt than it would care to appreciate. His efforts were instrumental in bringing the Oil & Gas Industry to the city of Aberdeen, through his purchase and redevelopment of the former John Lewis shipyard in 1972. This created the first new engineering and fabrication Oil jobs in the city, bringing in the repair work that only his yard could accommodate. This was the catalyst that brought to Aberdeen the large Oil Operators who were starting to prospect for Oil in British Waters at the time. As a result of his early success, many major international competitors to his beloved Woodgroup came to the city to compete, creating many more jobs which would have simply gone elsewhere. The discovery of the Brent and Forties Oil fields in the early 70s, didn’t automatically signal guaranteed great riches and long-term prosperity for the city of Aberdeen. No one had the slightest Idea if there would be any real long-term change for the city. Dundee had originally been the port of choice for the Oil Industry. It had a better natural harbour for handling the large Oil & Gas Structures and was more centrally located. What Dundee didn’t have was an Ian Wood, prepared to invest millions at great personal risk in the redevelopment of the first major Oil & Gas fabrication facility outside of Nigg and Ardersier, without any real guarantee of winning any business which would be needed to support it, merely going on a gut feeling that the industry would indeed surge, once the first new Oil & Gas developments started flowing oil.

 

 

 

Sir Ian woods legacy stretches far deeper than simply Oil & fishing.  He galvanised the city's Civic leaders such as Sir Maitland Mackie and others in the 1970s, who represented the Aberdeen Harbour board to motivate and push for them to rebuild and modernise the entire harbour system in Aberdeen, to ensure the Oil Industry came to the city and could operate there. He led the harbour team through a strategy developed to transition the city from fishing to Oil, a financial legacy it enjoys today. More than three million employees have worked through his companies in Aberdeen and beyond over the last forty years. These jobs would simply have disappeared to other more industrially advanced cities in the UK and Norway if it hadn’t been for Sir Ian. 

 

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Sir Ian still feels a significant personal obligation to the city, “his” city, his wish is for the city to prevent itself from falling back into economic obscurity. He feels Aberdeen and Aberdonians are part of the “Lucky Generation”, and he includes himself firmly within that description. He does not take for granted how different his life may have been had Oil not been discovered on the shores of the North Sea back in the 1950s and 60s. He is keen to leave a legacy for the city, not a personal legacy, but an economic legacy. He doesn’t wish future generations to look back once he is gone and ask the question:” What did you leave us”. Sir Ian is a true business great who is massively under recognised and appreciated for what he has achieved and done for the Northeast of Scotland. Complex, competitive, controversial, calm and measured, his legacy will outlast the readers of this book (If you’re reading in 2024), and his legacy will continue for generations to come. 

 

 

 

If we are to look at the greatest Scottish Business leaders throughout history, Andrew Carnegie sits on his own as the most recognised and greatest Scots business leader in our history, not for the wealth he created but for the wealth and created then gave away. 

 

 Second on that list of greatness sits:- “Sir Ian Clark Wood”​.​

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