This is a story about turnaround, restructuring, growth and distress, with a few acquisitions and sales along the way 

My entrepreneurial journey started 11 years ago when I became Finance Director of a £20m business that had been losing up to £1m every year for the previous 10 years, after leaving a corporate career that included Black & Decker & PD Ports plc. Why did I do it I hear you ask, because I saw a potential MBO, and that’s exactly what happened. I and a colleague brought the business to break even in 6 months and after suggesting a sale to the owners we bought in 12 months later, starting with a business that had a few legacy contracts, a load of liabilities and in reality nothing more than a brand name! 

After two years profits we had to restructure the business and start it from scratch to remove it from its extremely large insolvent pension fund and we then spent the next three years growing the business threefold with Net Assets reaching £600k. In 2006 we undertook two acquisitions utilising the surplus cash, with some extra investment in new machinery 18 months later, that arrived two days before Northern Rock was rescued. 

The next two years then became a struggle due to, with hindsight, being too highly geared at the wrong time in the economic cycle and in 2010 the shareholders felt that it wasn’t beneficial to carry on and utilised various means to exit the business and save as many jobs as possible. 

During this 11 year journey I became responsible for the financial, legal, HR & IT matters for the group, and collected the qualification of Barrister to supplement my ACA and became responsible for a multisite group that employed up to 200 people, and gained many interesting experiences both good and bad 

I now offer part FD/HR director/manager services aimed mainly at SME’s who cannot afford, and don’t need, someone like myself full time. The aim is to use my experience, successes and failures to support business owners on their journey and allow them to concentrate on what they do best, namely running their business. 

Anybody who wants to hear more detail of my story then why don’t you give me a call. It might help you in your business