Kerry: being believed in pushed me beyond my comfort zone
Kerry’s journey at UHY Ross Brooke began in July ’99 as a trainee. Today she is a partner at UHY Ross Brooke, running the Hungerford office together with Mike Robins.
I’d kept my career options open at university by studying international business and French. With maths having always been my favourite subject, I decided to embark on a career in accountancy. I was delighted to secure a trainee accountant position with the firm, which at that time had the one office in Newbury.
It was great to study ACCA alongside gaining practical experience in the workplace. I loved the fact that studying hard for the exams not only led to a good exam result but also meant you had much more knowledge to bring to the workplace.
Embracing challenges and opportunities
UHY Ross Brooke has always encouraged me to accept new challenges and to aim high. After obtaining a good grounding in accounts preparation, I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to undertake placements in the statutory, payroll and personal tax departments in Newbury during my training years. Attention to detail is one of my strengths and the firm made good use of this by providing opportunities to work on specialist assignments, such as charities and solicitors.
All in all, by the time I qualified as an accountant in 2004, I couldn’t have hoped for a better training experience to build solid foundations for the years ahead.
What I didn’t appreciate at the time was that this was only just the beginning of a much longer and even more fulfilling journey!
The post qualified years that followed saw my confidence grow whilst consolidating my general practice skills, building client relationships and undertaking interesting projects, including gaining experience in the further specialist area of trusts and estates.
It was really refreshing that all of this was happening alongside raising a young family. My part-time working was fully supported, I was made to feel like an integral part of the team and the opportunities were most definitely still there.
In 2017, I was delighted to be presented with the opportunity to join the board of directors and become a shareholder, something that, if I’m honest, I wasn’t sure I would do and certainly hadn’t envisaged doing whilst the children were still quite young! Once again UHY Ross Brooke was looking after my development, believing in me and taking me out of my comfort zone!
Looking forward
I left the Newbury office in November 2017 and joined forces with Mike Robins to take our Hungerford office forwards. That was seven years ago. I’m extremely proud of our supportive Hungerford team and look forward to the future and to continuing to grow and develop together, so that everyone can achieve their full potential.