I’m the daughter of a builder who ran his own business for years. Watching him work wasn’t just a childhood backdrop, it was my first education in the reality of small business ownership.

But what stays with me most isn’t just the complexity of running a construction business, it’s the sheer hard work behind it.

My father worked incredibly long hours. I remember evenings when he would come home very late, and was often was visibly exhausted. Then other times when we wouldn’t see him at all, because he was out early and back after we’d gone to bed. Even as a child, I could sense the weight he carried, not just physically, but mentally too. He wasn’t doing it for recognition. He was doing it because he wanted to build a better life for his family.

I suspect that’s where my work ethic comes from, having witnessed my father normalise that from such a young age. But it also gave me something even more important, a deep respect for the people who keep turning up, day after day, carrying the responsibility of customers, jobs, payroll, and cash flow, and often with little support.

• From the outside, people sometimes see trades and construction as ‘simple’ businesses; you do the job, you send the invoice, you get paid. But what I saw first-hand was the opposite a world of complexity, unpredictability, and constant juggling things like:
• Complex quoting and pricing, where one unexpected issue on site could wipe out the margin.
• Unforeseen problems that couldn’t have been predicted but still needed to be managed and funded.
• Bad payers, where weeks of hard work were followed by chasing money that should never have been late.
• Admin and compliance, which were essential but rarely a strength or priority for busy tradespeople.
• The feeling of being targeted, especially by systems like CIS and the fear of HMRC scrutiny.
• A constant mental load of filling schedules, managing jobs, staff, suppliers, customers, paperwork, cash flow, and the next problem around the corner.

I learned early that many business owners aren’t short of effort or talent. They’re short of time, reliable information, and support that fits the way they live and work.

Even then, I could see something else that shaped me profoundly, which is the emotional cost of uncertainty. When cash flow is unpredictable, when paperwork piles up, when you’re trying to be the expert, the manager, the administrator, and the problem-solver, it doesn’t just affect business. It affects sleep, relationships, confidence, and health.

That understanding became a thread that runs through everything I do today.

From 1996 to 1999 I studied business and psychology at the University of Hertfordshire. That combination reflected my belief that business isn’t just about numbers, it’s about people, behaviours, choices, stress, motivation, and identity.

Numbers matter, of course. But data only becomes powerful when it helps someone make a better decision. And decision-making is deeply human.

After university I went straight into accounting practice for a couple of years. It gave me strong foundations in fundamentals of finance, how to meet deadlines, how to ensure accuracy and so on. But I also noticed something early on, many clients didn’t just want the compliance done. They wanted reassurance, clarity and someone to translate complexity into relatable words.

From there, I moved into industry and worked 8 years for a multinational company, progressing through various finance roles until I left my position as European Finance Manager, when my second child was born in 2009.

That period gave me valuable perspective. Corporate finance taught me the power of systems, planning, and management information and it also showed me what small businesses rarely have access to; structured support, clear processes, and time to think.

I became increasingly convinced that small businesses deserve the same quality of insight and structure as big organisations, but delivered in a way that respects their reality. Small businesses are the life blood of our communities and it’s only right that they are properly supported.

I had a mini career break to raise my young family. During this time, and alongside running a part-time direct selling business, I also co-ran a landscape construction company for years with my husband. This is where my understanding of the trades world stopped being observational and became personal.

I handled the admin, pricing, sales, marketing, HR, finance; the backbone work that keeps a business running behind the scenes. And like many owner-managed businesses, we were balancing everything; customer expectations, staffing, scheduling, suppliers, weather disruption, equipment, cash flow, and the endless unpredictability that comes with physical, on-site work. That experience has had a lasting impact on how I serve customers.

When a customer says, ‘I don’t have time for this paperwork’, I know that means they’re drowning in competing demands, all of which are urgent and important.

When they say, ‘I’m scared of doing it wrong’, I recognise that fear, because I’ve lived in the same world of responsibility and uncertainty.
When they say ‘the cashflow worry keeps me up at night’, I can relate to the overwhelming panic that accompanies this statement.

Most importantly, I learned that a business can look fine from the outside and still feel impossible to run. Stress often always come from lack of turnover, it comes from lack of clarity, weak systems, poor cash collection, or a business model that doesn’t protect the owner.

That’s the gap I try to fill now: helping business owners build businesses that support their life, not consume it.

I initially started Torbay Accounting & Consultancy in April 2011 as a sole practitioner, on a part-time basis, while also running a small direct sales business and being a partner in our landscape construction company.

Like many founders, I didn’t start with a grand plan to build something big. I started because friends asked for my help and I knew I could meet their needs. On a very small scale I gave practical, trusted support for business owners who wanted to do things properly, but didn’t know where to start.

In those early days, I was working around family life, taking what I’d learned in practice and corporate finance and tailoring it to real people with real pressures. I was also noticing something that would later become central to our identity; people don’t just want a service, they want a safe pair of hands and a calm, strategic guide. It was not uncommon to be used as a sounding board, and I loved this aspect of my role.

Then in 2013, something happened that shifted everything.

My husband sustained an injury and needed extended time out for rehabilitation. My family needed stability and financial security, and so I made the decision to take Torbay Accounting full-time.

At the time, it felt like necessity, but looking back, it was a defining moment. It forced me to commit fully, step into the identity of founder, and build something resilient enough to carry both our customers and our own family through uncertainty.

Like many businesses I focussed on building size first. I easily fell into that trap of being the bottleneck in the company. I soon realised that I didn’t want a business that relied on me being available 24/7. That was too risky for me, my family and my customers. Instead, I decided to build something robust, calm, and dependable, a business that could weather change.

