Tom Williams Email & Phone Number

United Kingdom

Remote

After spending a few years working towards a Compliance role, I eventually realised that I came alive most when I was connecting with people and building relationships. I had worked with our Charity Development team on some project work, and after learning more about the area, felt like I could use my voice in the external world.It's my favourite job I've had to date. I get to tell everyone about the great work we do at the charity, connect with other people in the free debt advice sector, build relationships and manage and launch new and exciting partnerships so that people in problem debt get the help they need, when they need it. We are often not the first people our clients speak to about their money worries - lenders, collection agencies, local drop-in centres, social support services and others hear about this before we do. We can work together to clear up the stigma that thousands of people are dealing with.Whether it's collaborating with people who work in strategic roles, or speaking to frontline staff who chat to customers, I'm reassured by the fact most of us want to do the right thing. If you want a chat about how we can do that together, drop me a message!

Managing my brilliant team of Quality Monitoring Advisors will always be a career highlight for me. It was scary at first too! I moved from being a peer to a people manager, and took some time learning the ins and out of policies, procedures and how to make sure that side of things was done properly.But looking after your people is the most important thing. Development was a big thing for me in this role; I had so much support from mentors and colleagues with my own development, and I knew this was time for me to offer that out to others. I'm happy to say that I did, and saw some of my team move on to other things. They're still doing great now, and hearing about that makes my day.It's also absolutely fine to just stick at your day job though, and I enjoyed supporting people in work and being a listening ear for them. If you look after your people and treat them like adults, they will do good work. Leaders work for their people, and I let my people keep me in check!I achieved some great things with my team, my fellow TL and our manager. We redesigned and launched a new quality framework, setting us up for success in the future and giving us a model we could adapt in an ever-changing regulatory landscape. We saw a real shift and improvement in the quality of our service, and some brilliant audit results. Above all else, it was an amazing opportunity to learn about all the different areas of the charity, make some great connections with new colleagues and learn how to work with different stakeholders.

Chester, United Kingdom

Before remote working was a thing, our Chester office was focused solely on delivering debt advice. I was keen to move on, and saw a role in our quality team come up which was open to all centres. I'm proud to say I was one of the first people in a while to change to a different role, and spent a lot of this time singing the praises of our other Chester staff. We now have people from all over the UK doing different jobs, and I'm grateful this happened for others too.Working in QM was a great opportunity to build on my coaching experience, and gain more insight into regulatory risk. My big push was celebrating success - if someone has done a good job, they should know about it! I took every opportunity to let our frontline and back office colleagues know when they had gone above and beyond, and likewise when they were just doing the day-to-day job really well. Of course, it wasn't always giving good news, but balancing feedback and coaching people to improve was my way forward. None of us are perfect, and we all makes mistakes. We learn much more from our failures than success.

Chester, United Kingdom

The most rewarding job I've ever worked. Debt advice and debt solutions weren't entirely new to me; we had some experience of that in the family, so I jumped at the chance to apply! I took calls from people who were struggling with their finances, and learned so much about people's experiences. I also gained an appreciation for how anyone can fall on hard times, no matter how things may look on the outside. I eventually moved into a coaching role, and would take calls from other advisors on our Knowledge Line to help them with specific queries. As time went on, getting it right for clients felt more and more important to me, as well as making sure other advisors felt well-supported. An emotionally challenging role, which helped to build resilience. I will always have huge respect for Debt Advisors across the sector.

Chester, United Kingdom

My first big boy job after uni. I jumped straight in the deep end, handling telephone complaints for mis-sold PPI, with no previous experience! It was a sharp introduction to financial services: high case volumes and tough work, with great people. I moved around to do QC and UAT testing, but the best bit for me was floorwalking and coaching new starters. Helping other people to get their head around things felt rewarding, and was something I picked up later in my career.