“Be the change that you wish to see in the world.”
“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
“Growth is painful. Change is painful. But nothing is as painful as staying stuck somewhere you do not belong.”
Those quotes pretty much sum up how my thoughts around change have developed over the past couple of decades of being in business.
I’ve made some big changes in my life.
Left home at 17.
Moved to the other side of the world in 2011.
Committed to a large commercial lease in 2015.
None of those decisions felt comfortable at the time. Change is inevitable, and it can be scary. And I’ve learned that understanding the purpose of change is half the battle.
For a long time, I wanted to make a difference in the world. What that actually meant took a while to figure out. I spent years getting to know myself better. My values. My strengths. My motivations. To help me start to understand what kind of difference I was really trying to make.
Somewhere during that process, I also realised the importance of being in the right room.
Long story short, (and anyone who knows me well will agree I am not very good at telling a short story) I realised that in order not to stay stuck somewhere I did not belong, I needed to be much clearer in telling people who I am and what I do.
That realisation led me here.
A new way of saying what I do
I’ve been spending some time finding new words for what I do, and how I work with people.
Not because the work itself has changed dramatically, but because the words I was using didn’t feel or sound like me anymore. They didn’t reflect my values, or the kind of change I want to support, or the people I most want to work alongside.
So this is me introducing a new way of saying things. A way that feels more honest, more human, and much closer to how I actually show up at work.
The values underneath it all
There are a few key words that have shaped this updated version of the business. They have always been there, even when I couldn’t name them so clearly. Part of this process was finding these words to help remind myself of what’s really important to me.
Compassion.
Equity.
Perspective.
Creativity.
Self-reflection.
Curiosity.
Flexibility.
Clarity.
They aren’t shiny words to put up on a wall. They are practical. They show up in how I listen, how I ask questions, and how I support people to work through what is really going on in their business.
Compassion and equity matter because everyone’s context and where they started from is different. Perspective and curiosity help us look beyond what might seem like the obvious problem. Creativity and flexibility make room for solutions that actually fit each person’s life and goals. And self-reflection sits quietly underneath everything, because real change can’t happen without it.
Clarity is probably the outcome I care about most. Not clarity that pushes people towards more, but clarity that helps them recognise what is enough, right now.
A space without judgement
When you land on my new Home page, you’ll notice an invitation.
An invitation into a space where there’s no judgement. Where you don’t need to have everything worked out before you arrive. Where you can talk honestly about the real stuff that is happening in your business, especially the parts you are struggling with.
Running a business can be lonely. Many people feel they need to hold it all together on the outside, even when things feel messy or uncertain on the inside.
Here, you don’t need to perform or compete. You are welcome as you are.
I’ve been there too
Trust matters to me. And for me, that comes from being very open about where and how I’ve gained my knowledge and experience. I’ve been running a small business for over twenty years. I’ve also worked in the corporate world across very different environments, from waste management businesses to coffee companies, to interior design. And I saw many similar patterns amongst the different industries.
Along the way, I’ve learned from leaders, peers, and team members. I have seen what works, and what really doesn’t, when it comes to service, leadership, and collaboration.
I’ve always looked for ways to support people that fit with my values. This work was never about growth at all cost. For some people, growth might be the goal. For others, they might be looking for stability or sustainability – or simply working out what is enough at this stage of life.
It’s never about competition. It’s about collaboration, consistency, and clarity. And yes, I clearly love a bit of alliteration.
When the brand stopped fitting
After closing the flexible workspaces post-Covid, I began to realise something important.
My brand no longer reflected who I am.
It served its purpose, and brought together a wide range of business professionals into a shared space. But in trying to cater to so many different people, I had hidden parts of myself.
I am introverted, neurodivergent, and deeply creative. These are things I didn’t recognise or talk about for a very long time. Once I was aware, it became obvious that something had to change – if I wanted to be found or seen by the people I most wanted to help and connect with, I needed to show up more authentically.
So the branding shifted. Away from the more corporate, brightly-coloured collaborative pieces forming a circle, and into a creative, subtle, hand-drawn flower. Connected petals meeting in the middle, with messy, untamed tendrils heading off in all directions.
That felt more like me – giving me permission to be myself.
Finding my voice again
Around the same time, I started working with an incredible writing coach I found on LinkedIn.
A random, well-written comment on a shared connection’s post led me to her profile, where I discovered, with some surprise and amusement, a fellow Scot living in New Zealand, with a deep love of words and a real talent for helping people find their own voice in a growing sea of AI-generated content.
I connected with her to help me rediscover mine.
Very quickly, it became clear that while my new logo felt alive and expressive, the words on my website were not aligned. The descriptions of what I do, why I do it, and the passion I have for supporting the people I work with, were not visible .
I’ll be honest – I spent most of that year insisting I didn’t want any extra visibility, because I’d absolutely no capacity for more work.
As she gently and consistently pulled on that loose thread of my persistence over our sessions, she unwound my ‘cardigan of delusion’ and helped me realise I was really just avoiding speaking up about what I want to see change in the world.
That was a bit of a turning point.
When the words finally caught up
My blogs started to sound more like me, with my values and beliefs showing up more clearly in my writing.
And suddenly, the gap became obvious. My articles felt so much more current and alive. The way I still described my business, my services, and my role felt like an outdated version of myself.
I stopped and asked a couple of simple questions. How do I want people to feel when they land on my website? Who do I want to invite through the door for a longer conversation?
I found my words, and wrote them down. Any day now, you will notice there’s a new welcome mat at the door.
A new Home page. A new Services page. A new About page. All reflecting the parts of me that matter most, and the way I want to work with people.
An open invitation
There’s no ‘big reveal event’ this time for this new space I’ve created. It’s just an invitation into a space built on and around compassion, equity, perspective, creativity, self-reflection, curiosity, flexibility, and clarity. A space where collaboration matters more than competition, and where enough is a perfectly valid destination.
So pop by again soon if this feels like it was meant for you.
Consider this your invitation.
If you’d like to know more about my fabulous writing coach Lizzie, and witness her magical powers that helped me realise my own words were what would help me stand out to the people I wanted to connect with most – you can find her here, or on LinkedIn, where she often offers workshops and webinars.
