IT IS a far cry from his previous life heading up operations for the New York hotel chain belonging to Studio 54 boss Ian Schrager. But Alex Vince, the owner and founder of management training firm Enlighted Training, is determined to do anything he can to bring a taste of the Big Apple high-life to Scottish business.
Vince, who is opening the first Scottish branch of his business in Glasgow this week and has plans for further expansion north of the Border, has flamboyant tastes – and company policies to match.
Handing over his business card, there is a definit
e floral scent in the air. "They're perfumed cards," explains Vince. "Each employee can choose their own scent, it gives us some individuality."
And indeed, while Vince's signature fragrance is light and soapy, his newest colleague – John McGlinchey, who is to head up operations north of the Border – has chosen a more low-key, musky scent.
But it is not just business cards that smell rosy in Vince's world: his training centres also have a signature fragrance, created by scented candles.
He explains: "I want workers who train at our centres to recognise this – whether they are working on a training course in Basingstoke or Gateshead – they can walk in and immediately recognise it as Enlightened."
Combine this obsession with scent to Vince's policy of supplying Ben & Jerry's ice cream to trainees during lunch breaks and his insistence that only Starbucks coffee is drunk on the premises and Enlightened's 14 UK bases have a definitely different feel to the average IT and management training centre.
Although the entrepreneur's policies may to some appear gimmicky, a meeting with the idealistic man himself dispels any such fears. "I just like Starbucks coffee," he insists. "If that's what I like to drink, why would I want to supply some kind of awful watery, muddy tasting drink to people on my courses? I want to offer people something they are going to enjoy, to make them happy."
And with a £14 million turnover business that has approximately doubled every year since the company's launch four years ago, Vince's policy seems to be paying off.
Enlightened offers a wide variety of courses, from software training to time management and presentation skills.
The original plan was to open the first Scottish centre in Edinburgh, but the city's reliance on the financial services industry deterred Vince, who turned to the west of Scotland instead.
The Glasgow base, which has the capacity to train 22 delegates at a time, is the first of a string of training centres planned for Scotland.
Enlightened has invested £250,000 in the facility – including a set of rather beautiful £450 Italian desk chairs – and hopes to produce a £5m turnover by the end of the first year.
"We would hope to have one other centre, in Edinburgh or Aberdeen, open by the end of the year," says Vince.
He adds: "We don't need to run before we can walk, so we won't be opening hundreds of centres up here immediately, but it is definitely a good market for us. Scottish business is still growing and developing. It doesn't feel static like England – there is a lot more opportunity here." He adds: "In some ways, I don't think Scotland has been hit as hard by the recession as England," he says.
"However, if you had asked us a year ago where we would have gone in Scotland, we would have said Edinburgh – that was definitely on the cards. But after the recession hit, that meant we tended towards Glasgow."
And while he is aware that he may be a lone voice in his advocacy to expand a business at the peak of a recession, Vince is sure that he is doing the right thing. "There is always a market for development," he explains.
"A lot of companies are saying that they see the value of their staff. They might have downsized but, in some ways, that makes it all the more important that they train their existing employees. If they have got rid of staff, the workload on their remaining workers may have increased, which means they need to be as well-equipped to deal with that as possible."
Indeed, he claims his time management course, which is aimed at people who find themselves working 15-hour days unnecessarily, is proving to be one of the most popular among companies. He adds: "I think this time around, people are thinking about what happens when we get out the other side of the recession – and they are training their staff in preparation for that."
The former vice-president of operations for luxury hotel chain Morgans, which was founded by club owner Schrager but has since been sold on, Vince's previous career was in the leisure industry.
He started off working as the licensee of a bar in Oxford as a wet-behind-the-ears 18-year-old – and later moved into running hotels. Always keen on the luxurious side of life, during that time, Vince treated himself to a number of holidays in New York, where he liked to stay at the boutique Morgans Hotels chain.
On one visit, he befriended a vice president of the company and got his big break when he came down for breakfast one morning to find a familiar face sitting at the table.
"The vice-president had brought Ian Schrager himself to talk to me and had told him all about my work in the UK," remembers Vince. "He offered me a job then and there."
After a six year stint at the three-hotel chain, Vince returned to the UK for family reasons in 1998, and, looking for a flexible job in terms of hours and commitment, became a freelance trainer.
"During my time in hotels, I was responsible for driving standards," says Vince. "I suppose in a way it is a very similar thing to what I do now.
"In New York, the staff in the hotel trade has a very high turnaround, so I was constantly training people, constantly trying to get them to learn to do things the way we wanted them. I think it is just something that I am good at."
Spotting a gap in the UK market for bespoke training courses, he launched Enlightened four years ago and now has almost 300 freelance trainers on his books – all of whom have to wear the bespoke, handmade suit created by Vince's personal Leeds-based tailor, Toby.
The navy-blue suit boasts an orange lining to match Enlightened's logo – with the employee's name embroidered on the inside – and orange cufflinks. "We pitch for training contracts against the big guys and we have to stand out: I want them to look smart and for people to see them differently," enthuses Vince.
"You should dress for how you want your business to be in five years' time. You watch Dragon's Den and you see people coming in with the most wonderful idea in the world, but they get the look of death from the dragons because they slouch on in ripped jeans and trainers."
He adds: "You should also be giving your staff a reason to want to work for you that is not just to do with monetary needs."
If that is true, then Vince's staff, tucking into their Phish Food ice cream and skinny lattes, must be very happy.
BIG BREAKGETTING his big break to work in New York for Ian Schrager, the former club owner often credited with introducing the concept of the "boutique hotel" to the world, was a memorable six years for Alex Vince.
With exacting standards, his new boss was tough to work for. "You had to strive to be the best you could be – at absolutely everything," remembers Vince. "He was … quite a character."
And the standards had to be high due to the hotel's celebrity clientele. "The thing about Morgans was that almost everybody who stayed there was a VIP," says Vince.
"You would be standing in the lobby and Cher might walk past you and you'd turn the other way and Barbra Streisand would be there."
He adds: "Of course, we wouldn't have her on our books as Barbara Streisand – she used a pseudonym. But only hotel management would know what that was. It was an exciting time."
