00:00 - Jess White (Host)

So welcome to the Networking Spark, Kirsty. Thanks so much for being with us today. It's my pleasure, awesome. So Kirsty Parker is a transformational business coach. She's got over 30 years of experience of helping businesses grow. She's an award-winning book author, and really excited to dive deep into what makes Kirsty tick today. So, hey, Kirsty, what drew you into what you do today? So, you are obviously an author, a business coach, and an investor. What's your journey been?

00:39 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

My journey started off as somebody who did a management course with Marks and Spencer, so I was lucky enough to get on one of the 12 places going and I learned loads about business and thought this is the right thing to do after my chemistry. So, I ended up working for some of the biggest companies in the world, like Gillette and Boots. I worked for Coca-Cola, Adecco, and I really carved my teeth in being an operator who was used to making businesses work much more successfully, so I loved doing that. And then I decided to reward myself with an MBA, and after that, I went on to do exactly the same, but in healthcare instead. So I used to work with lots of small furry things, because I was a chief operating officer for a number of different veterinary companies which I again I transformed so that they grew really well and had one of them had an incredibly successful sale.

01:41 - Jess White (Host)

Fantastic, do you? Do you find it quite rewarding seeing businesses that you're helping grow?

01:48 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Oh, absolutely. I think there's so many businesses out there that are nearly doing it right, but not quite, and I'm able to go in there and help them take a step back. Generally, I find that the answers are already there in the company, but they are getting lost in the weeds. So what they really need to do is to have somebody there to come in and pick out the best bits and have a really good, clear plan and some well-thought-out targets, because if you set a goal, you'll achieve it, but if you're not clear on what you want, you're never going to get there.

02:21 - Jess White (Host)

And do you think that many business owners are stuck in the day-to-day tasks, working in their business rather than on their business?

02:28 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

That's absolutely right, Jess, and that's one of the biggest challenges that people have when they finally want to reap the benefits of all that hard work that they put into their own business.

02:39

By selling it because their business needs them so much, it actually reduces the value of that business and it makes it more difficult to sell. So, um, I, I coach and I mentor a lot of ceos, um, cfos and directors of businesses that have just got lost in the weeds and they just need somebody to reassure them, to help them to think through what's the most important thing for their company and to be very clear on what they want to achieve so that we can create a plan that comes from them on how, how to deliver that. And ultimately, that depends that varies in every single company and it depends on the motivations of that individual. Do they want to have a company that's award winning? Do they want to have a company that's doing something that's really good socially and has some good social impact? Or do they want to make loads of money? And I love working with them in any of those categories.

03:42 - Jess White (Host)

Do you think it's a good time at the moment for businesses to sell?

03:46 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Absolutely. I think it's really interesting. We have 5.5 million small and medium-sized businesses in the UK and they actually represent 90% of the workforce, so it's the most significant part of that. But interestingly enough, over 50% of those 5.5 million businesses are owned by people who are 55 or over. So I don't know about you, but I think that it's a really good time to think about. Even if it's not retiring, changing gear and selling your business that you've worked on for so many years for a good sum of money allows you to then go on and achieve some of your other dreams, be that sailing off into the sunset, buying a holiday home, putting your kids through college or your grandkids, or whether it's to be able to go and do something socially good or become an investor like I'm, like one of my many hats I wear, so that's a really useful thing. Half of the businesses are now likely to be up for sale in the next five or ten years because people want to do something different with their lives and move on to the next stage.

04:56

However, the Labour government is also giving lots of incentives at the moment for this, because they have a massive hole in their balance sheet and they need to make it up, and it's likely in the budget in October and again in April that we will see some significant changes to those people who have wider shoulders, so those that can afford to support the rest of the company country sorry, so that will be people, for example their business.

05:24

So for those of you who don't know, there's currently a massive benefit called BADA, which is Business Asset Disposal Relief. This means, instead of paying full tax on money that you make from selling your business, for the first million pounds of profit you make, you only pay 10 percent. It is very likely that in order to fill some of that hole in the budget, that the new government will remove at least some of that benefit, either in October, but more likely in April 25. There's also a likelihood that the capital gains tax, the CAGR, will increase from its current 24.8% level to hit the same as whatever your tax bracket is, for earnings. Those two are both signalled to start happening in April. So I would say, if you're even contemplating selling your business, you can't really find a better time than in the next few months get the, get the rockets going.

