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Derek Wilson New Zealand Country Manager at Red Hat
Tech Leader
Who is Derek Wilson? Get to know Red Hat’s New Zealand Country Manager
Taking time out of his busy schedule, Derek Wilson talks about the lessons learned in 2020, work-life balance and scrumptious New Zealand-inspired dishes.
Describe what you ate for breakfast this morning…
Normally a black coffee but this morning I had a 7:30 breakfast meeting so it was mushroom toast (mushroom, shiitake cream and caramelised leek on sourdough).
What’s the one film you go to time and time again?
Pulp Fiction – I’m a big Tarantino fan.
What book is sitting on your bedside table right now?
Nelson Mandela – The Long Walk To Freedom
Who do you admire the most and why?
Mahatma Gandhi. He was an empowering and visionary leader, who led by example. Gandhi was not a born leader, he became one because of his values of unity, equality, truth, non-violence, justice and honesty.
What’s been your biggest success in life?
Helping to raise my family in New Zealand, a far cry from where I grew up in London.
How do you rate your work/life balancing skills?
6 out of 10, it’s become much better since COVID-19 as there has not been as much travel.
You can choose any three people over for dinner – who are they, and what do you cook?
Assuming they are living people:
- Aung San Suu Kyi
- Richard Branson
- David Attenborough
I would cook for them Bluff oysters to start, followed by barbecued Kingfish fillet with a tomato salsa.
What did you learn in 2020?
To trust that my team were “doing their job” when working from home and during lockdown, I realised that I had to focus on outcomes rather than the number of hours worked or what time they were working.
What do you hope to achieve in the next 12 months?
Continued success with Red Hat and losing 15kg.
What’s the last record you listened to in full?
Pearl Jam – Gigaton
What’s your life motto?
It is based around a quote attributed to Mark Twain – “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything”. In other words, if you lie you continually have to make up stories to cover yourself.
Red Hat
Red Hat is the world’s leading provider of enterprise open source solutions, using a community-powered approach to deliver high-performing Linux, cloud, container, and Kubernetes technologies.
