Rob Cochrane celebrates 40 years at Tensor

Forty years ago …

"I had — and still have only had — three interviews in my life, with three local companies," says Rob.

"One of them was a big company that wanted me to go on an apprenticeship scheme involving five years of college work, no on-the-job training.

"Another was a small, family-run engineering company; I didn't really see how I was going to be trained and qualified on that side.

"Then obviously Tensor; Tensor's route suited me because it had on-the-job training, but also working for qualifications. Part and parcel of that was the Government Youth Training Scheme at the time, which encouraged companies to take on apprentices.

"At that time, Tensor was doing shop floor data collection and was very much involved with manufacturing systems. An example would be that you would want to accurately measure how many of a particular product have been manufactured, how much time had been spent on that product, and make sure that those products weighed the right amount.

"My role was to build electronic print circuit boards (PCB) for our systems. I was also given the responsibility of running the stores, making sure that anything was documented, that stock checks were taken care of, and that it was all audited.

"I earned £27 a week — it's obviously a lot different nowadays!

"At that age I hadn't even learned to drive. As part of my electronic technician qualifications, I was doing a City and Guilds qualification in Huntingdon, which meant that every Tuesday I needed to bike to the railway station from where I lived and get a train to Huntingdon — and then the same coming back.

"So, as quick as I could, I got my provisional licence and passed my test, which then obviously opened up other avenues for me as well."

Alongside the growth of Tensor and the company's transition to time and attendance and access control, Rob moved into installation: "I fairly quickly became the installations and operations manager, working with a team of engineers, which is a job I absolutely loved. I'd occasionally do some work with the sales team — very small upgrades, quotations, that sort of thing."

In 1996 this led to an offer from Nigel Smith, the Chairman of Tensor, to join the sales team full time:

"It was an area I was interested in — my father was in sales — and we came to an arrangement that I would do it for three months. If it worked out, I would carry on what I was doing. If it did not work out, I would go back to engineering.

"But I do remember Nigel saying: 'within a week you will not want to go back into engineering or installation, you'll enjoy sales that much.' And he was spot on. I absolutely loved it and still love it. I've now been in sales for over 30 years, and I'm still getting up early in the morning and getting home late at night!"

From punch cards to smart cards and beyond

In 1986, time and attendance was widely managed by manual systems, most commonly by employees punching a card into a clock-in terminal, which would then be counted by the payroll clerk.

Similarly, Rob explains that access control mostly relied on entering a PIN code into a keypad, which would then unlock the door. "But people could pass the PIN codes from one to another," he says, "so there was no way of auditing to know who actually opened the door.

"As computers became more and more popular, companies like Tensor designed systems to work with Windows-based platforms."

In 1992 Tensor launched WinTA, the first smart card based Time and Attendance and Access Control software package written specifically for Microsoft Windows, making use of the platform's capabilities by utilising a full graphical interface and storing photographs of each employee in a company.

"It started off as time and attendance, but as more people wanted to incorporate access control to keep certain areas safe, we developed access control systems. This initially used smart card technology, then in the last ten years or so, fingerprint technology, and in the last five years it's been facial recognition or facial authentication technology."

The uptake of biometrics (fingerprint and facial authentication) for access control has been closely linked to its use in consumer products, says Rob:

"When mobile phones started to use fingerprint and facial technology, it became part and parcel of modern life. You don't use a password on your phone, you use your face, and so why not do the same with access control? People are less sceptical because they use it on their mobiles."

Of course, the increased use of technology across four decades has influenced not only the evolution of the industry, but also how the sales role itself has changed.

"40 years ago, there were no mobile phones, and no computers like we know nowadays. Sending quotations out to people was mostly done by post, or maybe fax; now everything is emailed, particularly since COVID. There are a lot more online presentations. I used to do anything between 50—70,000 miles a year. Now, it is probably down to less than half of that. This has enabled me to have a better work life balance, it's positive on the environment, and it means I am more efficient. I can now do a presentation in the morning and then get a quotation ready straight away to be with the customer later that day."

Memorable moments

30 years of travelling for sales has led to some memorable trips.

"We had a distributor in Albania with a couple of customers they wanted me to help get over the line," Rob says. "So I flew over to Tirana, the capital city, which is an interesting place. I was there for three days doing presentations and site surveys with the Albanian representative. My hotel was right near the airport; I woke up the first morning to the Albanian military doing an exercise outside, going up and down, with an officer shouting at them in Albanian.

In 2012 Rob was invited by Tensor's facial authentication distributor to visit Barcelona where they could showcase the capabilities of their system.

One of the ways they did this was by attending a football match at Camp Nou to watch Barcelona play against Grenada.

"Our distributor took photos of us and told us to buy some tickets without saying where we were sitting in the stadium," recalls Rob, "and their cameras would find us in the 92,000 people in the stadium.

"So we got our tickets and watched the game. At the time, Barcelona were probably the best football team in the world; they had Lionel Messi, Iniesta, Xavi, Busquets, Carles Puyol, a very young Cese Fàbregas, David Villa. Messi broke the record for the most goals scored by a player for Barcelona, and he scored a hat trick; Barcelona had two players sent off and they won five-three. Talk about an all-action game of football!

Rob continues: "I always remember this because, for my sins, I'm a Spurs fan. The next day I left Barcelona, where it was probably about 28 degrees, and Spurs were playing Stoke in the evening; it was cold, and it finished up nil-nil. I was with my father and I said 'I can't believe I've come to watch Spurs play today in this weather when last night I was at Camp Nou watching the best player in the world in a match with eight goals'. It was just a surreal sort of moment."

Whilst that match is one of the most memorable things about Rob's time at Tensor, he happily says that the highlight of his tenure is more personal:

"Some people might think it's quite corny, but the best thing that's happened at Tensor is meeting my wife, Helen. She started in 1995, we started dating in 1996 and we have been married since 1999 — we actually had our wedding reception at Tensor!

"It was in the grounds at the back of the summerhouse. It was Nigel's present to us. He provided a marquee and fireworks — he loves fireworks; it gave him an opportunity to show off the fireworks there. We're forever grateful for him for that."

Passion and enthusiasm

After 40 years and five positions within three areas of the company, Rob is still passionate about his role.

"I've met some really good people that have been very, very helpful over the over the years — some that are no longer with Tensor, and some that are.

"I've obviously given a lot of loyalty to the company, but the company's been fair to me as well. I have done five jobs within the company across three areas: I worked in production, in operations and installations, then sales manager, and then Group Sales Director as I am now.