Nigel Gwilliam: What makes him tick?

10 Questions thrown at the Director of Media Affairs at the IPA

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Ten question for Nigel Gwilliam, Director of Media Affairs at the IPA, to find out what makes him tick - scuba gear, parsnips and Bitcoin are part of the eclectic mix.

Nigel Gwilliam: What makes him tick?

1. If your house was burning down, what one thing would you save (excluding people and pets)?

My scuba gear, gathered over many years

2. What is your favourite word?


3. What do you wish you’d invented?

Bio-degradable bubble wrap.., including a version painted red with "stress sheet" written on it (see Red Dwarf)

4. If it wasn’t advertising, what career would you have chosen?

Marine geographer

5. What have been your best and worst business decisions?

Best: running my own limited company for 10 years

Worst: not investing in Bitcoin when we were introduced to it on the 2015 West Coast Mission

6. What is your most over told personal anecdote?

I didn’t taste delicious roast parsnips until my first Christmas at university, my parents kept them a secret because my dad loathed them. "Oh, you’ve discovered parsnips have you."

7. What’s been the best thing you’ve read recently (article, book, tweet etc)?

"The Ends of the World: Volcanic Apocalypses, Lethal Oceans and Our Quest to Understand Earth’s Past Mass Extinctions" by Peter Brannen.

8. What’s your most hated business jargon?

Lean in

9. What advice would you give your younger self?

Invest in Bitcoin

10. What song or film has influenced you the most?

"Flagpole Sitta" (aka theme to TV’s Peepshow) by Harvey Danger

Quick fire questions

  1. Breakfast / lunch / dinner?

  2. Cats or dogs?

  3. City, sea, fields or mountains?

  4. Early bird or night owl?
    Early Bird

  5. Head or heart?
Last updated 11 April 2019