This episode of TRI-POD, The Moodie Davitt Report video podcast series in association with The SEVA Group, features Dubai-based Jacqui Davies, Commercial Director at Lagardère Travel Retail Middle East.
Jacqui has been involved in travel retail for 18 years, having joined DFS in her native New Zealand in January 2004, a company that she describes as “the best school in the world”.
She later worked for JR/Duty Free and Aer Rianta International before personal tragedy intervened after Jacqui’s husband passed away in September 2015 at just 57, a victim of cancer.
Jacqui talks movingly in this episode about the traumatic impact of her loss and of how she subseqently quit work to travel abroad to try to come to terms with her grief and somehow move on.
Then, unexpectedly, another kind of journey loomed, this time of the career kind. While back in New Zealand, Jacqui got a call from a former DFS management colleague, David Bisset, who had since moved to Lagardère Travel Retail.
“Jacqui D, I’ve just been made CEO of Saudi Arabia, do you want to come and be my Commercial Director?” he asked.
The response was immediate and affirmative. And just like that Jacqui headed off to to a new life in the Middle East. You can discover her impressions of (and love for) Saudi Arabia (throw away your preconceptions of the country now) and much more in this inspiring tale of a woman shaped by her upbringing in a close New Zealand family, several key mentors in a stellar career and her confrontation with devastating personal loss.
How has all this shaped her attitude to life? “I think my biggest philosophy on life is to live every day like it’s the last,” she responds. “I never miss an opportunity to tell someone that they’ve done a good job or that I love them. Don’t miss an opportunity to say what’s in your heart.”
As always, we take our special guest to the resident TRI-POD desert island. Find out Jacqui’s unequivocal choice of duty free item (spoiler alert, Estée Lauder executives will be delighted); what book and music she would take to accompany her; and which three guests (historic or contemporary) she would invite to a select private dinner.
It’s a powerful, poignant and very human episode.
Note: Would you like to appear with Roger and Martin on TRI-POD? Drop Martin Moodie a line at Martin@MoodieDavittReport.com and we will be in touch.
