How do you describe your job when you meet people at a party?
It depends on who I’m talking to. If it’s a scientist, I’ll explain what I do is science applied to the financial world. I take complex finance plans and then a build a plan whether it’s legislation, taxation, or the financial market. I tell other people that I’m a managing partner of a financial advisory company. I set up a boutique consultancy looking at financial planning. We help people with their finances to help them meet objectives in their life and are involved in all sorts of areas, including the environment and science
What is ‘cutting-edge’ about your work?
The knowledge and the strategic partners that we’ve got access to (science, financial markets, and legal) are all cutting-edge. We know all the top people and we’re called on to leverage all the top expertise.
Describe some of the highlights of your average day.
I plan out the week in terms of meetings, teleconferences, and web conferences. I keep at the development work, always looking for more target markets (i.e. sustainability, green areas). I publish articles online. A highlight is having complex data sets and being able to manipulate and dissect them (economic, scientific, and legislative data). You chop it up, dissect it, and then reconstruct it to present to people in a simple way. If a company wants to make their company “green” you go away and build them a plan. I like that I offer clients a simple bespoke service
Describe briefly how your career has progressed to date.
I did my post-doc with the aim to try and commercialise my science knowledge. After I did the academic thing I wanted to move into a more entrepreneurial business framework. People do great science and no one hears about it. I wanted people to hear about what I’m doing. I set up as a self-employed biotechnology consultant on Vancouver Island, Saanichton, in Canada. I learned how capital and intellectual property patents work, how to finance things and deliver a budget. I developed a business acumen sense, which is something that is lacking in academia. I finally made a jump into financial planning, which involved nonstop exams. But once you get to a certain level you can be quite unique
How is your job cross-disciplinary?
The good thing about science is that you’ve got translatable skills. You can structure portfolios to represent that. I can maximize tax breaks by having insight and throwing lots of information into one pot (high end tax planning, accountancy, legal) and working with the best partners in each field and clever technologies
What’s the most unexpected thing about your job?
The most unexpected thing is I’ve been asked to sit on various boards in non-executive positions for financial organizations in the US and UK. I’m also involved in a plan to create a biotechnology university that’s revered all across the world – a universal foundation for biotechnology based in the Midlands, with potentially an office in Canada. This has a high level of funding from the U.S. World Health Organization and the Mormon Church. We have forty inventions that we’re looking to bring into commercial practice. I’m helping them to see how they structure the company, what kind of investment returns they can expect, how they manage capital outflow, inflow, and other strategic and intellectual property issues. We’re also looking to develop social contracts and a charitable arm to the foundation.
What’s the biggest achievement of your career so far?
The biggest achievement has been getting chartered status across the board over a period of 12 years
