People: Talos360; Kin + Carta; Hill Dickinson; Bridging Finance Solutions; H&H Land & Estates; Time Finance
Warrington-based Talos360, formerly 360 Resourcing, a provider of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) people technology, has announced two new executive appointments to its rapidly expanding team.
The strategic hires, which include the arrival of Sam Adjepong as chief financial officer and Dean McGlone as chief revenue officer, mark the start of an ambitious growth strategy for the business, with plans to increase staff by more than 40% and double annual recurring revenue by the end of the year.
Talos360 is already laying the groundwork to welcome aboard 41 additional new hires over the course of the next 12 months, signalling that it has no intention of slowing down following a successful 2021 which saw the business’s ARR increase by an impressive 73%.
Sam Adjepong brings a wealth of experience in rapidly growing companies, having held senior finance roles within Synexus, a private equity-backed international clinical trial site organisation, and most recently Accelerated Enrollment Solutions, the global patient recruitment division of PPD Inc, a US clinical research organisation.
Sam is a Chartered Accountant (ACA) under the ICAEW. He initially trained as an auditor and worked in the UK and Australia before moving out of public practice to take on senior group and operational finance roles within the oil and pharmaceutical sectors.
He said: “Talos360 is making exciting strides in the HR Tech space, with products that customers love and a great company culture.”
Dean McGlone joins from UK software brand, Advanced, where he held a number of senior sales leadership roles. Dean brings significant experience of leading technology sales teams across multiple channels and will be at the heart of driving the next phase of Talos360’s growth.
He said: “Talos360 is a very progressive company in a fast growing market backed by superior SaaS offerings that stand head and shoulders above the competition. During the last 12 months Talos360 has seen impressive sales growth achieving 73% ARR growth in 2021, yet there is still significant scope to accelerate this further.
“We will be developing the sales organisation to enable rapid scaling as well as and building a partner network where I see a huge amount of opportunity across multiple markets. I am looking forward to being a driving force in our continued success given the transformative opportunity technology offers in-house recruitment teams and the increasing strategic importance of employee engagement and candidate attraction across most sectors in the UK.”
Janette Martin, CEO at Talos360, said: “2022 will be a milestone year for Talos360 and these appointments demonstrate our ambition and commitment to achieving our objectives. These are substantial appointments that help us accelerate our growth pace, and help us achieve the business objectives, bringing more expertise to key areas such as our partnerships growth strategy whilst overall creating a strong financial platform for our future.”
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Global digital transformation consultancy Kin + Carta has announced two key appointments to bolster its leadership team.
Mark Collin has been appointed as managing director of experience and product, reporting to chief product officer for Europe, Lindsay Ratcliffe. Additionally, Robert Wadsworth joins as director of enterprise data, reporting to Karl Hampson, CTO data and AI.
Mark Collin
Both new hires will be based in Kin + Carta’s Manchester office, in the XYZ building, and bring a combined wealth of more than four decades’ experience.
Part of the European executive team, Collin will sit within the consultancy’s product office, building and solidifying Kin + Carta’s digital experience and product propositions – sustainable, human-centred, driven by data and underpinned by modern platforms and infrastructure.
He begins his tenure following a three-year stint at luxury fashion retail giant YOOX Net-a-Porter Group, where he held the position of global director of customer experience technology. Prior to this, he worked as group director-ventures for global tech consultancy Thoughtworks, and VP Europe for Silicon Valley-based software engineering company Infogain.
Wadsworth joins with a remit to challenge traditional enterprise approaches to data, bringing product thinking into the mix and delivering value through tangible user-centric data products. Prior to Kin + Carta, he spent nearly five years at Co-op, where he helped transform the businesses’s data capabilities as head of data platforms & engineering.
He also led the cloud modernisation of BBC’s TV platforms and BBC Three Online, enabling the broadcaster to create incredible experiences for big events like Glastonbury and the Olympics. He also headed up a portfolio of global product teams delivering innovative health care products into world famous hospitals such as Great Ormond Street over a 10-year period.