06:31 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, have you noticed an increase in people selling their businesses?

06:35 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

yeah, without a doubt.

06:37

Um, and unfortunately, I've also seen an increase in the number of insolvencies, and we've all we've seen in the number of insolvencies and we've seen in the last quarter that we've had more insolvencies in that quarter than before the financial crash in 2008.

06:53

What do you think is the cause of those? I think people are not reaching out for help and they are struggling at the moment because the economy is not so good, so people aren't spending as much money, which is having an impact on their customers and their sales. And it's also because many people took out massive, big loans during Covid and they're now in the opportunity to have to pay that back. So these financial pressures are really pushing on businesses and unfortunately, we've had thousands falling into insolvency. It doesn't have to happen, and I work with a lot of businesses that are on the edge of that and we find a way to restructure the finances and create a business development plan which will bring them back into the black so that they don't have to see the 30 years that they put into the businesses going up in smoke, but there's a recovery in place so they we can work together a couple years and then be in a position where they actually get a nice reward for that company that thought they were going to lose.

07:56 - Jess White (Host)

So that's actually really wonderful work that you're doing there, because you're almost rescuing people that are, you know, know, in many regards could fail, and then you're helping them and they're getting a reward from that. You're wearing a lot of hats, as you've said.

08:13 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Yeah.

08:14 - Jess White (Host)

So you're an investor, an author, a coach, working with a lot of businesses. How many businesses at the moment are you working with?

08:21 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I've got about 10 businesses that I'm working with at the moment.

08:32 - Jess White (Host)

So how on earth do you manage your time and your head?

08:34 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I am a very curious soul and I like to. My fiance jokes with me about it because he says I need to know everything, about everything. And indeed I've been invited. I'm delighted I've been invited along to do a TEDx talk in St Albans in October, which is fantastic.

08:55

Congratulations, which is all about curiosity, so I'm eager to find out as much as I can about things and to actually make a difference. So business is actually quite straightforward and most people come across it when they over complicate it. So I have certain processes that I put in place when I'm working with businesses that they can follow as a step-by-step process and they do the work themselves. It's not me doing the work, I'm just there as a guide. I'm there navigating the way forward, giving them some information and advice. But generally I've found over the years that the problems I discover in one company are very similar to the ones I find in many other companies. So in fact, working with more than one business at the same time makes a lot more sense because you can share the lessons as you go with other companies. So something that's something that we're turning around in one business you can find that that same principle can be implied in another business.

10:03 - Jess White (Host)

interesting okay, and they're a huge variety because they're all different. Aren't they very, very different businesses, right?

10:10 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I help out from anything from health care to pets. I also help with social social justice companies and charities, so it's a very full range. Do you feel like you're living your purpose?

10:27

I think there's always more that you can do, and I strive to be able to help as many people as possible because that gives me fulfilment, and I've been lucky enough to be in the stage where I've spent the last 20 years running big companies and I'm now able to go and help the smaller businesses that don't get the same amount of support wonderful tell us a little bit about your books.

10:54 - Jess White (Host)

Kirsty, you are an award-winning book author and last time I spoke to you, you'd you'd authored four books and then it went up to six and then, all of a sudden, we just had a chat before and it's now 10 like where do you find the time, um, and tell us a little bit about the books?

11:12 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Okay, um, I've always thought that I had a book in me and it's addictive, I have to say.

11:20

If you want to go and write a book, stop and think about it because you'll find you will enjoy the process so much you'll just want to carry on doing it. So I was very keen when it came into. I had resigned from my job because my dad had recently died when we went into, when we went into lockdown, so it was a perfect opportunity to do something completely different and I thought you know what? What have I spent my whole career doing? And that's helping businesses start, grow, buy and sell, and I thought I would love to write a book about one of those. So I thought what? What's the most significant one I can hit? And that was about helping people sell their business.

12:08

The reason for that is, over the years I've been part of buying over 70 businesses and one thing that I've found because my focus has been on integrating those businesses into a group and a buy and build has been that those people who've sold their businesses feel somewhat bereft.

12:30

They're unhappy, they're not clear on what was required and they don't feel that they've got what they wanted out of that sale. That's generally because they're not prepared. So I thought how can I make the most impact using the skills and knowledge and experience I have? And I thought that's actually for the people who are selling their business. I always say that when you sell your business, it's like sending your five-year-old, who's just done a whip for the swimming pool, to the Olympics. You're there selling one business one time and you're up against people who have bought hundreds of businesses. So I'm here to level that playing field and actually be able to help and represent people and give them the knowledge and skills so that they know that they can sell their business at the right time for the right price do you think?

