CorpComms Magazine

One used to work for the Queen and the other is (very) distantly related to her. But there is something else that newly appointed private equity cheerleader Simon Walker and Tory party leader David Cameron have in common: they are both former corporate spin doctors.

Few would argue that both have entirely abandoned the art of spin in their current roles, although both have certainly moved onwards and upwards from their corporate communications days. But while Walker - the new CEO of the British Private Equity & Venture Capital Association - and Cameron have achieved a satisfying end result, other top communicators have fared less well in this corporate game of snakes and ladders.

Derek Draper, former spin doctor to Peter Mandelson, was forced to quit political life after boasting that there were 17 people who mattered in government and 'to say that I am intimate with every one of them is the understatement of the century.' His painful slide down that particular snake was very public.

Draper retrained as a psychotherapist, but attracted controversy earlier this year when he became involved in an ITV television programme with talk-show presenter Jeremy Kyle. It may not have caused another slide to a new career, but Draper's appointment as resident psychotherapist on Kyle's Academy, where therapy sessions with five troubled real-life volunteers were televised, is unlikely to have pushed him up many corporate rungs.

While moving into psychotherapy from spinning is an unusual career path, many experts believe corporate communicators develop skills that make them both highly sought after and able to thrive in many different sectors. 'There is life after corporate communications,' says Geraldine Davies, a partner at the Willis Partnership. 'Those who have been communications directors develop several transferable skills, such as the ability to understand complex situations quickly and translate them into easily understandable messages.'

Davies speaks from first-hand experience. A former director of corporate relations at Lloyds TSB and Prudential, she made her own break two years ago when she left the insurance giant to begin a career in headhunting with Whitehead Mann. She believes the skills honed in communications can prove invaluable in numerous other fields. The external perception of how a company, lobby group - or perhaps even the country - is being run has become an increasingly important part of the communications director's role.

'Communications directors tend to develop inclusive and diplomatic skills, which can be put to very good use in other roles,' says Davies. 'As an in-house communicator, you have it drummed into you that you are a cost centre, not a profit generator, and you have to use skill and persuasion to get your plans accepted. You develop the ability to bring people with you.'

Headhunting is a particularly good example of how those abilities can be transferred, according to Davies. 'It uses all the skills: summing up situations quickly, understanding different cultures and having a sort of sixth sense about people, which every good communications director has,' she says.

Winding roads

The paths trodden by Walker and Cameron out of the communications industry were not straightforward, with both spending some time on the corporate ladder. Born in South Africa, Walker worked as a journalist and consultant in New Zealand, Belgium and the UK. He was a special adviser to the Downing Street Policy Unit from 1996 to 1997, a partner at Brunswick and director of European public affairs for Hill & Knowlton.

He became director of corporate affairs at British Airways, from which he was seconded for two years to Buckingham Palace, where he had possibly the most impressive job title in the world of public relations: communications secretary to HM The Queen. It was a roller-coaster ride. Vilified for his handling of the fallout from the News of the World's 'sting' operation on Sophie, Countess of Wessex, Walker also played a key role in the successful Golden Jubilee celebrations.

He joined Reuters in 2003, initially as director of corporate communications and later as director of corporate communications and marketing. Walker had only recently taken on the role of senior adviser to the Reuters chairman and chief executive when he took his new position as champion of private equity, where he will need to use his spin skills to the full. The industry is facing unprecedented criticism and his predecessor, the hapless Peter Linthwaite, quit ignominiously after being mauled by MPs at a Treasury Select Committee hearing during the summer.

Conservative beginnings

Cameron also had early experience in government, as former adviser to both Lord Lamont and the then home secretary Michael Howard. He spent seven years as director of corporate affairs at Carlton Communications, the media group run by Michael Green, where he was described as 'board material'. His work at Carlton undoubtedly gave him some useful insights into how the media operate, even if his past dealings with the press have now returned to haunt him.

Chief among his detractors is Jeff Randall, editor-at-large of the Telegraph, who has never forgiven Cameron for misleading him over a story. His views on the opposition leader, aired in his Telegraph column, are scathing.

'I wouldn't trust him with my daughter's pocket money,' Randall wrote. 'To describe Cameron's approach to corporate PR as unhelpful and evasive overstates by a wildish margin the clarity and plain-speaking he brought to the job of being Michael Green's mouthpiece. In my experience, Cameron never gave a straight answer when dissemblance was a plausible alternative, which probably makes him perfectly suited for the role he now seeks: the next Tony Blair.'