Robert Wadsworth
The hires come after a senior leadership shake-up last year, which rolled out a new go-to-market strategy, strengthening Kin + Carta’s position as a global digital transformation consultancy. This brought 1,700 specialists across four continents closer together, delivering end-to-end digital transformation services for some of the world’s leading businesses including Toyota, Unilever, the NHS and Tesco.
Collin said: “Having spent my most recent role at YOOX Net-a-Porter Group focusing solely on CX, I’m looking forward to applying that to Kin + Carta’s fast-growing estate. There’s a stellar client portfolio, both B2C and B2B, and I’ll be working closely with our global teams to deliver the most sustainable, valuable, measurable digital products possible.”
Wadsworth said: “I’ve been aware of Kin + Carta’s approach and capabilities for some time, given the agency has worked with Co-op on everything from TV campaigns to bespoke AR experiences and digital charity initiatives. As director of enterprise data, I’m looking to aid Kin + Carta in helping large organisations unlock the potential energy and value of data through the application of new approaches such as product thinking and computational data governance, atop modern data platforms.”
Ratcliffe welcomed the new hires, saying: “Both Mark and Robert have been at the top of their game within their respective client-side organisations for years now. Having them come aboard Kin + Carta is an absolute coup, bolstering our capabilities and helping our clients achieve the potential in experience, product and data that they are striving for.”
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Full service commercial law firm Hill Dickinson has welcomed three new partners to its UK offices in recent weeks as it gears up for a busy year ahead.
James Paton-Philip joins the firm’s London office as a corporate partner. He advises private and public listed companies on a wide range of domestic and international transactions, including capital raisings, both venture rounds and on the capital markets, M&A, joint ventures and reorganisations.
From left: Jessica Neary, James Paton-Philip, Peter Winnard
Jessica Neary joins the Manchester office as a partner in the health litigation team, bringing experience of managing a range of different types of clinical negligence actions on behalf of NHS Resolution and other health sector clients. She joins from Hempsons, where she progressed her legal career acting for a range of NHS trusts and general practitioners on high value, complex clinical negligence actions including those arising out of birth injury and spinal injury.
She will be working closely with the other health partners in Manchester to strengthen Hill Dickinson’s growing presence in the region.
Peter Winnard joins Hill Dickinson’s fast growing real estate team, also based in Manchester, specialising in all aspects of large scale development and regeneration projects for both the private and the public sectors.
As one of five founding partners of Nabarro, Manchester, which later merged with Cameron McKenna and Olswang to become CMS, he has long been recognised by the legal directories as a Leading Individual and brings particular expertise to the team in projects involving complex site assembly, joint ventures, development funding and investment.
Chief executive, Peter Jackson, said: “Hill Dickinson, like many law firms, has experienced a sustained increase in client instructions across the past two years, despite the pandemic. That, in turn, has created a need to boost capacity in our teams to protect the wellbeing and productivity of our people while continuing to offer the highest level of service to our clients.”
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Bridging Finance Solutions continues to grow and strengthen its national team with the appointment of a new HR manager and credit control assistant.
Gill Barker
Gill Barker and Faye Davin are the first new recruits of 2022 for the Wallasey-based specialist lending firm with several others announcements to be made in the coming year.
Gill has a strong background in recruitment, HR and health and safety, having worked for almost 20 years at The University of Liverpool’s Veterinary School at Leahurst as part of the HR department. With a vast experience of human resources, and with a keen interest in diversity and equality, Gill will support the implementation and management of a robust HR strategy.
She said: “BFS is a growing and ambitious company that is building its team as the operation develops. They’ve taken the important decision to focus on, and invest in, HR with the creation of my new role which reinforces their strong people-centric values. I really look forward to helping develop their HR function in-house, working with the brilliant team.”