13:25 - Jess White (Host)

There's quite a few sharks out there and if you're not careful and you don't have that guidance and advice, then you don't know what's going to happen. Somebody could I don't know you tell me.

13:37 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I think from having my buyer's hat on, I know that there's been hundreds of opportunities to buy businesses at a lot less value than they should really deserve, and that's because people don't get the right guidance. Also, they often go to brokers and brokers. Only 20 of the companies that are listed with brokers generally sell. There are some really good brokers out there whose rates are really high, and you should try and find those if you're wanting to work with the broker. But the brokers take a good percentage of whatever that transaction fee is, as well as having a significant chunk of money just to list the business.

14:21 - Jess White (Host)

So I'm trying to help people to understand the whole process so they can go in with their eyes wide open and and find the right buyer who's going to do the right thing to their business so, would you say, the difference between somebody working with you and a broker is that you would give them so much more support, guidance, help, learning, whereas they go to a broker and they would just take a fee and sell, or maybe not sell, the business for them I think, um, every broker is different and I don't want to say anything bad about brokers because there are some really good ones out there, but generally, um, the business model for brokers is that they get a fee to list a business for sale and then they get a fee, like a state agents would, when they sell the house.

15:09 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

So if they can list 1,000 businesses for sale, that fee is so high that if they only sell 20% of the businesses, they've still got a really good income stream coming in. So the model is wrong with a lot of the brokers and, I think, with myself and other people who are helping people to sell their business. If you come to me tomorrow and say I'm wanting to sell my business, I'll have a good look at it with you. It doesn't take very long, a few hours and I'll say that's great, but your business? I do a free valuation and a 20-page report and this gives you a realistic picture of what your business is worth.

15:54

Now I've worked with hundreds of SME owners and I ask them how much they think their business is worth and generally I get £1 million. That seems to be the answer most of the time. Unfortunately, that's not actually the fact. Very often I come to businesses and I'll value them and they'll only be worth three or four hundred thousand pounds. So I want people to have a really, really realistic idea of how much their company's worth.

16:23

But also, why sell for three or four hundred thousand pounds when we can work together and very, very simply increase the sales profit and the attractiveness of your business so that you can hit a million pounds? So I'm currently working with a couple of people who have a business which is probably worth about three million and they've figured out that they want a business that's worth nine million. So I'm working with them to put a plan in place so that we can increase the value of that business to nine million um so that they can sell it and do everything that they want um to do with that money which is a much better plan than just selling it for what they didn't want to sell it for right in the first place.

17:09 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, so have you, if you can some. I know it's a big, complicated process of valuing and you know working within the business, but could you, in a nutshell, give a few top tips for an entrepreneur thinking about their exit plan and wanting to get their business in the perfect state ready to sell?

17:29 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Yeah, um, as I say it's, it's not rocket science, it's very, very straightforward, but it's having um the right structure and plan and um, if required, having the support and the navigation through that. So I have a um, a, a business, which is a community that brings together lots of people who are looking to sell their business, which is called the Sales Success Circle. It's a membership site and it gives you all of the tools that you need to be able to prepare your business and be really clear on what you want to do. We use a scale system. It's a methodology that I've developed over the last 30 years. So the S is for strategic and review, so it's actually saying where are you now and where do you want to be. So we're really clear on what that is.

18:24

The next one is um. The c4 is um creating an action plan, um and that's really about saying let's tackle each area of your business, from sales marketing through to your operations, through to your people, and let's be really clear and your finances, of course. Um really clear on what you want to get um. The next one, a, is for adding value. So I work with these people to help them to make sure that action plan is delivered.

18:55

And then the l is for leveraging value. So what more can we do then to really polish it, to really get to that valuation that individual wants, and that might be things like recurring revenue streams, making sure that the finances are really in a good place and making sure that the growth plans have been delivered. And, finally, it's elevating the exit. So it's only right at the very end. The e is for elevating the exit and that's making sure that you know how to sell your business and how to find the right buyer for it and how to basically get the value that you deserve for that business. What an incredible answer, nicely structured.

