DESCRIPTIONS of Billy Reid tend to involve the word pragmatic.

The manager of Hamilton Academical is rarely given to moments of ostentation -- his deliberate, considered approach informing both his tactics on the pitch, and his manner off it. Yet it remains a simplistic definition.

A chat with Reid is not likely to result in several days of intensive media scrutiny and a hastily arranged super-injunction, but a lack of hyperbole should not be viewed as an inhibition. Reid is an honest character -- “It [relegation] wasn’t a shock. We’d had five years of continued success and had progressed every year and I always knew the day would come” -- and retains an innate, if reserved, confidence in his coaching abilities.

It is for this reason that there remains something enigmatic about the Hamilton manager. Aside from the litany of disappointments last season -- his side won a solitary league match at home and finished bottom having garnered only 26 points -- Reid’s tenure at the club has brought relative success.

He led the club to the Clydesdale Bank Premier League in only his third season in charge, having left Clyde in 2005, and maintained their status in the top flight for three seasons, finishing as high as seventh a year ago. For a club whose average home attendance last season was a paltry 2800 and which must sell off their best players to generate additional income that is no small achievement.

It did not go unnoticed at other clubs, and last year Swansea City were reported to be interested in offering him his big break. But Reid remained where he was, seemingly unmoved by the attention. He has now stayed so long that he finds himself as a manager in the first division once again, his growing reputation blemished by relegation.

There is a feeling that Reid should have left when his star -- or rather Hamilton’s league position -- was at its highest rather than stick around at a club he knew would eventually fade, but his reluctance to leave -- or, at least, his refusal to actively cultivate interest -- does not point to a lack of personal ambition. Reid is content at Hamilton, a feeling fostered by his relationship with chairman Ronnie MacDonald, and is assured enough to discern when the right moment will be.

“I’m like anybody else and I’m disappointed I’m managing in the first division this year,” said Reid. “I want to manage in the Premier League and I think I’ve proved I can. I’m ambitious to move on to a bigger club but I’m happy in my job, in the surroundings I work in.

“We were relegated but the chairman has backed me up and that tells you everything about the relationship we’ve got. Sometimes it’s not always greener on the other side, but if I’m lucky enough -- and I mean lucky -- to get an opportunity then I’ll certainly know when the time would be right to move on to a bigger club or a higher level.”

Reid is unlikely to feel as though he has missed his chance either. English clubs view Scotland as a lucrative market when it comes to coaches; Owen Coyle began his managerial career in the modest surroundings of Falkirk and has quickly risen to the heady heights of the Barclays Premier League with first Burnley then Bolton Wanderers, while Derek McInnes, Coyle’s successor at St Johnstone, has been linked with other posts and recently turned down a move to Brentford. Mixu Paatelainen also used a successful stint at Kilmarnock as a springboard to become manager of Finland.

“I think we’ve certainly had an influence,” said Reid. “But I think success is really difficult to judge, especially in Scotland. We all know that Rangers or Celtic -- or Celtic or Rangers, however you want to put it -- are going to win the league. There’s nobody else who’s going to in the next 10 years as far I can see.”

Without an array of shiny trophies to impress prospective employers, aspiring Scottish managers are required to be a little more creative during an interview process. It is clear what attribute Reid would probably place at the top of his cv.

“I judge success on grooming young players and bringing them through,” he said. “That’s how I sell this club to young players, I say ‘come to us and you’ll get the opportunity if you’re good enough and get put on the stage’. We’ve done that and nurtured them in the right way and it’s my job to make sure that continues. I’m almost certain that will be the case.”

That would be the pragmatic thing to do, after all.