I wanted to write today about John Linton of Exetel who died 1st of Feburary 2012. While I never knew John personally, I found his ideas and Exetel business to be quite inspirational through my dealings with John and Exetel under my own business.
John’s son James posted to Johns blog on the 2nd of Feb saying:
“Yesterday my dad was doing what he liked doing best. Eating at a nice restaurant, drinking nice wines , and talking about the state of the telecommunications market in Australia, and the various companies that make this up.
At lunch he suffered what was thought to be a mild stroke, and was immediately taken to St Vincents hospital. He was conscious in the ambulance, responding to their questions, but when he got to the hospital he had trouble breathing and they needed to put him into a medically induced coma and put him on a ventilator to help him breathe. Unfortunately it turned out to be a very intensive stroke and there was nothing the doctors could do, without killing him in an operation or leaving him severely brain damaged. So last night, with most of my family present, his ventilator was turned off and a few hours later he passed away peacefully.
This is the saddest day of my life, I have lost my dad, my mentor, my boss, and one of my best friends.
However dad would not want us fussing over him, he would want to know what we have sold, which was actually one of the last things I said to him.
He would also want Exetel to go on as he had planned for it to. He put in a place a strategic plan, so we need to move on as he had wanted us to, and remember him for the great man he was.
If any of you feel like buying my mum and family flowers, I would ask that you instead make a donation to his favourite charity, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds; http://www.rspb.org.uk/”
I found John to be a very interesting person and would regularly read his blogs. Before my dealings with Exetel I had the stereotype in my mind that somebody in their 60’s cannot keep up with bleeding edge technology – John changed that view in my mind. I also found Exetel’s use of automated business processes quite fascinating, and used some of their ideas in my own business and continue to develop in this area. Also I strongly agree with John’s idea that “a few bad customers can ruin things for everyone” as I’ve experienced this in my own business.
From what I understand John’s son James and John’s former business partner Steve Waddington are now in charge of Exetel and it is business as usual (that never changed). My past dealings with both James and Steve tell me that Exetel has very great strengths even without John and I have every confidence in James and Steve.
I’ll miss you John and I thank you for the inspiration you gave me. I hope the best for James and the Linton family through this tough time.
