After three years rowing at Durham University, breaking the ice with Richard Wood (founder of Wood.com), I qualified as an accountant with Ernst & Young (big boys in London) knowing I wanted to be able to do the financial gobledy gook but not be an “accountant” in practice – so as soon as I qualified I left to run a ski bar in Meribel! Le Tremplin was without doubt the least profitable bar in the alps (too many free drinks) however I trained my assistant well – Nick Robertson, founder of aim quoted ASOS.com. On returning to London, I started working for the best MD I have ever met – Paul Smith, who invented the game show “Who wants to be a Millionaire?” – he was my mentor – detail, fun, persistence, quality and totally on top of finance. Then after a period of Venture Capital, reporting to Rupert Hambro (wonderful patrician banker with penchant for lime green socks), I was asked to join the board of one of my investments as CFO (chief financial officer) – by the time the business was successfully sold to Scottish Mutual 4 years later, I was the longest serving executive director…a brutal, tough but ultimately profitable turnaround and trade sale. I was then asked to join a restaurant /retail group which at the time was losing £0.5m – after catching the GM with his hand in the till, the Chairman Colin West (founder of Micro Focus) asked me to be MD and sort the business and prepare it for sale – after rebranding/re-positioning with help from a great designer (Ian Logan) and building a terrific team, the business was successfully sold to AIM quoted Madisons. I was now able to pursue other interests – including a long held ambition to do more mentoring and tutoring in business generally and of course finance in particular. I became a co-founder of Catalyst Venture Partners, which helps get companies investment ready, a non-exec of one of the best documentary film makers Icon Films, where I helped them raise $2.5m of production finance. My involvement in the creative sector also includes e-learning and digital downloads. So to the present where I am focused on removing the “fear of finance” and helping entrepreneurs from all sectors bridge the chasm that exists between the money men aka financiers, bankers, business angels etc and the entrepreneur.
