I joined Beyondly in 2006 shortly after the business was founded as Comply Direct. On completion of my A-levels I decided not to go to Uni and even by the time I joined Comply Direct 9 years later, I still didn’t have a set career goal – my biggest ambition in life at that point was to have children and be a present Mum. I’d worked in customer service and medical recruitment previously and had some limited line management experience, I’d just returned from a year of travelling.
I began as a Sales Support Co-ordinator – my main responsibility was recruiting new members to the packaging scheme. This quickly evolved as we grew the scheme and with the introduction of the WEEE regulations in 2007. As well as recruiting new members, I looked after our existing members, co-ordinated WEEE collections and quite quickly took on all the finance related tasks as well as all the office management type tasks – this saw me move into the Office Manager role after less than a year in 2007. From this point onwards, I was also always involved in any discussions around the organisational strategy and whilst ultimate decisions around this sat with the founder of the business (Gareth), my suggestions, ideas and views were always considered and incorporated where appropriate.
As the business continued to grow I became closely involved in the recruitment of new employees. We also began looking at accreditations that would serve us positively and I took responsibility for the implementation of IIP and all the ISO standards and also began writing any newly required policies. I quickly began to realise that the people side of things is where my passion lay and I implemented all the people related frameworks (e.g. performance reviews, reward framework, benefits, competency framework). With the growth in team numbers, this presented a business need for a dedicated HR role and in January 2013 I moved into the HR & Ops Manager role. I began to feel a bit like a Jack of All Trades Master of None so decided to enhance my skills by completing my CIPD level 5 in 2015. Whilst you learn so much on the job and experience is so valuable, I definitely found this worthwhile and believe it made me more effective in my role.
As Gareth began to take more of a step back from the business, he was keen to grow the Executive Board and a business need was identified for a Director of Talent, Culture and Operations from April 2019. I completed the IOD – Role of the Director and the Board training in January 2019 and began my CIPD level 7 shortly after.
With Sarah Foster’s resignation as MD in December 2022, the role became vacant. I expressed my interest in the role, and the decision was made that it wouldn’t be advertised externally. I delivered a presentation to Iain and Gareth and the wider Beyondly team and have been in the role since April 2023.
- Problem Solving – aside from Gareth, I was the most senior and longest serving member of the team for a number of years so people naturally looked to me to provide solutions to problems and challenges. This is clearly absolutely crucial in my role today, I need to inspire and motivate the team every day and show them that we can overcome any challenge or problem – in my eyes there is always an answer!
- Strategic Thinking – as mentioned previously, I was involved in strategic discussions with Gareth very early in my career with Beyondly/Comply Direct and I utilise this every day. The buck ultimately stops with me for establishing and executing the organisational strategy.
- Emotional Intelligence – whilst I believe myself to be naturally emotionally intelligent, I feel that through my career development it has helped me recognise just how important this is in the workplace. Our people are at the centre of everything and even in my role now which is somewhat removed from the ‘frontline’ I remain fully invested in all things people related and continue to use my emotional intelligence on the daily to ensure we have a happy, healthy, motivated team who are always on their A-game.
I was very lucky to join Comply Direct as a start up and as a result, have full exposure to all areas of the business. I have carried out the majority of roles and responsibilities (although not quite all!) that remain in the business today and that makes me well-placed to make key decisions in relation to all aspects and areas of the business.
Take accountability for your own career development, put the time, effort and work in – you need to put in what you expect to take out. Be open to new experiences and learning opportunities. Embrace change and remain resilient if things don’t quite go to plan. At Beyondly specifically, those who are most successful in their careers (and I count myself in this) epitomise the company values, go over and above as standard, throw themselves into every task and challenge presented to them and show up every day with a growth mindset and solutions-focused approach.
