Roger Steward looks back on a fulfilling 40+ years in the industry

Like father, like son

Roger was just 18 months old when he visited his first gas turbine site, in Johannesburg, South Africa. He was probably too young to remember that now, but he does have fond memories from his childhood of living in different places around the world.

Kindergarten in Massachusetts. Being one of just 40 kids at a school in Finland, in the middle of a forest, in the middle of nowhere. Weekend adventures in Zambia: kayaking and trekking in Zambia on rivers infested with crocodiles and hippos.

“Thinking back now, I would never have had the guts that my parents had to do that kind of thing with my children. I guess it shows you how parenting has changed over the years.”

Roger says it was almost inevitable he would follow in his father’s footsteps.

“I could see it was a career that could be interesting and exciting, and it looked like it would be good fun, traveling the world, fiddling with jet engines. I ended up starting my career with the same company he had worked for and the rest is history.”

Steeped in jet engine history

That first job was as an apprentice for GEC Gas Turbines (a business that became part of Siemens Energy). Its factory was around 10–15 miles from Lutterworth, in Leicestershire, England, where Roger attended secondary school. It’s also where the inventor Sir Frank Whittle developed the first jet engine for use on aircraft.

“As apprentices, we worked in the test areas, which still had a lot of the original test equipment lying around from when Frank Whittle tested his original engines.”

While collating Rolls-Royce engine parts, Roger had a chance encounter with the director of a small company that had recently been acquired by Wood Group.

“The next thing I knew, I was on a train to Aberdeen, had an interview and was offered a job.”

Over 40 years later, he hasn’t looked back since.

Lessons from living abroad

Working at Wood Group/EthosEnergy for over 40 years, Roger held a variety of global roles. For a decade, he was also EthosEnergy’s Vice President of Operations for the Middle East and Africa. So, what advice would he give on building relationships with customers and colleagues from different parts of the world?

“Be patient. People have different ways of doing things and you may not necessarily see them as the right way of doing things. That can be challenging, especially in different work environments. You have to have patience and think about how you come across.”

Another key attribute you need to acquire is the ability to exercise influence cautiously and gradually by building trust.

“Many significant milestones we’ve achieved as a business have been brought about by deliberate but cautious confidence building with people from other cultures and backgrounds. It was remarkable, at times, what I was able to achieve once I got that trust with customers and the people I had to work with from very different backgrounds to mine.” 

Memorable milestones

Looking back on his career so far, there are many significant achievements Roger is especially proud of.

Teaming up with Rolls-Royce

“In my early years, Wood Group had a very successful team in Aberdeen working on Rolls-Royce Avon engines. We became so successful that we were able to form a joint venture with Rolls-Royce that became Rolls Wood Group (nowadays called RWG).”

First posting abroad

“In 1992, straight after the first Gulf War had ended, Wood Group sent me to Saudi Arabia. It was a test case for the Gas Turbine business really, because at that stage we had nobody stationed anywhere around the world. We had virtually no business in Saudi Arabia at the time but it was the world’s largest Industrial Gas Turbine Market. Almost immediately from being put there, we started to grow our business in Saudi Arabia. Ultimately, it became one of the biggest markets for the Wood Group gas turbines business and now EthosEnergy.”

Growing the repair business

In the mid-90s, Wood Group bought a company in Dundee, Scotland whose portfolio included repairing heavy industrial gas turbine parts for a small number of operators.

“They brought me back from Saudi Arabia to be the sales and marketing director for the heavy industrial turbine business, to grow that business and broaden its customer base. Those early years had significant challenges as our business grew rapidly, but it was also very rewarding as we grew into a globally recognized service provider just as the boom in gas fired power generation took off.”

Joint Venture in Thailand

“In the late 90’s and on the back of our success in supporting Thailand’s power infrastructure we were invited to form a joint venture with part of Thailand’s state power producer. We started with small beginnings and ultimately bought out our Thai partners and invested in people and equipment to deliver what is now EthosEnergy’s hugely successful Gas Turbine component repair workshop in Rayong Thailand, now supporting our global customer base.” 

Beginning to compete with the OEM on complex deals

“As our credibility became established we started to get opportunities to compete with the Gas Turbine OEMs on big long-term contracts with significant performance metrics as part of the commercial structure – some of them as long as 15 or 20 years. I really enjoyed the complexities of the negotiations. There are lots of moving parts to those kinds of contracts. These contracts became essential to the backbone of the heavy industrial gas turbine business.”

This is an area of the business that Roger still provides his input today using the benefit of many years of experience negotiating and executing these type of contracts.

Forming another joint venture

“In 2012, just before we formed EthosEnergy, we were invited to tender for a huge contract in Kazakhstan, a market that until then we had not been active in. It quickly became clear we needed to have a joint-venture partner to compete on this contract. I was asked to lead this initiative, not just in the negotiation of the contract, but also in the formation of the joint venture. This joint venture has since become the very successful basis of EthosEnergy’s growth into the Kazakhstan market.”

Since then, Roger has been involved in the development of a number of other joint ventures.

“Overall, I think that my proudest achievement has been my very minor contribution to the development of some great teams and individuals through my career. Teams that have contributed significantly to the growth and success of the business and individuals that are now in senior leadership roles that will shape the future of our business for the next generation.”  

Still working on his dad’s classic car

Roger’s career has taken him from Scotland to Saudi Arabia; Dundee to Dubai. From quality assurance to project engineering; sales and marketing to commercial management and general management.

“Part of how I ended up staying with the same company for so many years is because I ended up doing so many different types of jobs in what has been a rapidly growing company with some amazing people. That kept me enthused and always learning over the years.”

Some things never change, however.

“When I got the job with GEC Gas Turbines, I remember the interviewer asking what I did for a hobby. At the time I was stripping down my father’s 1937 MG that he’d had since before my mother and father got married in the 1960’s.”

All these years later, Roger is now building a new house with a garage designed especially so that he can look after his father’s car once again. It couldn’t be in better hands.