Operations Director at Adore Group / Managing Director of Liiift
“Human Resources isn’t a thing we do. It’s the thing that runs our business.” – Steve Wynn
Fun Fact about yourself?
I competed in a charity Strictly Come Dancing tournament in 2019, scoring 39 out of 40 dancing to a song from Dirty Dancing, one of my all-time favourite films.
What’s your go-to productivity hack that helps you stay on top of your work?
I love a weekly meeting to keep things moving.
How do you like to unwind after a busy day at work?
My answer in the past would have been to exercise, but now there’s nothing better than to spend my downtime with my young daughter.
What’s the best piece of career advice you’ve ever received, and how has it influenced your work?
“You can’t be everything.” I actually learnt this from the Adore Group CEO, Sean O’Neill.
What’s one thing you wish people understood better about your job or department?
I think a lot of people don’t necessarily understand the importance of HR. It’s something that can be summed up perfectly through the following quote: “Human Resources isn’t a thing we do. It’s the thing that runs our business.” – Steve Wynn
Q&A
What is Liiift and what does it excel in?
Liiift, to the outside world, is a Business Consultancy that specialises in HR, Coaching and Business Strategy, but on the inside, we are so much more than that. The easiest way to explain how Liiift excels is to explain what the three i’s in Liiift represent, and that is: immerse, invest and innovate.
We fully immerse ourselves in our clients’ organisations, getting to know them, where they see their organisation, and their goals and objectives.
We invest our time and our skills into the work we carry out for our clients, providing a bespoke service that is not a “one-size-fits-all” approach.
We truly care about our clients, and we want them to succeed, and that’s why as part of the work we do, we innovate and create new ways of working to streamline what our clients do and how they do it.
What kind of projects do you enjoy working on within Liiift?
I personally love coaching; I thrive when I get to coach and develop my clients. As a team, there is nothing more rewarding than when we establish a long-term working relationship with a client in which we get to work on several components, such as creating their branding, designing and building their website, managing their socials etc.
How do you encourage a learning culture within your team and organisation?
I am a huge advocate for talking things through; I actively ask my team how they’d like to develop too, making learning a personal and bespoke experience for each member of the team.
What is the one piece of advice you wish you’d received earlier in your career?
To manage my own expectations, and not stretch and dilute myself too much. I suppose we can all be guilty of being hard on ourselves and putting ourselves under too much pressure!
If you could go back and change one decision or action in your career, what would it be and why?
I don’t have any regrets; every decision we make leads us on a new path, where we can take the lessons we have learnt in the past and use them to shape our future choices.
How can Liiift help other companies to succeed?
Liiift goes above and beyond for our clients, and by immersing, investing and innovating, we really get to know them, what makes them tick, and what they want to achieve. We do this because we genuinely care; we WANT them to succeed, and we want that success to build and grow so that it is sustainable, and so we give them the tools to achieve it. I love the analogy of the gardener; if our client is the plant, then Liiift is the gardener, and we take care of, water and nourish the plant so that the roots take hold, it grows strong and flourishes.
The services we offer are entirely bespoke and according to the individual requirements of the client, so whether it is website building, HR retainership or key personnel coaching, Liiift can deliver tangible results.
Who has been the biggest influence on your leadership style, and why?
Not so much an influence, but more a huge amount of respect for John Timpson of Timpsons. I have the utmost admiration for his approach to business and leadership and what he has achieved. He once said, “Our bosses don’t tell anyone what to do. They do their job by helping every team member become the very best they can possibly be.”