19:37 - Jess White (Host)

I really love that and I'm not surprised. You've written books um, and I'm reading one myself to grow your business, baby. It's um, it's super good, love it um so yeah, uh, if you were to like if somebody's running a business right now, okay, they're not, they're not yet there in terms of an exit plan. How important do you think that business networking is for business owners in terms of growth?

20:07 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I think that, uh, it doesn't matter whether you're wanting to sell your business or not. Networking is absolutely essential and it's always been a massive benefit to myself. So I started. I started early on. I was actually at university and I started going to networking meetings. I got into a local business group when I was a student as a student member and I spent time there.

20:33

Um, I was doing a thin sandwich course, so I was able to get six month placements at a number of places of course um, it's a degree course where you work six months and you uh study six months and you do that three times and then you do your final year okay so being in those networking groups at uni got me the very best placements, which were paid, and it meant that I finished a four-year degree course with zero debt, which is quite unusual, yes.

21:03

So I constantly followed that up through various networking groups as I went through my career. But the best one that I had, which made a difference in the middle of my career, is I did my MBA at Henley Business School and I've got the most amazing network from Henley Business School and from there I've got jobs. I've got loads of other people jobs. I've got loads of people um sales contacts and um I've also helped people to buy and buy and sell their businesses and grow the business. Um. We've got a network of a few thousand people, but we've got a couple of hundred that are quite active and it really makes the difference.

21:46

Um, lately I have got much more into networking with people of high net worth. Um, I am an investor myself and I was delighted to be invited along to become part of the henley business angels, which is a group of people who have successfully sold their companies and got a lot of money. So we act as dragons and we look at every quarter. We look at about 40 or 50 different businesses and look at helping them to find investment. But that's a fabulous network and I find that the businesses I'm working with I've been able to get investment from them from that network Fantastic.

22:29 - Jess White (Host)

Does that make the saying your network is your net worth come true?

22:36 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Absolutely, absolutely. If you don't currently network, I really recommend that you do. It's about finding something that's right at the particular stage. But I always say aim a little bit higher. So I know full well that my angel network has got people in it with loads more net worth than I've got.

22:55 - Jess White (Host)

But it's always best to be down there and aim high, surround yourself with the people that inspire you and people that are just one step above you and that will help you with your growth right.

23:07 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Yes, absolutely.

23:08 - Jess White (Host)

Yes, Okay. So you were talking just a moment ago about business owners being stuck in the weeds often. So what's your? You know, if you come across a business owner who is really stuck, because often people running businesses, they've got so many different, you know jobs to do and pressure upon them and they can feel, sometimes feel stuck or perhaps even burnt out, what would your advice be to them? Take a holiday.

23:39 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

And I say that very flippantly, but you never. You can never see what's going on in your own business until you step away from it, and it's a very painful and difficult thing to do for any business owner who's been used to being there 24 7. But if you realistically want to make a change in your business, you have to stay away from it long enough to see how it manages without you. So that would be the first, first stage.

24:07 - Jess White (Host)

That's incredible advice and that's something I also think is super important. Even if it's just for a couple of days sometimes, even if you can't do a week or two just going somewhere else, away from your day-to-day life, it just it can just open up your mind and just give you a different perspective.

24:24 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I love that advice. I'm trying that with a couple of my mentees at the moment and one is away on holiday and, um, he agreed that he wasn't going to have any contact with work. So I sent him a couple of emails and got a response because I was just testing him. Good work, um. So that's the other thing. But the other thing, um that a lot of business owners forget is how good their team is around them, and it's because of them that the team is so good, but they forget to give them their credit and see how much they could potentially do.

24:57

So, um, I always like to um help business owners to go and spend some time with their team, and I run sessions with the whole team which is looking at strategic options, and it's dynamite. I mean, I work in transforming businesses and most of the answers well, at least half of the answers to that business transformation come from the team rather than from me. Business transformation comes from the team rather than from me. Um, it's just, uh, having the time to step back and ask those people and put it into a structured plan, um, so that people know what's happening and know why, and then it's amazing the magic that can happen yeah, I think.

25:39 - Jess White (Host)

Personally, I think building a good team is a real stepping stone when you're starting and growing a business, and that can be the difference between success and failure of a business is finding and growing a good team. Would you say so?

25:57 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

No, I'd absolutely say that, absolutely say that, and I think people business owners are so busy and focused on doing everything that they don't have the time to stop and realise that and unfortunately, it often leads to them losing people who would be dynamite for them in their growth.

