Opportunity knocked…

It’s a little over a year since I took the opportunity to join AAB Consulting. It’s been a whirlwind of a year full of opportunities for me to grow in a number of ways and I wanted to share my reflections on some of these.

Firstly, I’ve had the opportunity to spend quality time with my son Calum, who arrived halfway through my first year with AAB. The whole business has been incredibly supportive and flexible about my having a young family (with another one under three!). Lesley in particular always seems to talk of my family as being an extension of the AAB family, which I really quite like. Of course, given zoom calls and home working with a two year old in the house, sometimes the family is more of a physical presence in the team than I might like!

I’ve been fortunate to have the opportunity to work in some great organisations before but I’ve never been so genuinely encouraged to be my whole self at work as I am at AAB.  Lesley and Mark help us all to be the best versions of ourselves and at the core of that is being yourself. The culture at AAB Consulting and across the AAB Group is one of authenticity and it’s great to have the opportunity help build and foster that culture.

Having enjoyed huge opportunities in my previous role, including working with the highest levels of UK government on Brexit, working to deliver significant transformation projects in the wider public sector, financial services and energy and utilities, I was keen to take that knowledge and experience to a different environment. One of the main reasons I moved to AAB was to join a business on an exciting journey of growth, and one in which I could play a key role in helping deliver that growth.

The opportunity AAB Consulting has identified and is pursuing is incredibly exciting, for example our new work supporting clients to adopt and adapt to Robotic Process Automation in Higher Education and other sectors. Being part of a team that is bringing on new clients, colleagues, propositions, operational processes and tools, all while maintaining core values and culture keeps me energised and hungry for more!

I was also keen to take the opportunity to accelerate my learning as a consultant at AAB. As a Change and Transformation Programme specialist, I have come to the right place – the learning curve is showing no signs of levelling out! I am learning a new sector, Higher Education, a new domain in Automation and I continue to learn an enormous amount from fantastic colleagues and clients on subjects from Business Cases to Service Design and Digital.

An opportunity I have been keen to seek out in recent years is learning more about and working on environmental and social impact. Recently, the business was kind enough to give me the opportunity to join the Scotland CanB programme, which is all about these important subjects (please do check it out). As part of that programme I had the opportunity to put our own business into the spotlight. It was hugely reassuring to identify the ways in which AAB Consulting and the AAB Group already care deeply about social impact in particular. There’s a moral compass to this organisation.

Similarly, I recently jumped at the opportunity to join the Anderson Anderson & Brown Charitable Initiative (AABIE) Board of Trustees. AABIE is the AAB Group’s platform to engage and support charities and organisations in our operating communities. AABIE raises funds and takes applications from a broad variety of charities and I have the pleasure of working through these applications with other Trustees to decide how funds are distributed to provide the biggest impact. This is food for the soul and I’m eating it up!

Perhaps the main reason for coming to AAB has been to have the opportunity to learn how to lead a business by working directly with Lesley and Mark. This has been a bit like winning The Apprentice and working with Lord Sugar… without the weird challenges, strange and incompetent people and the short grey-haired man at the top of the tree… although we do have Mark (and me for that matter!). In terms of my leadership journey, opportunity has knocked again as I join Entrepreneurial Scotland’s Resilient Leadership Programme from next week and I can’t wait.

I am incredibly grateful for the opportunities I have had so far, I’m looking forward to more that will come and I sincerely hope that I can pay it forward by offering similar opportunities and support to our team as I grow in my role as a leader of our growing business.

By Glenn Hogg, Managing Consultant.