Bunhill: Simple beginnings (CORRECTED)

CORRECTION (PUBLISHED 29 MAY 1994) INCORPORATED INTO THIS ARTICLE

TO HEAR Derek Rosling tell it, the techniques that turned the Hanson Trust into a big international business were simplicity itself.

They go back to the Hanson family's transport business. Local depot managers scattered far from the Huddersfield head office were encouraged to show their entrepreneurial talents by finding return loads for the Hanson fleet of lorries: costs were covered by the outward journey, but the real money was made on the return. This led to the Hanson formula of giving local managers - nowadays in charge of multi-million pound businesses - their head and duly rewarding them if they made it.

And how does Rosling know all this?

Well, his firm of accountants in Huddersfield had always acted for the Hanson family. So he found it perfectly natural to join Young Master James and his equally young friend Gordon White when they set out to build a business of their own. And for 30 years, Rosling has remained with his former client, acting, as he says 'as everything from tea boy to finance director' - latterly as vice-chairman.

Last week, he finally retired from the Hanson board. Unfortunately, he has no intention of writing a book on the unique business formula he helped develop, which would be more use than most of the management nostrums purveyed by less qualified practitioners.

(Photograph omitted)