26:29 - Jess White (Host)

So, Kirsty, you are a powerhouse of a woman. You've got um, so much experience, so much knowledge. Um, do you feel like you have aspired to do everything you want to do, or is there a lot more that you would like to do? Do you have, it's a horrible phrase, but do you have a bucket list?

26:46 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I actually do have a bucket list, and I created it when I was 25 and it's called my list of big, hairy, audacious goals. So that includes owning 10 properties, and I'm not quite there, but I'm nearly there.

27:03 - Jess White (Host)

That includes owning my own businesses, which I've done, and that includes sailing around the world, which I've also done there are because you have your own boat right, which is incredible, and you can write your books on the boat.

27:19 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I did find my first book, How to Sell Your Baby was written when I was. That's wrong okay, amazon made me change the name. My publisher was happy with it. But amazon didn't like my second book, which was How to Buy Someone's Baby. So I have added the pretext of business. So it's Know How, not How To. So it's now how to sell your business baby.

27:47 - Jess White (Host)

It's a good word, though, because people do. I'm going off track here, but people do treat their businesses. It's like their baby, and that's when you're saying they can't step back. Often people are like that with children as they're growing up. They don't allow them the freedom to grow up, and they're a bit like that with children as they're growing up. They don't allow them the freedom to grow up, and they're a bit like that with businesses as well.

28:07 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

But, yes, your business is a luck of a child and it's very difficult to cut the apron strings, totally without a doubt. So, yes, I did. I wrote that when I was getting a bit bored, because it was three and a half weeks across the Atlantic and it was only the storms that kept me interested. Um, so, um, yes, I have lots of other um things on my bucket list, on my list of b-hags, um, and one of them is, uh, to get married, which I'm doing for the first time next year.

28:37

Congratulations, that's amazing um and the other one, one which I haven't done yet is to own my own island, wow. But many of the other things that I've achieved in my career in terms of being chief operating officer on the C-suite for big companies, I've done that, but that was only because I set a goal to do it. My writing of my books. Yeah, I did one, and now I'm so excited about it I've just finished my 10th book, um, but um, that's. That's because I think that I've got a lot of information to share and most books are written in a way that makes it over complicated. Mine are just simple, straightforward. It's just easy to implement plans and um, that's um. That's why I wanted to share it. So, set your goals, um.

29:29 - Jess White (Host)

The bucket list is even more aspirational um, when we're talking about an island, are we talking about an island in Scotland or in the Caribbean, or Croatia? Hopefully not in scotland. I did nothing wrong with scottish.

29:45 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

I looked at an island in Scotland that was up for sale four years ago and I was quite serious about that because it looked amazing as a retreat, but obviously only probably for six months of the year.

29:57

Um, and I do a lot of yacht racing in the Caribbean and so I'm often going around Ireland thinking, oh but I wonder if that one's for sale. But um, is that how depends on where you are in the world and how big the island is. They're out of my reach at the moment in terms of um, what, what I want, where I want to buy and what type of island I want to buy. So I think I'm going to have to keep on working for quite a while and buy and sell a few more businesses.

30:23 - Jess White (Host)

It's a great goal to have, though I love that so much. Oh, wow. So you're doing so many things and you have done so many things. What's been your most favourite sort of role in what you do as your work? Is it what you're doing at the moment? What's you know?

30:44 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

um, what I like um is the biggest challenge I can um have, so I can't pinpoint it at one particular thing. But um, my current challenge is to help as many people as possible not get ripped off when they sell their business and to sell it at the right time to really get the value out of it. So that's my big challenge at the moment. But I've had loads during my career and um, I remember um one funny was I was um, I'd started, uh, I had my first um operations director role, um with a deco big um big multinational company and for recruitment and h HR outsourcing. And on day three my boss came up and said, oh, can you go to Switzerland tomorrow Because we want you to do a presentation. And I'm like, okay, that's my day four, what am I presenting on? And he goes it's just three slides, no problem, here are the people you want to put together. But you're talking about recruitment and I'm fine. So I researched all the information, hardly slept that night and I got my three slides done and I was happy. I flew over to Switzerland, walked into this huge boardroom which was full of somebody from every country in Europe, and they said, right, could you give your three slides. My three slides, which should have taken 10 minutes to present, actually took an hour because I had so many questions and I was fielding questions on day four about recruitment.

