David Calder

What has been your personal highlight of 2020?

The resilience of people and their desire to continue to move forward despite COVID-19, including those in our local communities, our customers and our business, Adarma.

From a purely personal point of view, seeing my eldest boy start his first job (at the local chippy), my middle boy go to play rugby with a smile and my youngest boy bring home conkers and insist we string them are all highlights for me.

Which three celebrities would you invite to a Zoom party?

I'd invite Henry Ford, Bill Gates and Tim Berners Lee. They have all changed our world through technology and I'd love to hear them reflect on our world and their contribution.

What has been your guiltiest lockdown pleasure?

Ooh embarrassing! I've became obsessed with car restoration TV despite never having worked on a car. Not sure what this means but I almost invited Mike Hall from Rust Valley Restorers.

Which tech figurehead has inspired you most this year, and why?

I'm not a fan of celebrity and Twitter etc so I struggled with this. I'm really impressed by MS Teams - it has made day-to-day collaboration possible and I'd guess Microsoft have been like a swan, graceful on the surface while working frantically below the surface - so I'm going to give my salute to Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella while also acknowledging to Zoom CEO Eric Yuan.

What piece of technology, or app, have you not been able to do without during the pandemic?

It has to be MS Teams. It has been the next best thing to being face to face. I also really like to be up to date with the news and the BBC News app has kept me happy there.

If you could be anyone else for a week, who would you be and what would you do?

If I were to be completely self-indulgent here, I would pick a world-class racing driver such as Valtteri Bottas - experiencing that level of ability and in-the-moment fearlessness would be incredible.

Do you miss face-to-face events?

Massively and I honestly didn't realise how much I would as I think of myself as a bit of a loner. The spontaneity that face-to-face brings and the positivity just seems to be missing through a digital device.

How will COVID leave its mark on the way the channel operates long term?

Customers want true partners and this has become amplified by COVID. Everyone in the channel will need to ensure relationships are more than simply transactional.