Ian Hobway Wins UKLA 2012 Young Employee Award
Last night, around 250 of the lubricant industry’s most influential people gathered in central London for one of the most prestigious networking events of the lubricants calendar, the UKLA (United Kingdom Lubricants Association) Annual Dinner.
During the course of the evening, not only did guests hear about the recent work of the UKLA and their plans for the future, they were also treated to a superb evening of fine dining and top quality networking before being entertained by Bob Bevan, one of the country’s leading guest speakers.
Amidst the formal proceedings of the evening, in usual tradition, the UKLA announced the winner of their ‘2012 UKLA Young Employee of the Year’ award, which this year went to Ian Hobday, Applications Team Leader at Croda Lubricants.
Ian has been recognised for the UKLA award due to the hard work and professionalism he has shown over the past 4 years that he has been with Croda Lubricants. This dedication has seen Ian rise to become lubricants applications team leader, a role he commenced in January this year.
During his time at Croda Ian has been instrumental in decommissioning the laboratory at Wilton and re-commissioning it at our Cowick Headquarters, he has supported the business at key customer meetings and presented the business and new product developments at global industry events. More recently, Ian has led a technical group in developing new ground breaking friction modifiers for automotive lubricants and is now leading the technical team to develop this project into an extension of the product range, whilst continuing to drive forward and support other key R&D projects.
Chris Nottingham, Vice President of Croda Lubricants, commented “Ian has taken on enormous responsibility both in terms of projects, customer support and team management. His rise to this level within the technical team has been swift due to his skills, capabilities and ‘can-do’ attitude.”
On receiving the award, Ian Hobday commented “I am overwhelmed to have received this award. It is a great feeling to be acknowledged for all of the hard work that I have put in while at Croda. I am always enthusiastic about developing truly innovative products that really make a difference to our customers formulations.”
The UKLA said “Each year the UKLA Board considers all the excellent nominations for this award and whilst it is always a difficult decision, the board decided that Ian’s professionalism, drive and passion for lubricants as well as his extensive knowledge in automotive lubricants and an experience level greater than his years meant that he was a more than worthy recipient of this years award.”
UKLA
The United Kingdom Lubricants Association is the UK's lubricant industry lead trade association. It represents 103 companies who produce the majority of the UK's £2 billion, 800,000+ tonne output. Members include multi-national major oil companies, independently owned lubricant manufacturers / marketers and the sector's raw material suppliers. Its activities are currently being widened to encompass distributors and stockists, end-users, academics & individuals; in fact everyone involved in lubricants, beginning to end.
The UKLA provides members with advice and information on current, future and pending legislation; acts as a forum for industry views; maintains contact with and lobbies UK Government departments and other Agencies about proposed legislative developments; provides members with help on industry wide issues; is recognised as the focal point and lead body for the UK lubricants industry sector by UK Government and its agencies.