In a heartfelt message at the end of a video conference with senior leaders in 10 countries, Steve Tarr recently announced he would be stepping down as Chairman of Hili Ventures after five years. The announcement, which elicited more than 500 messages of good wishes, marked Tarr’s decision to transition into semi-retirement 45 years after embarking on an illustrious career spanning numerous countries and sectors.
A well-known but discreet figure in Malta’s business community, Tarr, whose late mother was Maltese, has worked with some of the country’s most successful family firms and advised many foremost entrepreneurs. Ever since he expanded his business from the UK in the early 1980s seeking to start a consultancy in Malta as well, Tarr steadily built a reputation for his prowess in change and people management. With his propensity to inspire people at various stages in their careers and business journeys to identify and fulfil their potential, many are fortunate to have been able to look to him as their mentor.
He has been embraced by the wider professional community as Chairman of Business Leaders Malta, the joint venture which began as a conference organiser 12 years ago and expanded into a group encompassing a business school and research firm. BLM, jointly owned by audio-visual specialist Jugs, recruiter Konnekt, and Tarr’s Mdina Holdings, now does business internationally. Morgan Parnis, who was brought into BLM’s fold 10 years ago and is now the Chief Executive and a shareholder, has been instrumental in the business’ success. Parnis is also a director of Tarr’s own company Mdina Partners.
A qualified management consultant, Tarr spent his school holidays on the island. Aged 16, he took on an apprenticeship at General Motors, a job he little enjoyed but completed at 20 to appease his father, a sales director at Fry’s Chocolate. He joined an engineering firm as a salesman and was soon promoted to sales manager. Headhunted by a competitor to become sales director to lead a team of 40, Tarr began to look up specialised sales training but realised that beyond open courses, bespoke programmes were practically non-existent.
“Instead of buying a house as most people would have done at that age, I spent all my earnings on 20 courses to understand the psychology of sales,” he says. “I became almost obsessed with people’s behaviour: what motivated them, what inspired their attitude, what shaped their mindset. I was so fascinated I left a secure job and set out to train salespeople.”
By his 30s, Tarr had built a training company called Strategic Training International in Bedford with two partners and more than 40 trainers, operating from a state-of-the-art 700-square metre facility. He found that as managing director he was not dedicating as much time to training as he had hoped. He sold his shareholding, retained a few clients, and decided to pursue the potential his fledgling management training business in Malta and the UK was exhibiting. He admits the experience gave him invaluable insight into management and how critical it is to have the right people doing the right things at the right time with the right attitude. Business owners and managers, he discovered, were crying out for leadership skills. Together with his own team, Tarr operates quite differently to most consultancies.
“We were, and still are, different in that we conduct a people audit, identify training needs, deliver the training and then measure its effectiveness. This is why our client relationships are an average of 10 years. We become part of the team,” he says.
I had never worked with a company and team as dynamic as Hili Ventures
Early in his career, Tarr made a conscious decision to never be employed and remain independent to preserve his ability to challenge his clients’ status quo. He has spent 40 years building relationships with family business owners, supporting them to design management and people strategies and business plans as they headed for growth – all the while travelling between Malta, the UK, the US and other parts of the world.
One of his first experiences, which he says shaped his consultancy skills, was working with the visionary Jeremy Pilkington of Harrogate-based construction plant company Vp plc. Pilkington was taking over from his father and evolved the firm into a conglomerate as it acquired companies in the US and integrated them into the group. Over more than eight years, Tarr supported the change and people management that was critical to ensuring the business’ growth was effective, efficient and ultimately sustainable. Pilkington, Tarr recalls, was meticulous, structured, and displayed a remarkable acumen that would ensure his vision was realised.
“I learned so much by observing him and his behaviours – he was so strategic. He had a particular brilliance,” Tarr says. “His company was growing rapidly and people all around him were experiencing change. It caused me to think about how critical empathy is and how crucial it is to communicate with people as much as possible and as early as possible, giving them time to process the information that is going to affect them. Reassurance and transparency go a long way to settling people’s nerves, gaining their trust and loyalty, and retaining them. It’s all about people, treating people as you wish to be treated and creating an environment that encourages decision-making. Correcting your mistakes is the clever bit.”
Tarr went on to work with Northern Rock, supporting the management to transition from a building society to a fully-fledged bank and working to give branch managers accountability. For 10 years he assumed the responsibilities of the Chief People Officer at Measurement Technology Limited, a Luton family business engaged in switchgear technology, as it expanded into 36 countries and became a plc. He consulted and trained teams in China and the Far East, Russia, the US and Canada, and across Europe. At parcel company United Carriers, he supported the Chief Executive while the group expanded through acquisition.
In Malta, in the early 1990s, he played a key HR role as Gasan Insurance and Galdes & Mamo merged into GasanMamo Insurance – both companies had different cultures, but the transition saw just one senior management resignation. Elsewhere, as Alf Mizzi and Sons expanded, Tarr oversaw all the training and development for the growing team.
In tandem to these appointments, his own firm in Malta Mdina Partnership engaged engineer Alex Galea, now its Chief Executive, who shared his vision for a bespoke leadership and management training provider and “never looked back”. Today, the company, renamed Mdina Partners, has offices in Malta, the UK, and Germany – the latter set up in collaboration with a delegate who was so inspired by the company’s programme that he asked to establish a presence for Mdina Partners in Germany.
“I had always wanted Mdina Partners to not be dependent on me and to be successful when I am not here. Thanks to Alex’s leadership and the team we have in place, this has already been achieved,” he says.
Tarr has been dividing his time between the UK and Malta for more than 30 years since the late Albert Mizzi and his son Alec Mizzi assigned him consultancies with many companies in the group. He was introduced to many family business leaders and soon came to know the Hili family and consulted for them as they grew the McDonald’s presence in Malta and expanded their shipping business Carmelo Caruana Company.
Melo Hili, the youngest of the Hili brothers who at first headed their engineering company Motherwell Bridge and became the licencee for McDonald’s in Malta in 2005, discussed the opportunity to establish Hili Ventures in early 2012. The new group would encompass some of the companies the family had built together as he branched out on his own. Tarr supported Hili and veteran finance director Richard Abdilla Castillo design a plan that fit the vision for the group’s growth trajectory. As Chief People Officer, he recruited an experienced management team to implement the strategy before he was appointed the group’s Chairman in 2016.
“It was a learning curve for all of us,” he recalls. “Hili Ventures has grown its revenues many times over from the €50 million at the time. The group is now present in 10 countries, operates 166 McDonald’s restaurants in six European markets, runs 30 Apple Premium Resellers in Poland and Hungary. We’ve ventured into oil and gas, hospitality, leasing, technology and real estate over the years and grown to 10,000 people.
“I had never worked with a company and a team as dynamic as this. We succeeded in demonstrating that we could grow a business exponentially, one that was not dependant solely on activity in Malta. Melo and I have experienced many challenges, but I worked hard to understand the dream he had for the group and his desire to see it founded on honesty, transparency, work ethic, and shared values – values that cannot be compromised. More than a professional relationship, we forged a trusting, valued friendship. These have been fun, exhilarating years.”
A father of four, and now grandfather to two, all of whom live in the UK, Tarr decided to make Malta his home base 15 years ago, knowing he would eventually retire in the country he loved. The situation caused by the pandemic led him to examine his lifestyle and he says he experienced a taste of semi-retirement which involved minimal business travel and commuting – and liked it. He has decided to retain a handful of board appointments at smaller companies while considering a few others. He says he will dedicate his time to family, friends, his love of watching sport and documentaries, and hopes to be involved in charity to give back.