As part of our business growth strategy, Scotch Partners are delighted to welcome Amanda Keightley-Pugh to the team as the new Business Operations Director. Amanda brings with her a wealth of knowledge and experience which will prove invaluable to our practice as it grows and develops. We caught up with Amanda to find out more about her and what she is looking forward to most in her new role.
Welcome to Scotch Partners Amanda. Can you tell us a little bit about your career to date?
I’ve been lucky to have a varied career. I lived in Paris for a couple of years after finishing A levels before returning to the UK and working in commercial property management. I then spent 8 years working for a global corporate event management agency on an automotive account, which involved a lot of diligent time management, juggling and hitting tight deadlines across multiple events running in parallel. After taking some time out to have a family, I joined a life sciences campus in Hertfordshire where I spent 7 years working as Commercial Operations Manager, responsible for negotiating contracts and tenant leasing agreements, day to day accounting, financial management of capital projects, HR and insurance. This led on to an opportunity to join a clinical stage biotechnology company located on the campus, where I’ve spent the last 3 years. I joined with a broad remit looking at legal, finance, HR, insurance and facilities. It became clear early on that the company was rapidly outgrowing their lab and office space, so I took on the role as Head of Facilities and my focus turned to defining a brief for a new facility, securing a location, commercial negotiation of the lease and identifying the correct design partners to deliver a mix of office space, collaborative breakout space, research labs and clean labs.
What attracted you to Scotch Partners?
I appointed Scotch Partners as the lead M&E design consultant for the lab and office design in my previous role. Over the past couple of years I’ve been fortunate to get to know several members of the team pretty well and have seen how they work together to deliver a project despite numerous changes and delays, whilst still maintaining energy, a positive attitude and a sense of fun. Definitely an environment and culture I wanted to be part of.
Can you tell us a little bit about your role at Scotch Partners?
I’ve come in on a strategic level to work with the Partners across core business activities, for example HR, finance, events, marketing, business development, employee training and development… this appealed to my ambition to return to a broader Business Ops role. This is a new position for Scotch Partners so over the coming weeks we will be defining priorities together.
What are you most looking forward to about your new role?
Scotch Partners is a busy place and I’m looking forward to taking some of the more operational pressures away from the Partners. This will enable them to focus on nurturing client relationships, pursuing new project opportunities, and continuing to successfully deliver projects.