Page 22 - FOGlet 4

On the spot:

a quickfire Q&A

Ausaf Abbas, Managing Director, Coombe Advisors

1. What was your first job? 6. What does your ideal weekend
My first paid job was filling the shelves in involve?
our local delicatessen at the age of 13 International rugby, Liverpool FC, family
and my first career role was as an and the sofa to recharge for another
economist with BP, straight out of hectic week ahead.
university. It didn’t take me long to figure
out that finance was a better option than 7. How long can you go without your
oil, so I joined Merrill Lynch. mobile?
A few hours, then I need to know what
2. What was the best advice you were I’ve missed.
ever given?
8. What advice would you give the
“Sparkle, young man, just sparkle”, by the
young you?
MD and head of Corporate & Strategic
Planning at BP when I was applying for a Follow the money.
role there as a new graduate.
9. What would be your luxury item on
3. Which was the last book you read? Desert Island Discs?
Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie, but I also My iPhone, assuming they have wi-fi or
loved Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms by data there.
Gerard Russell, which explores the
10. Who would you most like to meet,
disappearing religions of the Middle East.
and why?
4. What would be the first item on your Chinggis Khan to try and understand how
bucket list? an illiterate Mongolian horseman could
Visit Kyrgyzstan and North West China command an army which went on to
travelling along the ancient Silk Road to conquer a third of the known world in the
see things before the Chinese Government early 13th century.
destroys all the history and culture there.

5. Who inspires you?
Nelson Mandela. To spend 27 years in
prison and then become President of your
country with the capacity to forgive seems
astonishing.

20 www.gpfo.co.uk Foglet 4th Edition