Let me tell you about one of the most exhilarating challenges of my career – helping build CleanCo Queensland from the ground up. You know that saying about building a plane while flying it? Well, try building a power company while keeping the lights on!

When I joined CleanCo as a start-up HR leader, we weren’t just starting with a blank slate – we were starting with a slate that needed to be operational yesterday. Picture this: a brand new player in Queensland’s power generation industry, needing everything from basic HR policies to complex union agreements, all while the business was already running.

Here’s what made it fascinating: we weren’t just crossing t’s and dotting i’s. We were creating an entire HR ecosystem in a high-risk, heavily unionised environment where every decision had long-term implications. Think of it like conducting an orchestra while still writing the music – and teaching some of the musicians their instruments!

I remember one particularly intense week where we were simultaneously drafting enterprise agreements, designing organisational structures, and handling day-to-day employee relations issues. A colleague turned to me and said, “Tom, this is like trying to change all four tires while the car’s still moving.” I laughed and replied, “More like building the entire car while it’s already on the highway!”

But here’s what made it work: we focused on building strong foundations while staying flexible enough to adapt. Every policy we wrote, every process we designed had to serve both immediate needs and future growth. It was like planting a garden that needed to produce food today while growing into an orchard for tomorrow.

The proudest moment? Watching CleanCo develop into an organisation with a robust HR infrastructure that could handle anything thrown at it. Those late nights poring over industrial agreements and early morning strategy sessions paid off in ways we couldn’t have imagined.

You know what still makes me smile? Walking into CleanCo now and seeing how those hastily sketched ideas on whiteboards have evolved into a thriving HR function. It proves that sometimes the best way to build something is just to start building, even if you’re not quite sure where all the pieces will fit.

After all, the best planes are the ones that get built mid-flight – they’re tested by real conditions from day one.