Thinking about Nick Wilsdon’s Legacy
I was going to leave this post until next month, which would’ve marked my fifth year working for Torque Partnership, the company I work for when I’m not playing folk music. However, given the recent sad news about my dear friend and the company’s founder and CEO, Nick Wilsdon, I’m going to post it today.
My career has been a mishmash of things, the common thread being the written word and the sharing of stories. At various times, that has been through journalism, brand storytelling, book-writing, songwriting and the performance of old traditional songs that still have so much to teach us. I’ve never stayed in one place for more than a few years, partly because I’m always keen to learn as much as I can, and partly because I’m not well suited to the often very shouty nature of the media world, where plenty of people have plenty to say.
It’s only lately that I’ve understood why I haven’t moved on from Torque: Nick built what I think may be the ideal company. He was great at the onstage talking, and he spent many years blogging his ideas and building a deservedly strong reputation. But above all, he was about doing good work well. The outpouring of love and tributes over the last few days bears testament to his kindness and his unwavering support for the people around him, often people he happened across at events or through friends of friends. Tributes have rightly been paid to his pioneering skills as an early SEO. I knew him at a time when “SEO”, as a phrase or a concept, didn’t even exist, but he could see it was only a matter of time. (I used to joke that he and his first business partner, Stephen Field – the mutual friend who introduced me to Nick – invented SEO. Over time I've started to wonder where the boundaries between the joke and the truth are blurred.)
What many people didn’t know is that, over the last few years, he built the most wonderful business, somewhere I feel very lucky to work. He was brought up by a father who devoted his life to John Lewis, a company that believed in the idea of a business being a caring, supportive community. I think that shaped Nick’s outlook hugely, and he wanted to offer the same to other people. His brother said that their dad instilled a motto in them both: “There are two kinds of people: drains and radiators. Give warmth. Be a radiator.” That’s probably all you need to know about how Nick approached life. He was a radiator to everyone who had the good fortune to work with him, and his warmth, approachability and innate urge to look after people are at the centre of the company he went on to build.
A funny thing has occurred to me in the days since I learned of his death. When we met as 21-year-old students, it wasn’t seen as cool to show too much enthusiasm for people or things. Cynicism was the order of the day. I found Nick deeply odd when I first met him, and it took a while for me to feel comfortable around him. I see now that it was because he didn’t live by those ‘cool rules’ (he lived his life in tech hoodies; fashion largely passed him by). From the off, he was openly enthusiastic about everybody and every idea they wanted to share with him. Shamefully, the young me couldn’t get my head around that. But that’s how he lived his life until the end, and I grew to love him immensely for it.
Over time, I saw that his superpower was spotting skills in other people that they didn’t know they had. In some ways, he was a champion of the underdog. Torque Partnership is filled with good people, mostly handpicked by Nick, who may not have found life in other companies – shouty places – comfortable. They’re super-intelligent people who aren’t interested in office politics, in one-upmanship, in outdoing each other or chasing any kind of fame. He spotted people who had a quiet talent and inquisitiveness and who were willing to share and explore ideas with each other. And because of his reputation, he attracted some of the very best. As a result, I get to work every day with people who are at the forefront of this industry but are humble enough – as Nick was himself – to share their time and knowledge without question, simply because they’re passionate about it. Simply because it’s the right thing to do.
He spotted me again and again. Every time I thought I was done with something, or that my chance had passed me by, he found new ways to encourage me and to point whatever talent he saw in me in a new direction. Few people in my life have had that effect. What a thing to have done for a person. To change someone's life for the better is quite a legacy to leave.
I also believe he was a pioneer in how businesses should be structured for the post-pandemic age. Work/life balance was hugely important to him, as was seeing people flourish in areas outside the company’s central focus. He had seen first-hand what tech burnout and overwork could do to people, and from the very beginning he was determined to find ways to make great work possible without jeopardising people’s mental health in the process. I’ll always remember the first Torque Christmas party, at the tail-end of lockdown, when he and his wife, Anna, hand-built a digital playground where our avatars could all mingle and play games. It was so “Nick”: geeky, a little bit bizarre, but determined to use whatever skills he had to bring a little light to a very bleak time. And that was a constant. He used to message randomly, "fancy a cuppa?", and we'd sit for an hour at either end of a Zoom call, making each other cry with laughter over a shared memory or whatever had tickled either of us in the news that morning. Work was never dull with him; he knew the importance of pausing to take a breath.
While good work was a priority, he knew we were here for other things. He was hugely supportive of everyone in the business. Benevolent, even. If, in my other area of work, I was making a new album or starting a website to help people understand traditional arts, he was the first to put his hand in his pocket and offer funding (I never asked him to; it's just what he did), or to offer his time and expertise on how to make that website go further. He'd just keep a gentle eye on you. And I'm certainly not the only person with these stories. Everyone at Torque received this kind of attention. I don't know where he found the time.
And so, five years on, I find myself one very dear friend down but a whole Nick-picked family of workmates up. As I approach 50, I’ve wondered what might be next for me, but I think this is it. I’m lucky enough to have found the right place, and it’s now my privilege to help us continue building Nick’s vision of what a good working life and a good company should look like.
My love and thanks to Nick, Anna and the whole Torque family.