Faye Davin
Credit control and accounts admin assistant, Faye, will be working as part of the finance team, supporting them in all financial aspects of the business. Having previously worked for Bibby Financial Services for the past decade in a similar role, Faye will provide much needed additional support in this particularly busy area of the business.
She said: “As BFS is growing, I hope that I can bring some of the attributes that I developed in past roles including excellent customer service skills and the ability to maintain good relationships for future deals with the clients, whilst being mindful of protecting and safeguarding the integrity of the business at the same time.”
Managing director, Steve Barber, said: “It’s great to have Gill and Faye on board. Faye is a much needed addition to the finance team whilst Gill will help us manage our workforce, improving and introducing procedures and processes that will help us operate more efficiently as we continue to grow.”
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To handle growing demand, H&H Land & Estates has recruited property specialist Paula Elliot to lead its residential lettings department.
Based in the head office in Carlisle, Paula will work across all seven offices in Cumbria and Durham. As lettings manager Paula will be responsible for driving the department forward, supporting customers, implementing new legislative and business initiatives, and reviewing and streamlining systems.
H&H Land & Estates has particular expertise in the lettings sector, recently extending its reach with the acquisition of Penrith-based Eden Lettings Management in the autumn of 2021. Last year the company experienced a huge surge in demand for property and the continuing buoyant market means there is a shortage of all types of residential property for people to rent.
Paula Elliot
From Newcastleton, Paula has spent most of her career working within the property sector in the North of England. Before joining H&H Land & Estates she worked as property manager for Hunters in Carlisle. Paula brings with her a great deal of experience in training and staff development, as well as a sound knowledge of the Borders and North of England property market.
She said: “I am really excited about joining such a dynamic and well respected company. With ever increasing legislation and health and safety requirements landlords really need to ensure that they are legally compliant, so expert advice is essential if mishaps are to be avoided.”
Managing more than 500 properties in Cumbria, H&H Land & Estates provides a bespoke offering, including safety checks, marketing, viewing and tenancy agreements and, if required, the whole management of the property. It has a well established client base across its offices in Carlisle, Cockermouth, Durham, Kendal, Keswick and Penrith.
Colin Tomlinson, managing director, welcomed Paula, saying: “Her expertise and enthusiasm shine through and will no doubt inspire her team. It is an exciting time for our company with record property sales last year. I am sure Paula will contribute enormously to our continued growth and development.”
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Time Finance, the specialist asset-based lender, has appointed Steve Nichols as director of asset finance. Steve’s appointment reflects the firm’s commitment to asset finance as a vital proposition within its portfolio of funding solutions to UK businesses, it said.
Steve assumes overall responsibility for the operation and performance of asset finance for the Manchester business and will become a member of the operating board. He succeeds Carol Roberts as part of a planned progression and the two will work alongside each other in the coming months to support Steve’s transition into the role.
He brings two decades of financial services experience to the role having built a credible career working in both relationship and business development roles with an increasing focus on the use of asset finance to support growth ambitions. Working with businesses turning over up to £50m his focus has been to help them to source the funding solution that is right for them. Steve joins Time Finance from Simply Asset Finance having held roles at Barclays, Santander, and Close Brothers.
Steve Nichols
He said: “The opportunity to join Time Finance was an exciting prospect. The business has undergone change in recent years as it repositions itself as a multi-asset funder and are building a strong reputation for delivering a commercially driven approach to funding.
“The asset finance market is recovering quickly as businesses invest in equipment to support growth initiatives. Time Finance are ambitious and have set themselves some challenging objectives which I am looking forward to helping them achieve.”
CEO, Ed Rimmer, said: “Steve is a great addition to the Time Finance leadership team and will carry on the great work that Carol has delivered over the last three years. He brings valuable experience which will support SME’s as they look to make the most of the growth opportunities expected in 2022.
“His experience will prove invaluable in guiding the future development of our asset finance offering as we look to strengthen our propositions and support to the business market as we drive forward our growth strategy.”
