What drives people to succeed? Some want the fast car and the big house. Others want to escape their past. For investment trust director John Mackie, it's a bit of both. Words by Lauren Mills.
At 53, John Mackie has achieved much of what he set out to do. He seems at ease, although he clearly remains ambitious. Why else would he take on new challenges at this stage of his career?
"The UK mid-market is just the place to be," he says. "The industry is making records in terms of fundraising, exits and returning money to investors."
And Mackie wants to be a part of it. He wants to wallow in the mud after his early years of relative drought. For Mackie is not your typical private equity executive.
A straight-talking Northerner, from working-class roots, he has clawed his way up the ladder of one of the UK's most competitive industries through hard work, determination and, in his words, "some good luck".
Mackie left school aged 16 with five 'O' levels and took on a trainee manager position at Woolco Department Stores, a division of Woolworths in the US. A steady, if unexciting, career in retail lay ahead of him.
But after eight years of hard graft, working 75-hour weeks for little reward, he decided enough was enough. "I sat down and thought: 'If I am prepared to work as hard as this, I must be able to make more money.' So I applied for a job in management consulting in the retail sector," he says.
But the switch from blue collar to blue chip was not so simple. Mackie's approach was rejected because he was not a graduate. "So I decided to get a degree," he says.
This life-changing decision came at huge personal cost - he had to sell his house to pay for it.
He says university was "brilliant" and that he "really enjoyed it". But the serious-minded Mackie was not the sort to get up to any student antics along the way.
"It sounds very boring," he says. "But to put it into context, I had given up my salary, my annual bonus and my house. And I didn't have massive confidence that I'd be able to cut it - so I worked hard."
"I'd grown up in a rough working class background and had this notion I was intellectually beneath people. But as it progressed, I realised I could do it," he adds.
His hard work soon paid off. After graduating and qualifying as an accountant at Arthur Andersen, he joined 3i as an investment director, first in Glasgow, then Reading. So why the move into private equity? Was this about being seen as more than a bean counter?
"It wasn't about recognition," he says. "It was about making money. I spent ten years working very hard and earning very little. From a very early age I wanted the suit, the nice car, the house on the hill."
His private equity career got off to an inauspicious start, though, when his first investment went bust after a year. He vowed never to make the same mistake again and pressed on with a dogged determination.
Five years later, he was approached to become a founding director of Morgan Grenfell Development Capital, a private equity start-up within the former investment bank. Mackie recalls this period as a career highlight. "It was incredibly exciting to be going to a leading merchant bank to help set up a new business," he says.
After eight years at the cutting edge of the business, he decided to take a break from the daily pressures and spent two years learning to swim and play the piano, as well as managing his own investment portfolio.
Then, in 2000, he was asked to head up the British Venture Capital Association as its chief executive. He spent more than five years in the role, during which time he helped to raise the profile of the industry.
"Media relations and interaction with government - these were brand new things to me, and fascinating, as I had never done anything like it before," he says.
Now, in addition to his role at August Equity Trust, Mackie also works part-time as a director of Parallel Private Equity, a co-investment buy-out fund.
He has known the team at August almost as long as he can remember. "Andrew [Hartley] and I had worked together at 3i in the 1980s and Richard [Green] is a former chairman of the BVCA, so I know them well. They have done a great job building the business and managing exits and I hold them in very high regard," he says.
Mackie's role is to advise August Equity Trust in all aspects of its operations. The team is clearly pleased to have him on board. "John's experience as a direct investor and as chief executive of the BVCA gives him a unique perspective. He brings a very broad and detailed understanding of the private equity industry to the board, as well as a long list of contacts in the UK and Europe - not just other managers, but investors in funds too," says Green. "So he is a good catch for us."
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