Starting a business at the height of the recession may seem like folly but that was no deterrent to Sinéad Doherty.
A fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants and a qualified financial adviser, Doherty set up Fenero in 2009 as an accountancy firm. Six years and one harsh recession on, it now specialises in providing legal structures and tax solutions which enable contractors and freelancers to carry out contracts for business. Essentially it provides an umbrella company offering tax and insurance solutions for people working on contracts.
Doherty’s business doubled in size annually between 2009 and 2013. It has levelled off somewhat since, as the business has expanded, but which remains at around 70 per cent.
In 2010, Doherty took on her first employee, followed quickly by two more members of staff. There are now 12 and the company is currently recruiting for two more roles, with more due later this year.
Among the first staff “head hunted” by Doherty was her then fiancé David O’Reilly. Now her husband and MD of the company, he is a chartered accountant and tax adviser. Doherty says it had to be the case that O’Reilly was right, both for the company and in terms of his own career.
Good prospects
“David is a qualified tax consultant and accountant so he was a great fit for us but it had to be right for him too. He was working in the tax department in a top 10 firm in Dublin at the time with good prospects ... When he joined it meant that we had a good well-rounded team to take things forward.”
In 2013, Doherty made the decision to “pick a niche and become really strong in that niche”. The company was growing at such a rate she was afraid that, without focus, it would not be able to deliver for clients. Despite the economy being still in the teeth of recession, she made the unusual decision to stop taking on new clients in the accountancy area and to begin discontinuing certain accountancy services in order to “soft-transition” into the contracting solutions company which Fenero is today.
She admits it seemed counterintuitive to discontinue services and actively discontinue relationships with around half her clients in a process that took until the end of 2014.
“Underlying it, I always knew it was the right move but when I was going through it, there were times when I was keeping my fingers crossed,” she says. “It was of course a deliberate strategic move for the business but there is something unnatural about turning away business that you have worked so hard for.
“We had developed a close working relationship with many of our clients and had got to know people personally and some of them we considered to be friends, so it made it even harder to say ‘this is the market we want to focus on and you don’t fit into this model’.”
From a personal point of view, the switch from being an accountant to being an employer has also been huge.
“I don’t have a huge amount of involvement in producing accounts any more. Most of my time is spent on HR and strategy, IT issues, sales and marketing. It’s a huge transition. You’re learning as you go so I think it’s very important to engage mentors and speak to people with different skill sets.”
Mentorship
Doherty says that paid-for mentorship has also been crucial in terms of developing her own role in the business and driving business forward.
“The advice and help you get from a paid mentor and expert can be invaluable,” she believes. As the business grows, one of the areas of focus is that of team-leading, both for Doherty and her employees.
Doherty believes that Government bodies do little to support service providers such as Fenero, favouring export business and manufacturing or software. It’s been a case then of forging her own path and she is currently engaged on the Going for Growth programme.
“It’s a free programme and the women I have met are ambitious and driven and come together as peers to support each other. I think that whatever level you are at in business, you need to have a sounding board for ideas,” she says.
Fenero is one of four champion companies selected by Ibec’s Nutrition and Health Foundation. The company encourages employees to be physically fit through initiatives such as gym membership.
Doherty believes the future is bright for Fenero with more companies, particularly, multinationals engaging staff on contract basis, all of whom need to operate under an umbrella company or need help establishing a private limited company in order to be tax compliant.
Many leading recruitment companies such as Morgan McKinley, Has and CPL refer clients to Fenero and Doherty saysthe massive recruitment drive within the recruitment sector itself bodes well. “It is a real anticipation of growth in the jobs market,” she says. “We started at the beginning of the recession and have grown the business through that ... so we are well placed now to be in a good position to benefit from an economic recovery.”
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