For Cameron, his time in corporate communications was always a stepping-stone to his real career goal. That much he made clear to Green when he joined the company, apparently telling him that he wanted to work in the investor relations (IR) department, but had no plans to stay there. Even so, he lasted seven years before being elected as an MP.

Final destination

For many, however, corporate affairs is a destination career rather than a stepping stone, with the ambitious or restless trading up - or down - between different companies or agency and consultancy roles. Of those who move on, many already have the qualifications to take them into new areas. Finance tends to be one of the chosen fields and there are numerous examples of executives switching back to the fast track of the finance department and beyond after a stint in IR.

Take high-flyer Sarah Hunter, for example. Now barely 30, she was appointed finance and property director at Gatwick Airport in 2006 after two years as head of investor relations at airports group BAA. The youngest-ever head of IR for a FTSE 100 company, Hunter was named Harper's Bazaar Young Businesswoman of the Year in 2006.

At Taylor Woodrow, now merged with rival Wimpey, former IR man Jonathan Murrin switched to an operational role in the group's US arm and is now UK finance director for Taylor Wimpey. Over at Vodafone, IR executive James Lindsay recently moved into a senior role in the company's finance department.

For some, the move into an operational role is relatively brief. Simon Lewis started his career at Shandwick Consultants, and went on to become director of corporate affairs at NatWest and head of PR at SG Warburg before joining Centrica in 1996. He was seconded to Buckingham Palace as the Queen's first communications secretary (Walker succeeded him) and, on his return, branched out into operations as managing director for Centrica in Europe. He later returned to communications at Centrica and three years ago moved to Vodafone as corporate affairs director.

Andrew Mills, group communications director at consumer packaging group Rexam, and a former chairman of the Investor Relations Society, also enjoyed a spell in operational management. While working at Kingfisher as director of IR, Mills was seconded to retail chain Woolworth's prior to its demerger from the DIY group. He returned to Kingfisher as director of corporate affairs, later quitting for Rexam.

Journalists opting for the spin shilling is nothing new but former Financial Times scribe Bernard Gray is unusual in that he has been both a political and a corporate spin doctor - and has gone on to run his own business.

Having worked as personal adviser to defence secretary George Robertson, Gray became director of group strategy and communications at Lord Hollick's United News & Media and was subsequently appointed chief executive of the group's UK media arm, which he ran for five years. He is now executive chairman of TSL Education, publisher of the Times Educational Supplement.

Two-way street

The path from PR to Parliament is a well-worn one but it is not all one-way. Dick Saunders, chief executive of the Investment Management Association for the past six years, is a former press secretary to Lord Lamont. After spending much of his early career at the Treasury, Saunders quit for a communications role at Lord Hollick's MAI group, later joining financial PR agency Cardew.

As for political spin doctors, they end up in all manner of places when their days of spin finally come to an end. The best-known of all, Alastair Campbell, went on to see his diaries successfully published, although The Blair years recently topped a list of the books most often left behind in hotel rooms. Campbell's deputy, Tim Allan, went on to spin as director of corporate affairs at BSkyB and now runs his own financial PR firm, Portland.

But the web of former Labour spin doctors spreads far and wide. Gez Sagar, a former press adviser to John Prescott, recently launched an online television channel, CampaignTV. Funded by donations from a group of Labour party supporters, Sagar says the new channel will champion progressive politics and encourage broader debate.

Sticking with television, while Draper became involved with Kyle's Academy he at least turned down offers to work on Freaky Eaters, a show about people with compulsive eating disorders, and the chance to be involved in Big Brother.

Sadly, the same caution was not shown by one of the founding figures of the modern spin industry: Lynne Franks. Said to be the role model for Edina Monsoon in Absolutely Fabulous, Franks founded her own PR firm in 1970 at the age of 21. She sold the business in 1995 but made a spectacular return to public view at the end of 2007 as part of the motley crew of D-listers undergoing bush-tucker trials on I'm a celebrity, get me out of here.

Highlights of her stay in the Australian rainforest include the mystery of who stamped on her hairclip and her admission of a phobia about sharing toilets. It may be one way of filling the void when the spinning finally stops, but it marks a backward slide down the game of career snakes and ladders.

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