2019: AAB People’s Year in Review

The last 12 months have seen exciting progress for AAB People on our growth journey and as 2019 draws to a close, we wanted to step back and reflect on some of our highlights.

A Growing Team

We welcomed 4 new team members this year – Clare Sullivan as Office Manager, Amy Gardiner as Senior HR Consultant, Linda Stein as Marketing Lead and Marina Horner as HR Consultant – and are reaping the benefits of their fantastic contributions and hard work. We will continue to further grow and strengthen our passionate and purpose-driven team in the New Year to support our growing base of innovative clients.

A Growing Portfolio of Innovative Clients

We are proud to have welcomed a range of exciting new high growth clients on board in 2019 across the technology, engineering and life science sectors. Scotland has such a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem which we love being immersed in. Just some of our new clients include Neatebox, Speech Graphics, Beyond Green, MiAlgae, Platinum Informatics, Artificial Lift Performance and FlexMedical. We have enjoyed getting to know their businesses, embedding ourselves in their teams and doing what we love best – supporting them on their growth journeys.

Well done to all our innovative and purpose-driven clients on your fantastic successes and achievements this year!

Revenue Growth

Whilst investing in the operations, infrastructure and resourcing of the team in order to build on solid and robust foundations, we are delighted to have meanwhile continued to increase our revenues with a sustained profitable growth trajectory.

Team Learning & Development

Lisa was privileged to have the opportunity in September to return to Babson College in Boston via Entrepreneurial Scotland and to refresh her learning, further building on the Saltire Fellowship journey she first embarked on back in 2014. Being able to access more of the incredible teaching on offer was invaluable and simply having time to reinvest in her own personal development was so beneficial at this stage of our growth journey.

We are hugely grateful for the fantastic support we receive through our amazing network and being part of the Unlocking Ambition programme, having been retained to the second year of this flagship programme as Ambassadors, and to have the opportunity to attend insightful and inspiring masterclass events.

Ongoing learning for the wider team has included a Strategic Marketing Masterclass and Radiant & Brighter’s Cross-Culture Communication training, as well as a whole team communications session working with business coach Rosemary Taylor to enhance our own culture and performance.

#LearningNeverStops

Events & Workshops

We have loved meeting and supporting some very inspiring early stage businesses this year through delivering our ‘Building Your First Team’ workshop to accelerator programmes including Climate KIC and Edinburgh Innovations, and to entrepreneur networking groups. We look forward to continuing this early next year with both follow up workshops and new events planned.

We were delighted to participate both as an exhibitor and as a workshop host at the fantastic Startup Summit in October. We ran a session on ‘Embedding Values, Mission & Culture in a Start-up’ and also took time to enjoy the range of insightful talks and interviews across the various stages.

Women in STEM

The findings from our widely publicised Women in STEM survey were unveiled in April at our launch event at CodeBase. Co-sponsored by Administrate and Modulr, and supported by Girl Geek Scotland and Women’s Enterprise Scotland, the survey revealed what attracts women in to STEM jobs and what kind of companies they want to work for.

The results have provided valuable insights on equality, inclusivity and building diverse teams, giving practical recommendations and advice for SME employers to help attract, develop and retain more diverse talent. We have worked with our clients to tailor these recommendations in practice and have enjoyed discussing the findings at follow-up events including DisruptHR Glasgow and an event with Be-IT in Edinburgh.

Recognition

It’s been an honour to be shortlisted for two awards this year alongside other amazing businesses and role models and to be recognised for our progress.

Our Managing Director, Lisa Thomson, was a finalist in the “Emerging Business Leader” category at the Women’s Enterprise Scotland Awards in September, and we were finalists in the “Established Business of the Year” category at the Business Women Scotland Awards last month.

We were also selected as one of only 10 Scottish growth businesses for the SBN and Entrepreneurial Scotland London Launchpad for Global Success event in October which was both a great learning and networking opportunity.

Rebrand

2019 saw us rebrand with the launch of our lovely new logo and website. We felt our old branding was no longer reflective of who we are as a business, or our values and purpose. We wanted to convey our innovative and refreshing approach as a niche provider of HR services and really reflect our passion for enabling teams and businesses to thrive and grow. The fantastic designers we used really delivered on our vision!

2019 has truly been an amazing year for AAB People, so thanks to everyone who has supported us and been part of the journey. We are buzzing with energy and ideas and look forward to seeing what 2020 has in store. We have some exciting projects in the pipeline which we can’t wait to share with you!

A very Happy New Year from all the team at AAB People.