Our leadership team has been working with Annabel Sweet, a leading consultant who helps businesses develop their culture and increase engagement amongst their people, by sharing innovative team building and communication techniques.

Annabel’s passion is for helping businesses and teams perform better by creating great places to work. Her philosophy is that most of us have to work for a living – so why not make it fun while we're doing it?

While we think we have a pretty effective team already, our own philosophy is that there’s always room for improvement. So, in between sessions, we sat down with Annabel to find out a little bit more about her background in HR and why she’s got what it takes to help our team be even better at what we do…

How did you get into the industry?

I started out as an HR graduate trainee at Tesco. Retail is a people business so there weren’t many situations I didn’t come across in my 8 years there – a brilliant grounding for HR.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received in your career?

Two things…

• Firstly, don’t ‘land grab’. Instead, do a brilliant job that’s focused on your team and you’ll be asked to take on even more.
• Secondly, don’t leave a job until you have left a legacy!

What advice would you give to someone starting out in the HR sector?

If you work in HR, everyone else’s salaries are visible to you. So, be happy with what you get paid (or talk to your boss about it) and ignore everything else!

What’s the best thing about working with Chatter?

You’re always upbeat, positive and good fun. When I worked with you as one of your suppliers, you were super creative and always delivered to the highest standard and tightest deadlines.

What are you reading, watching and listening to at the moment?

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman.
‘This is us’ on Amazon (although I think it might have been C4 originally)
Always a Global radio station… Smooth or Radio X usually, unless I am out running and then it’s my ‘keep running’ playlist!

What’s your guilty pleasure?

Mini eggs… definitely mini eggs.

Three words to describe yourself?

Organised, hard-working and collaborative (although my husband would probably add… ‘a little bit ditsy’!!)

What fact would surprise people about you?

I am a bit WYSIWYG… ’what you see is what you get’, so there’s not much about me that’s surprising!!