Chris O'Shea

I studied accountancy at school, so I was doomed probably to become an accountant from an early age. For two reasons. One, I was quite good with numbers - that came quite easily. And the second one, was that my parents were self-employed, but their business got into difficulty when I was ten or 11 years old and we had to move from Fife, where I was brought up for the first ten years of my life, to Glasgow, which is only 60 miles, but it seemed at the time to be the end of the world. And there was a lot of instability and the one beacon of stability was a family friend who was also the family accountant. Now, I didn't realise at the time but I think that had quite a big impact on me. And so when I went to my high school in Hamilton just outside Glasgow, numbers came easily. I clearly had this thing in my mind and they offered an O Grade, which is the equivalent of a GCSE in accountancy. So I found that quite straightforward, the equivalent of an A-level, and then went to university to study accountancy. I didn't know that you could study something else and become an accountant. So I wanted to be a professional. I applied to do law. I was invited to Oxford for interview. It was a complete disaster. I was unceremoniously rejected and so I decided I wanted to take my main offer and my subsidiary offer in one subject. So I accepted places in Glasgow and Heriot-Watt in accountancy. So I did that.

So I was newly married and I applied for a job with Ernst Young in Aberdeen, which is 150 miles away from Glasgow. So again, a bit of a further journey from Fife to Glasgow. And I was invited for interview and it was to do with tax. So I got the train to Aberdeen, I read up on Tax and Oil companies. I assumed oil companies would be involved as it was Aberdeen and the person that interviewed me was an old taxation expert, so he was quite impressed at this and they offered me the job at the interview, which I accepted.

And when I came out of the interview I suddenly thought, got newly married, got a new baby, and we've just agreed to move to the city. We don't know anybody. So that seemed a little bit impulsive. But Stacey, my wife, and I had discussed it beforehand, and agreed if I was offered the job, we were both willing to move. And then I went in this team [on secondment] at Shell and I really enjoyed that. And Shell offered me a job and I stayed. I worked with them in Aberdeen, I moved to London. And then I went to the US to work in the tax department in Houston. When I was there, I did an MBA. Shell were very kind and sponsored me to do an MBA, and the reason I wanted to do that is I looked at Shell at that point had recruited a CFO from the outside for the first time. And my very basic thinking was they're going to be bringing people in with other qualifications, so I’ll try that.