MY CIPP
MY CIP
Tell us a little bit about your career and background so far. I've had quite an eclectic career, which started out with art studies in college and then led to my first 'proper' job in the sign industry, combining artistic design with technical skills. Life relocated me from Inverness to Winchester, where I had my first foray into payroll as an administrator for the Ministry of Defence. In the second year of this tenure, it was recognised that I had a propensity for soothing troubled waters and I became responsible for managing all employee queries. This was a steep learning curve as the questions were so varied, but I thrived in an environment where I could turn around customer satisfaction. I went back to study fine art further, but another fork in the road took me into customer service roles within retail and then on to management. Eventually I became area manager for a foreign exchange company. Redundancy then found me picking up the roots of payroll again, and in 2009, I joined the CIPP (then IPP) as a policy liaison officer. I combined research skills with payroll knowledge and worked with stakeholders and members for over 10 years. I then found new challenges as a subject matter expert and subsequently a digital learning developer within product development. During this time, I completed an instructional design qualification, which has really helped to inform the learning solutions we provide. I also undertook training to become a CIPP tutor. What are your main priorities as learning and development manager? The learner experience is at the heart of everything the learning and development
team does. Our qualification and training products must be relevant, engaging and, above all, accurate. It’s important for our learners and delegates to relate to the content we produce and use their learning in practice in a variety of pay environments. We strive to ensure our products use current work practices, are up to date with legislative change and are delivered with effective interactive learning solutions. As a result, our qualifications and training courses are in a perpetual product cycle. We have a substantial and diverse portfolio of learning content and I’m lucky to have a great team of eight in the department, who bring a wealth of experience, skills and knowledge. And fun, where time allows! What does your role mean to you? My role enables me to drive continuous improvement across the department; within the products we develop and the skills across the team (including my own – every day is a school day). An important part of my role is effective collaboration across the company. We know payroll doesn’t stand still and neither does technology, so adapting and developing with change is key. To ensure an optimal experience for our learners in the delivery of products, we work closely with the education and training teams and with our learning technology department. We also have several initiatives underway to align and streamline our work. This is my first year of heading up the team and everyone has been supportive of my move into the role which means the world to me. Thank you all! Can you share a moment you’re particularly proud of during your time at the CIPP? When I joined the CIPP, I immediately took on the Foundation Degree in Payroll
Management. If my job was to provide members and pay professionals (many of whom are fully qualified and with far more experience than me) with up-to-the-minute policy implications, I wanted to put the work in to earn not only those letters after my name, but also the right and authority to impart accurate information. As many of our members will attest, it’s challenging taking on years of study while working full time. It was so worth it when I rocked up at the Graduation Ceremony in 2012 (literally, as I was seven months pregnant at the time) and proudly received my award. This, and the other qualifications I mentioned, along with becoming learning and development manager are achievements I’m very proud of. Outside of work, what are some of your interests and hobbies? I’ve always been creative, and for a while I thought that might be the centre of my career, but I took a different path and I’m glad I did. My creativity helps with my job in ways I didn’t envisage when I started out on my CIPP journey, but back then eLearning was in its infancy. I have many creative hobbies, but painting is my first love, and I have at least two unfinished canvases hanging around, and a few walls too. Indoor hobbies are weather-dependent though. I live in bonny Scotland, so if the weather is nice, or just passable, you’ll find me out on a loch paddleboarding, at the beach or dragging my daughters up a mountain for a chilly picnic. And then there’s the re-education of helping with high school homework; was algebra always this difficult? I’m enjoying the guitar and Spanish practice, though. I’m also an avid reader and have taken to audiobooks over the last few years; a great way to fit in more stories around a busy life. n
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| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward |
Issue 115 | November 2025
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