Staff News - 7 January 2008

Yet another accountant has joined us, the first of the New Year.  Lizzie Hall has joined us to broaden her experience, after qualifying with an Oxford firm.

Staff News - 14 December 2007

Another two accountants have joined us since the last update.  Susan Koffler is a Chartered Accountant living in Thame who had enjoyed a spell of several years in Local Government before returning to the profession and joining us on the 19th November.  Rachel Cooper is an Accounting Technician who has joined us to take her professional progression further and study to become a Chartered Accountant.  Rachel, who lives in Longwick, joined us on the 3rd December

Staff News - 11 October 2007

The summer has been busy here at Richardsons.  Seven new additions and two more exam successes - along with all the exciting new work - have kept us pretty busy.  Regular readers of the news page are overdue an update - so here it is!

Gemma King, an Oxford PPE graduate, joined us on 2 July.  Gemma has a great deal of experience and enthusiasm for helping the less fortunate, developed during her substantial volunteering stints. This, her time at Corpus Christi College, and a training contract with Richardsons, all provide some contrasting experience that will serve Gemma well in her future career.

Sarah Kennedy, as a graduate from Oxford Brookes in Law and Accounting, hit the ground running when she joined us on 13 August.  Her CV includes such items as Tae Kwon Do and an enthusiasm for tax (!) so there is perhaps a danger that we will start to feel some sympathy for the denizens of HM Revenue and Customs.  On the other hand...

Kat Johnston decided that training as a chartered accountant was preferable to going to university, and so joined us on 28 August.  Following in her father's footsteps can be taken too far, though, and therefore we are the fortunate beneficiaries of Kat's talents, rather than the local firm of which her dad is a partner!

Fresh from the London School of Economics, Meera Modi also joined us on 28 August.  A graduate in Accounting and Finance, she is also a keen traveller, cricketer, and practitioner of Indian Classical Dance.

Another Oxford Brookes graduate, James Halsall, has been lured away from the water - where he has rowed at international level - to join us on 17 September.  A graduate in Hospitality Business Management with Music, he enjoys writing and playing music, but hasn't completely given up on the wide variety of sporting activities in which he likes to compete.

The final newcomer joining us as a trainee Chartered Accountant is Jo Grant - although she was still Jo Lynch when  she applied for the job! Jo is an Edinburgh graduate in Physics with Meteorology, and had a few years with the Met Office before realising that a career change was called for.  She joined us on the 8 October. Her impressive mathematical and IT skills will prove a major asset to us,  but the great advantage is that we now have someone in-house that we can blame for the bad weather!

We are confident that all of these new colleagues will excel both academically and professionally, and will join the ranks of the qualified accountants in a short space of time.  We look forward to introducing them to you over the coming months.

Our Financial Services division has also added another name to help deal with the growth in activity.  Emma McNeill joined on 10 September to help with the administrative side of the business.  With a background in the building trade, initially she used her geological skills in site investigation before switching to the business, contracts and administrative side.  Gardens play a major part in her life, and she holds a General Certificate in Horticulture granted by the RHS.

Influence with the Institute - 10 July 2007

To add to her seat on the board here at Richardsons, on 10 July, Alison McDowell took up her seat on the Learning and Professional Development Board of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.  As one of a group of fifteen, she shares responsibility for steering the Institute's policy and practice on professional development for those under training contract and for qualified members meeting their responsibility for maintaining competence and skills.

This appointment was recommended as a consequence of the Institute's scrutiny of our learning and development procedures, support and mentoring for trainees, to which they expressed enthusiastic approval.  Alison's key contribution to our approach, and to those processes which implement it, has been justly rewarded by this prestigious appointment.