Page 46 - Be Reasonable – Do It My Way , Peter E. Daly AM, My Story

CHAPTER 3 - JOHANNESBURG TO DURBAN TO CAPE TOWN TO PORT ELIZABETH AND BACK TO JOHANNESBURG
Dick was an unusual person and as I said, he was quick witted, sarcastic but was extremely well liked and respected in the building and construction industry. He handled two major risks comprising of the Glaser and the Hoffman Groups. Incidentally, they represented about 5% of the L&G premium income. For my sins, I was seconded to him. I strongly suspected there was coming a time when he would re-tire and therefore they needed someone to manage his connections.
He was quite an amazing fellow. On one occasion we went to visit the Hoffman Group Company Secretary, who handled the insurance arrangements: the major purpose being to introduce myself. Dick said to me I bet you can’t sell him any policies and to this the Secretary replied that he had every single policy available. Dick said, no you don’t, you don’t have a polio policy. At this he pulled his left hand out of his pocket revealing he had a withered hand. He said I have already had polio. To this Dick said, you better get a polio policy just in case the other hand goes the same way! To my surprise, everyone just laughed it off; I must say I thought he was quite rude at the time.
I found it rather difficult to adjust to Head Office, given that I had been away now for something like 12 odd years and was treated like a God in any other place as I was the ultimate boss. For example, if I required any material like pen, paper etc., I had to fill in a form and it went to the Supplies and Services Department, which was a joint department between the Life and General Insurance. I was told by the Deputy General Manager there was another way of doing it. He showed me when I was sitting in his office.He phoned another staff member asking him to come to the office and suggested I should go then to his office and pinch his pens and paper.
When I arrived in Johannesburg and not knowing anybody, I discovered another fellow sitting at a desk who also seemed to be doing nothing. His name was Alan Mason. I asked him what was doing and he said “planning”, which I found a very interesting subject because I rather liked planning and preparing corporate
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