At Torbay Accounting our mission is to improve the lives of our team members, our customers and the local community. This sentence is not marketing copy for us, it defines how we show up on a daily basis, it’s our guiding principle.

It shapes how we build the team, the culture, the customer experience, and even the customers we choose to work with. Because I’ve learned that you can be busy and still not be building something meaningful. I wanted the opposite, a business that creates positive change and a ripple effect.

One of our biggest commitments is creating a calm working environment, where team members are encouraged to embrace continual learning and use feedback as an opportunity for improvement.

Calm doesn’t happen by accident. You design it. You protect it. You treat it as a standard; because a calm team does better work, communicates better, and supports customers better. And learning matters because the world is constantly evolving. Technology changes, rules change, customers’ needs change. We want to be the kind of team that doesn’t resist change but uses it to serve better.

We build strong relationships between team members and customers because that is where real support happens. When there’s trust, customers tell you what’s really going on, not just what they think they should say. They ask questions sooner, share worries sooner and that’s how we can help before small challenges become big problems.

Relationships also create something that’s hard to measure but easy to feel, and that’s relief and safety. Knowing there’s someone in your corner.

We make sure we work with customers whose ethos and values are closely aligned with our own; Quality, Respect, Trust & Integrity.

That’s important because we’re not here for quick fixes or corners cut. We want customers who care about doing things properly, building something sustainable, and treating people well. Those are the businesses that usually create the best outcomes for everyone involved.

And truthfully, values alignment protects customers too. It means we can have honest conversations, make decisions confidently, and build long-term.

We provide accurate, clear, concise information in a timely manner, supported by best-practice use of technology.

This part matters because I’ve seen how damaging uncertainty can be. When people don’t have clarity, they either avoid decisions or make rushed ones. Clarity changes the way people show up in their business. It reduces anxiety. It increases confidence. It creates options. And that’s ultimately what we want to give customers, options rather than panic.

Every growing business reaches a point where what worked before doesn’t work anymore. For us, growth brought a realisation, we could stay in a cycle of reacting, or we could become intentional about the experience we deliver.

We chose to evolve. Not just by adding tools or refining processes, but by deciding what we wanted customers and team members to feel when they interact with us.

We made a commitment to:

• Highlight opportunities for positive change – for customers and internally
• Work closely with customers who want to embark on a journey of business improvement
• Keep raising our standards in a way that protects calm and consistency, by constantly feeding back, identifying areas for improvement and implementing change through systems

This shift is how we got to where we are today. Customers don’t come to us just to ‘get things done’. They come because they want to feel safer, clearer, more in control, and more confident. And we’ve learned that the path to that outcome isn’t intensity, it’s consistency.

The best way to describe our approach is that we don’t just support businesses, we support the people running them. Here’s what customers consistently tell us matters most, and what we work hard to deliver:

• Calm, not judgement – People shouldn’t feel embarrassed for not knowing something. They shouldn’t dread asking for help. We meet customers where they are, treat them with respect, and create an environment where questions are welcome.
• Clarity, not complexity – We don’t hide behind jargon. We explain what matters, why it matters, and what the next best step is, so customers can make decisions confidently.
• Partnership, not distance – We build relationships that feel supportive and steady. We want customers to feel they have someone alongside them, especially in stressful moments.
• Improvement, not just maintenance – We don’t want customers to simply ‘keep going’. We want them to get better outcomes over time, more resilience, more confidence, and more freedom.

That’s what ‘improving lives’ looks like in the day-to-day: less stress, clearer decisions, stronger businesses, and owners who feel more capable.

Our mission includes the local community because I believe small business is part of the social fabric. When local businesses are financially resilient, the whole area benefits in terms of employment, stability, confidence, and growth.

Giving back isn’t a side project for us. It’s part of how we measure success.

We do this through:

• Sponsorship of local youth groups
• Supporting environmental charities
• Offering work experience to local young people
• Working with the local college to get young apprentices into work, providing support and mentoring
• Providing discounted support to local not-for-profit organisations
• Guest speaking in person and on webinars, to get as much useful information as possible out into the community, free at the point of access
• Giving free support for clients that we identify as most in need

We also believe that by improving the financial resilience of our customers as small local businesses, we can contribute to the growth of the local economy.

That matters to me personally because I want the work we do to be meaningful beyond the walls of our business. I want to build others up; customers, team members, and people in the community who might not have had the same chances or support.

Personally, I want a few simple things, and they shape how I lead. I want:

• To feel fulfilled in my work and make a difference to the lives of people I work alongside and for.
• To maximise time on the aspects of my role I enjoy the most, providing insights to my customers and mentoring the team.
• To have work-life balance. I am very passionate about my work, and I also want to have the opportunity to pursue my personal interests.
• To eventually have the time to set up a non-profit CIC to coach young people from disadvantaged backgrounds on how to become business owners, to help them break the cycle and achieve their own financial freedom.

That CIC vision comes from the same place as everything else. I’ve seen what hard work can do, but I’ve also seen how much harder it is without guidance, knowledge, and someone who believes in you.

I want to be part of changing that for others.

It’s a very exciting time to be in this profession, not because of the technicalities, but because of what it enables.

The industry is evolving. There’s less manual processing and more opportunity for business support, tech guidance, and advisory, which means more opportunity to do the ‘human’ element of the work – building relationships, supporting decisions, and helping customers create positive change.

Initiatives like MTD ITSA and the reduction in new talent entering the profession are creating a clear divide between businesses that resist change and those that embrace it.  We intend to be firmly in the second group.  Not because we love change for its own sake, but because embracing the right change allows us to serve customers better with more clarity, more timeliness, and more meaningful support.