Page 63 - James Caan - The Real Deal

7 · The Job That Changed My Life

to expand as quickly as possible: I could hire as many people as I
could find, as the only cost to the company was the extra office
space.
Reid Trevena was in the process of moving offices when I joined,
and they didn’t have space for me, so Tom said he’d stick a desk
for me in his office and I could share with him. Recruiting for the
company was considered quite an important role, and for the first
couple of months he said he’d like to see me in action. At the time
I was a bit annoyed as I really wanted my own office, but within
two weeks I’d begun to think that I’d do the job for free just so I
could observe Tom work.
Sitting and watching him sell and recruit I was learning from the
master. The guy was phenomenal. I used to watch him interview
someone who was earning £30,000 or £40,000 a year – which was
a very good salary for the time – and by the end of the interview
the candidate was thrilled to be giving up a great salary with
terrific benefits, like BUPA cover and a pension, to take a job that
paid absolutely no base. He showed candidates how working at
Reid Trevena would lift them out of the ordinary and give them
the kind of income they had only been able to dream about. To
me, Tom’s skill was similar to that of an artist or a writer or a
musician: it’s an art to be able to inspire someone to do that, and
Tom became something of an idol to me. I watched everything he
did, the suits he wore, the way he sat, the way he spoke, and I
started to copy him, almost down to the way he picked up the
phone, or how he would stand, or the way he pronounced his
words, or the way he used his hands. What he did clearly worked,
so when I was interviewing somebody I literally mimicked him.
After a few months in the job, I had perfected my version of
Tom’s technique. Let’s just say I’d placed an ad for sales
consultants in the Evening Standard, and a rep from Rank Xerox
had applied and had come in for an interview. I would know from
his CV that he was on £13k a year, that he was twenty-two and

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