32:14

During the break, the organiser came up and said actually, we are changing the way that we do recruitment in Europe, so everyone here wants to know how you do it in the uk. Can you run a training session this afternoon, um, on how to do it? And um, so I said, of course I can. Um, I subsequently went outside and um, uh, blasphemed rather a lot to my boss, who thought it was very funny, and um, I got all the information that I'd got and put it together. It's quite straightforward anyway, but, um, I loved it because I was under so much pressure and I had, I created, uh, over the lunchtime, a training format for the afternoon. Um, I thought this couldn't get much worse and, as I stood up in front of these 23 people and then the creaking boardroom door opened and it was the global CEO and he came in because he wanted to find out what we did in the UK.

33:12 - Jess White (Host)

So he sat there the whole time at the front, just in front of me, just to add on a little bit more, but luckily you thrive in it.

33:19 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

But ultimately, if you put yourself under pressure, you set your targets. I was very clear it was a short term target. I had to get through this and I had to do the best I could to represent my country in this international forum. For my business it's amazing what doors it opens week from being ops director in the uk to being a sales success director for the whole of europe because the ceo had seen me and I'd had the opportunity. So it's amazing what you could do if you challenge yourself incredible.

33:53 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, very true, very true. Have you ever done that? And it's kind of gone wrong oh, loads of times, yeah yeah, and is there anything you wish that you hadn't done? Just because it was so horrendously hard, I think? I mean, we all make mistakes.

34:09 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

Yes, I've had lots of mistakes and challenges in my business career. Uh, I I had an amazing dream job at a big multinational company in a senior operations role, and I didn't agree with the way that they were treating people who they bought businesses from, and I proposed a completely different way of doing it so that people integrating into this huge business would feel happy, content and they'd stay there and they deliver more for for this business. Um, they didn't agree with me and they thought it was all about uh, fulfilling the dreams of the uh venture capital company, um and uh cookie cutter. So, um, I ended up leaving as a consequence because it just didn't feel right and it pushed against my values. And, unfortunately, I've seen that so many people leave the business because they weren't thought about. I think you've got to keep a really clear business head on in terms of what you want to achieve for your business and what you want to achieve financially, but please do it thinking about the people.

35:25 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally agree. And is that? There's that, I suppose, when you're in that world kind of that corporate world that's, you know, that's where things often, yeah, become more about profit than people, yes, and it doesn't have to be that.

35:37 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

There's some amazing corporates out there that are very, very values led and they make sure, um, that they uh fulfil that and, um, I work, um, I worked as an obstructor for another business that did exactly that on a very, very difficult government contract, and I'll always admire them for that may I ask you do you prefer working with entrepreneurs or corporate, big corporates?

36:02

I think, um, I enjoy working with both um. Taking on a corporate and getting them to change the way of thinking is a much bigger challenge, so I do enjoy that. But the um, fun and excitement and speed of working with an entrepreneurial team is brilliant, um and um. So my last last, particularly in the last five years I've been working with what were SME healthcare companies, and one is now a unicorn, and that speed of change in movement was just so exciting.

36:40 - Jess White (Host)

I bet, I bet. Um, starting to wrap up now, but what would you say about work life balance? Do you believe that there should be a work-life balance, or do you believe that if you love your work, then it kind of melts into your life and therefore it's okay? What's your strategy?

36:57 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

um, I'm uh, I probably say that I take over my take from my dad, dad that I like being a workaholic. However, it's taken me. I suppose in my 30s I started to realise the importance of being able to balance things. So, rather than spend five days working really, really hard and two days off, I tend to group it up a little bit more and I'll set my sights on a challenge and work at it non-stop for as long as it takes and then take two or three months off.

37:33

Um, I reward it. I reward myself. I rewarded myself of 18 months doing it at my mba, which was travelling all over the world doing that, and I rewarded myself with three months in Australia doing the Sydney Hobart race after I'd had a really successful contract. So balance is ever so important because you have to find fulfilment in life. But family and friends are really important to me and it's only when I've become older that I've stopped and given enough time for that. It's such an important thing because the people you love the most are often aren't there as long as you think they'll be.

38:09 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, life goes quickly, doesn't it? And yeah, I think that's a good note to end on. Really Life goes quickly, right?

38:19 - Kirsty Parker (Guest)

So, Kirsty, thanks, you've been amazing, you are amazing, you're an incredible inspiration, so thank you so much for being on the podcast thanks so much for inviting me, jess, and all I can say to you lot is get out there networking, because it makes a massive difference. Yes, I agree, thank you.