HOWZAT

Hill struggles a little to describe the boundaries of the firm’s activities. “We don’t do manufacturing and we won’t do the pure provision of finance, we are not a bank. But anything in between — anything to do with the application of skill and intellect — that’s where we sit. We start a new business every two or three years.”

His own career demonstrates this pursuit of the new. Having trained as a civil engineer, he became interested in economics after working alongside an economist on a project. He went off and did a master’s in the subject, and came back to Arup and launched into broader planning work.

Those who have worked with Hill say he embodies the firm’s values. “Terry is one of the good guys,” says Rob Holden, chief executive of London & Continental Railways, the firm that built the Channel tunnel line. “He always sees the positive in whatever is brought to him.”

A senior Arup staff member, who asked not to be named, pointed out that Hill was the first chairman not to come from a building-services background. “Before there was always that subservient relationship — we were working for the architect. He has taken us to a new level.”

Arup’s “intellectual acquisitiveness”, as Hill puts it, is good for business. It has grown by 15%-20% a year for the past two decades, and by 25% last year, all without making a single acquisition or borrowing any money. The company is owned, indirectly, by its staff. A trust, of which Hill is a trustee, holds the equity, with instructions to act in the interests of the staff.

“We are not a democracy, we are a meritocracy,” says Hill. Staff receive dividends every year, depending on their seniority and how well the company has done.

Hill joined in 1976. He was working on the M25, and Arup was working on his section of the road. Coming into contact with the Arup people made him want to become one of them.

“They had designed a bridge, and my work fitted either side of it. I was in touch with them and I became fascinated by them. They treated you like a human being, not just another resource.”

His first weeks at work were something of a culture shock. “I had been working for a government agency, a road-construction unit. And then I arrived in this very loose, very free-thinking organisation. It was brought home to me very quickly what that meant. I had been working for someone I thought was my boss. Then I had another project, a road in Nigeria, that I had to finish very quickly. He came and said — ‘can I help?’ — and suddenly he was working for me.”

New staff are asked to read a speech given by Sir Ove in 1970. It says there are two ways to approach work. One is the “Henry Ford” way, where work is a necessary evil and life is lived in your free time outside your job. The second way is to make your work interesting and rewarding. “We opt uncompromisingly for the second way,” the speech says.

Hill and his fellow directors often think about whether they could improve on the speech when drawing up their five-year plans. “We can’t,” he says.

There must be a limit to all this motherhood and apple-pie goodness. Doesn’t Hill ever want to just give his staff a good bollocking? He must have seen the benefits of shouting at people when he was working for road contractors.

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