“Being meticulous allows me to make sure that everyone is happy”

6.30am: Rise and shine
Most days, I wake up at 6.30 and get myself ready, along with my girls Mali and Nel. My husband’s working away from home at the moment, so if you include our British Bulldog Jac, I have three children to sort out! This means that I have to be on form immediately, making sure we’re out of the house and in the car on time to start our days.

Balancing family life with two young girls and a full time job that often requires me to be away from home on either a client visit or work event isn’t easy. I manage by being meticulous – it allows me to make sure that everyone is happy. I hate organised chaos, but if I plan, plan and plan again, we’re sorted.

8.00am: School run: Gladiators ready!
We get to the girls’ school just before 8am. It can feel a bit like doing the gauntlet on Gladiators by the time I get the girls to respective classes and nursery, make sure they’ve taken fruit boxes, PE kit and reading in with them, do my best to avoid over-chatty Mums and over-committing to anything for the school fete in June. I can even organise this meticulously…just!

Once I’ve run the gauntlet and got safely back to the car, I check my emails. Because I’m regularly out visiting clients, whether that’s a lawyer or a lay client, I spend a lot of time in the car and I am used to it being another office.

This morning, the Business Development team has sent over a new enquiry from a law firm in Leeds. One of the solicitors in the Personal Injury team has a client whose case has just settled and they are in need of financial advice. I make an initial call to the client directly and we set a date for a more in-depth meeting next week to discuss options, including the setting up of a Personal Injury Trust, as the client advised that they are on benefits and this will ensure their benefits entitlement is protected. I then let my colleagues in the office know, so they can keep paperwork up to date.

9.00am: Welcome to life on the road
I’ve been working in the car until now, so luckily I’ve missed the worst of the rush hour traffic – always a big relief. The start of my life on the road day sees me heading out from my home in Cardiff to Reading for meetings. Today I’m sitting down with a Deputy to review some client files together before we go and meet with a new client.

I’ll stop on the way to pick up some sandwiches as we both know time is precious so we’ll do an “al desko” lunch rather than anything more elaborate.

11.00am: A joyful audit and dreams of the Med
Today the Deputy and I are looking at four clients’ files before meeting with a new client. Each of the four clients we’re talking about have sustained catastrophic injuries as the result of various accidents, and they all have different circumstances and needs. Together we’re evaluating their current financial needs and ensuring these needs are still being met by their financial plan.

I’ve called it a joyful audit because both the Deputy and I derive so much satisfaction from these meetings, and we’ve established a great working relationship so it’s a pleasure to spend time working in tandem to meet each client’s needs. It’s so vital that a good financial adviser is one who makes sure their clients’ money is always working for them and that as a client’s needs change over time, the advice provided takes that into account. For example, one of the clients we’re discussing today is a young boy whose money will need to provide a solid income and in time we may need to consider investing in a property for him, however this would require substantial adaptations in order to meet his needs. Another is a lady in her mid-60s whose home was fully paid off before her accident. The differences are stark and it’s satisfying to be providing that unbiased advice that is designed around my clients’ needs.

We also catch up on holiday plans whilst we share our lunch; the Deputy is off to Ibiza in early June for a girls’ trip and I am extremely jealous!

1.30pm: Becoming a part of the team
Our new client lives in Reading, so the office is nearby and we make our way over to the client’s home for 1.30. Our client is a gentleman in his 30s, who has parents with him and I have been engaged by the family in order to support this gentleman’s financial needs following a successful Beauty Parade. At a first meeting like this, the goals are for my client and their family to start to get to know me and for me to learn what the client needs. It’s the start of a new relationship and I want them to view me as joining their team. I will be working to tailor my support to exactly what is needed so this meeting is vital for all of us.

I take copious notes, which I’ll take home with me to create finalised financial advice. I’ll then speak with the Deputy further, complete the advice and share it so that we can get this long-term relationship off to a great start. I’ve recently celebrated my 10-year anniversary with Frenkel Topping and some of my clients have been with me almost from day one. I highlight this to my new client, so I can emphasise how successful we can all be if we work together as a team.

3.30pm: Quick pit stop and gear change
After saying goodbye to the family and Deputy, I make a pitstop at the services to check my phone, get a coffee and leg stretch, and triage my emails. I can see that a solicitor I’ve sent a PPO report through to last night has received it and has commented on how useful he’s found it, which I’m really chuffed with as I’ve not worked with this solicitor before – financial advisers like positive feedback, just like anyone else!

Another solicitor I’ve worked with has been in touch with me to let me know a case of his I provided a Loss of Earnings report for is going to an approval hearing, and he needs a settlement approval report. I make a quick phone call to him, confirming I can turn the report round in a shorter timescale than usual as counsel’s diary is tight.

After making a few notes on the fly and blocking time in my diary to write this report, I get back on the road home to Cardiff.

6.00pm: On the home run
Luckily I manage to get back to school in time to collect the girls from after school club without having to make any frantic phone calls to see if someone can collect them because a meeting’s overran or a client call has taken a little longer or I’ve been stuck in traffic. I work very hard to create a sense of continuity for them; that’s what my sister and I grew up with and it’s been of huge benefit to both of us. My Mother went out to work and ran a business when I was younger and growing up so I’ve been used to seeing that nothing comes without hard work and that you can be whatever you want to be. It’s important to me that my girls grow up with the same ethic I did and know that they can choose their own path.

Spending this time with them is so important to me and I love to hear about their days whilst I’m having dinner with them. I get them ready for bed, which does not go smoothly because they both want to stay up late, but we manage in the end.

8.00pm: Final push of the day
The girls are now in bed, their fruit boxes and bags are organised for tomorrow, along with their uniforms laid out, so that we avoid any unnecessary panics in the morning, and I’ve cracked open my laptop to send a few final emails and finish some tasks off before I wind down for the night. It’s a cliché to say no two days are the same in our job role; we can be fully out on the road with clients, at home powering through reports and more often than not, all of the above.

This week I’m on the road quite a lot; I need to prepare for an overnight stay in Manchester tomorrow in order to attend our Deputy Day the following day, and I’m then going to London to meet a couple of clients at the back end of the week, so taking time to get on top of things now will serve me well for the rest of the week. At some point, I’ll put my feet up with a cuppa and catch up a bit of TV to switch off and escape reality for an hour or so before I go to bed. My current watch is Mobland with Tom Hardy; the sort of organised chaos I can just about embrace!