Please can you give us an overview of your career?
After University, I had a short stint in H Samuel (The Jewellers) in Guernsey. I then continued the retail theme, joining Primark in Belfast as a Trainee Manager, but as a keen hockey player this was short lived due to Saturday working! Following this, I worked for 9 years in a variety of roles with Standard Life, ending up as a Broker Consultant specialising in Self Invested Pensions. One of my connections, International Accountancy Firm BDO, approached me with a role in their Tax and Wealth Department. Following qualification as a Chartered Financial Planner, the role expanded with some international work and regular Business Development trips to London, the Channel Islands and Malta. With regular trips to Jersey, we worked closely with Jo Luce and Aqua. When BDO decided to sell their Wealth Management Practice in 2019, Jo kindly offered me the role of Director with more travel and the Isle of Man via Boston MFO now on list.
Where is the most interesting place you have travelled to for work and why?
During a site visit in Romania for a new property fund in 2010, we managed to get stuck for a week due to the Icelandic Ash Cloud and witnessed all aspects of Romanian life. Friends were made for life, as 5 of us (Bankers, Accountants and Property Agents) got the train from Bucharest to Vienna via Hungary, to Stuttgart, Paris, London & Holyhead in Wales before getting the ferry to Dublin and then by car to Belfast. Having left Romania on a Monday afternoon, my wife Debbie had the suit, shoes and razors at the ready upon my return to home soil and I arrived suited & booted on the Thursday morning for a breakfast meeting with the then Northern Ireland First Minister, Arlene Foster!
What’s the one gadget you couldn’t live without?
My GPS on my Golf Trolley. Whilst my golf ball normally doesn’t go where it’s supposed to, it’s always best to use the correct club and point in the right direct.
What’s the best thing about your job?
The variety, the travel (apart from winter Red Eye Flights), the relationships with long standing clients and colleagues and the opportunity to meet new people.
Tell us something that might surprise us about you?
In my teens I was the lead singer in a Belfast Punk band called Lergy. It was short lived as like Joe Strummer of The Clash, I didn’t like the ‘gob’.
What’s your motto or personal mantra?
It’s a bit twee but ‘Teamwork makes the dream work’. Having been involved in hockey, sailing and several Professional Teams throughout my career, when you get the teamwork right, positive results just happen.