60 Second Interview - Ralph Tribe

Director Business HR & Policy, Sky

What was your first ever job?

Ad Sales Rep on "Farmers Weekly"

What's the best place to go if you really want to find out what's going on in the office?

Any place where you can talk to front-line staff - the more social the better

How did you get into recruitment/HR?

My brother was the Marketing Manager on Personnel Today magazine and I believed his hype!

What do you do at weekends?

Firstly try to understand where all my kids are, then try and escape them with Dympna (my wife)

What is your favourite restaurant?

"Bombay Bicycle Club" on Wandsworth Common - probably the best Indian outside India (and also the name of my favourite band!)

If you weren't in HR what would you have been?

Well I told my school careers officer I wanted to be a Vet but he laughed and told me to reset my expectations a little... his suggestion was a Zoo-Keeper

What is your favourite film?

"Slum-Dog Millionaire" - it's not easy to produce fresh ideas after 100 years of cinema but I think this film told a traditional love story in a really original way

What was the first record you bought?

Siouxsie and the Banshees "Hong Kong Garden" - at nine years old I was probably a little younger than the average punk (getting to gigs was particularly problematic given my bed time was 8 o'clock)

What is the best thing about your job?

Sky being Sky - to me it's probably the most interesting FTSE 100 company out there - my journey to work is pretty cool too as I cycle from Kingston through Richmond Park, then along the Thames at Richmond, then through Syon Park, then along the Grand Union Canal to Brentford where Sky is based - how nice is that on a sunny morning?

What is the toughest thing about your job?

The same journey but in the snow!

What was your biggest work/career mistake and what did you learn from it?

Apart from the one everyone has about sending the wrong email to the wrong person I guess not joining quite early enough to get stock options at DACG... happily corrected when I joined Getty Images

What book are you currently reading?

"Child 44" by Tom Rob Smith - a sort of Silence of the Lambs set in Stalinist Russia - very original and authentic - probably the best novel I have read in a years. I also just finished "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy which is beautiful in an utterly bleak and depressing kind of a way LOL

What is your favourite children's book?

"Watership Down" certainly left an impression - same with "The Hobbit"

If you were stranded on a desert island, what two luxury items would you take with you?

Well obviously an iPhone so I could stay in touch (admitted perhaps missing the point of being on a desert island) but then definitely a good snorkel & mask for when the battery ran out

Who would you least like to sit next door to at a dinner party?

Piers Morgan or Patricia Hewitt as they rather make my skin crawl on TV (although I accept that they might be nice people in real life!)