Back Row L-R: Jonathan Firth, Simon Gray and Simon Alsop, ICAEW. Front Row L-R: Andrew Clark and Sally Adams
Simon Gray, founding director of Career Codex
After starting his career as an accountant at KPMG, Simon Gray, FCA, spent more than 10 years working in the recruitment industry. In 2013, following the publication of his first book ‘Super Secrets of the Successful Jobseeker’, Gray set up Career Codex a company which offers training to jobseekers on how to take a different strategy to their job search and stand out from their peers.
At Career Codex he works in particular with mid-career and senior executives to help them navigate the job market. His latest book, ‘Super Secrets of Successful Executive Job Search’, was published in July 2015.
Alongside his work at Career Codex, Gray is a member of the ICAEW’s Business Committee and is President of the Nottingham, Derby & Lincoln Society of Chartered Accountants.
Sally Adams, Acting Chief Financial Officer at Electrocomponents Plc
Sally Adams joined global engineering parts distributor Electrocomponents Plc in 1996. Listed on the London Stock Exchange, Electrocomponents Plc has operations in 32 countries and an annual turnover of more than £1.2bn.
Over the past 20 years, Adams has held roles in the US and Asia, and moved inside and outside of the group’s finance function, for example, she has been involved in system implementations and led IT governance. She served as Head of UK Finance for four years, managing a team of 90, before moving to Head of Global Strategic Planning in 2012.
In 2015, she moved to her current role as Acting Chief Financial Officer. In this role Adams is responsible for the internal and external reporting of group performance, leads the budgeting and forecasting processes, as well as other financial statutory compliance areas.
Andrew Clark, Finance Director at Costa Enterprises
Andrew is Finance Director of Costa Enterprises, (part of Whitbread Group). He started his career at KPMG where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant and as a Corporate Treasurer. He spent a year in audit before moving to Corporate Restructuring where he spent five years advising banks who had invested in companies which were underperforming.
He left KPMG in 2005 to join the Group Finance Team at J Sainsbury's, before moving to Whitbread in 2006. He has held a number of senior Group and Divisional Finance roles since joining Whitbread, including Head of Treasury, Financial Controller (Costa) and Finance Director (Costa International).
Jonathan Firth, Managing Director Michael Page Finance
Jonathan Firth has 20 years’ recruitment experience in the UK, with the last 10 years at PageGroup. While the majority of his career has been in finance recruitment, his experience at PageGroup includes assisting with building their search business and running their legal recruitment business across the UK.
In his current role as Managing Director for Michael Page Finance, Firth heads a business of more than 100 consultants across eight offices focusing on the recruitment of qualified accountants into industry, the public sector and not-for-profit organisations and practice firms. In addition, Firth also runs Page Executive Finance, the search arm that recruits in excess of 60 Finance Directors a year.
Listen to the ICAEW Guide to Successful Job Search podcast series at icaew.com/careerpodcasts