BANKING, TAXES & BASKETBALL

EDUARDO BEUT
TALKS TO BOB YAREHAM

There are not many important people in Valencia who don’t know Eduardo Beut, and not many that he doesn’t know. If you want to know what will be in tomorrow’s newspaper, ask him yesterday.

But, for the man who has been the boss of the Inland Revenue in the Valencian Community, a Vice President of the CAM and Bancaja Savings Banks and is currently Secretary General of FECOVAL, the Valencian Federation of Construction Companies, the great passion in his life, family aside, is basketball.

And in basketball too he has a vision that few others have, a fact that was recently confirmed by none other than Spain’s best ever basketball player, Pau Gasol, who in his recent autobiography states that Eduardo was the first person to ‘discover’ him, and to try to sign him for Valencia’s team, Pamesa, where Beut was a youth coach and talent spotter.

Despite his busy schedule of business meetings and conferences, Eduardo still keeps his hand in as a part time coach, and has over the years taken advantage if his more than 15 visits to the USA to observe American players at all levels, and to learn whatever he can from whoever he can.

Learning is important for Eduardo Beut, a person who rarely gets a good night’s sleep if he hasn’t learnt something new that day. He devours books (frequently having to cross the street to avoid walking past a bookshop for fear of spending a fortune inside) and is especially fascinated by history and science, and by characters such as the Duke of Wellington; being able to explain, as he did for me, the strategy of the Battle of Waterloo off the top of his head without maps of books to help him.

But for him, learning is not just for pleasure; for him all this knowledge is important to help understand how we arrived at our present situation, and where we are going.

His early years were spent in Barcelona (where Gasol was a player) and where he himself played for a year, the same year that Johan Cruyff arrived at the club. He started studying Law in the Catalan capital but later changed to Economics and moved to Valencia to take up a position in the Inland Revenue as a sub-inspector on passing his Civil Service Exams.

The easier pace of work in Valencia enabled him to take up basketball again and to become associated with the Valencian team, Pamesa, where he has held various coaching positions.

Human values are a passion with Eduardo and as a youth coach he had a clear idea that his job was not to win games but to prepare both the technical and human side of his charges. Concepts such as team spirit, values, attitudes, unselfishness and ‘means’ instead of ‘ends’ have characterised his approach in a world where he laments that young players, like all young people, have too many distractions today.

From 1999 to 2002 he was in charge of Valencia’s Inland Revenue Service and responsible for some of the technical advances that were brought in to make the service more efficient as well as to overcome the problems caused by the infamous 2000 effect in the world of computers; and also to adapt Spain to the advent of the Euro currency.

On a human level he endeavoured to change old prejudices of fear and loathing from the general public and to cultivate a corporate attitude of seeing the taxpayer as a client rather than “all the usual suspects” (a quote he made from ‘Casablanca’, revealing another of his great passions; the cinema).

He is proud to have surrounded himself during that time with a good team of motivated professionals, many of whom have since moved on to important jobs, and to have met many interesting people in the world of big business.

When the political parties of Valencia decided that it would be a good idea to merge the two main Valencian savings Banks, CAM and Bancaja, they looked for somebody who was politically neutral and trusted on all sides to oversee the operation, and Beut was a natural choice. Although the merger finally failed, largely due to the unwillingness on both sides to relinquish power, Eduardo’s efforts through the organisation to focus on the importance of investing in Valencia’s infrastructures, also made him the ideal man when FECOVAL were looking for a new Secretary General to liaise with local and national government and with the European Union in an attempt to overcome the inadequate communications which were isolating Valencia from the rest of Europe and to ensure that Valencian companies were given their fair share of the civil engineering contracts that were put out to tender in the Valencian Community.

The English language is important for him and, as well as following a daily course of classes himself, he ensured that his daughter went to one of Valencia’s British schools, and our whole interview was in fact conducted in English.

He pointed out that the inability to speak English well is one of the greatest frustrations for many top executives who, although they have brilliant, creative ideas, cannot necessarily communicate them in an international scenario.

Another of his passions is gastronomy and for many years he has had a close personal association with one of Valencia’s top restaurants Ca Sento, where he also revealed another of his interests, contemporary art; being responsible for the choice of original paintings by contemporary Valencian artists that hang in the award-winning restaurant.

Eduardo Beut’s phone rarely stops ringing as friends, colleagues and acquaintances call him up asking for advice or to check out if a current rumour is true. I was able to check this out myself when he told me (off the record of course) two days before the story broke in the newspapers, who the new CEO of Valencia Football Club was going to be.

He is also in great demand from newspapers, magazines, radio and TV, and is a frequent contributor in all the media.

But it is basketball that rouses his greatest sporting passions, and this month (May 2006), he helped coach the Llíria Under 15s to victory in the Valencian Community League Play Off Final against his old team, and favourites, Pamesa, and is now preparing to take on Real Madrid in the South Eastern and Central Spain Championships.

©2007/2008 Bob Yareham.

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