Career and Achievements

Current Portfolio

For Hodder Arnold, proofreading further/higher education law textbooks.

For Oxford University Press, proofreading academic and practitioner law textbooks.

For Henry Stewart Publications, proofreading financial journals including collating author proofs.

For The Stationery Office, proofreading business books.

For National Extension College, proofreading business distance-learning courses.

For Norwich Union, proofreading proposal documents.

For Coddan CPM Ltd, copy-editing legal documentation and website content authored by non-native English speakers, writing a house style.

For Aquarium Writers Ltd, proofreading corporate documentation.

For Hogrefe Ltd, copy-editing a product catalogue including changing US English to UK English.

For Florence Production, proofreading academic textbooks on a variety of subjects.

For Tribal Education Ltd, copy-editing distance-learning courses, trainer-led workshops and presentations.

For Janus Publishing Ltd, proofreading fiction.

For Melrose Books Ltd, manuscript reading and reporting for a range of fiction and poetry.

Publishing career

My roles within the publishing department of a financial services training consultancy involved designing, writing, researching, editing and rewriting, and proofreading technical distance-learning and other training material. I worked on a variety of projects for UK and overseas financial services clients. These clients ranged from those in the sophisticated UK financial services industry to those in less-sophisticated financial services industries, for example in certain places in South Africa and Malaysia. This range of clients developed my skills in making material appropriate for the target readers.

Some examples of projects completed include:

• designing and writing training material for UK clients, for example banks, building societies, friendly societies and life assurance companies to cover all stages of the Personal Investment Authority (PIA) Training and Competence Scheme including:
• industry qualifications covering the financial services marketplace, financial planning, compliance and taxation
• the client's financial services products for protection, house purchase, retirement, and savings and investment
• the client's procedures
• continuing professional development
• writing distance-learning textbooks, including questions, for qualifications offered by the Chartered Institute of Bankers, covering personal investment planning, the regulated environment and pensions
• designing and writing training material for a range of world-wide clients just beginning to sell regulated financial products through, for example, banks and shops
• managing and designing a training course for underwriters in China, covering what the underwriting industries in China and the UK can learn from each other
• creating training material, including a user guide, for call centre staff in the UK and South Africa
• editing training material to meet new requirements, for example changes in taxation, legislation or in the client's procedures
• identifying, sourcing and interpreting reference material, for example from the Inland Revenue and the regulatory bodies

Financial services career

In my financial services career I achieved the following:

• for a major bank I managed a portfolio of small and mid-corporate business accounts on a day-to-day basis, involving controlling overdrafts, lending new monies and selling associated products
• for another major bank I managed a portfolio of personal accounts, involving day-to-day monitoring and control, lending new monies and selling associated products
• for a major chartered accountancy firm I audited large public limited companies, involving verifying the figures in the balance sheets and profit and loss accounts produced by the clients