ALL ABOUT YOU! The Life and Times of Senior Women in Indirect Tax…

I am delighted to present the eighth in a series of profiles of senior women in Indirect Tax. The aim is to showcase the talents, experience and stories of these amazing women, and provide some insight into their professional and personal lives, what inspires them and what wisdom they can share. My eighth interviewee is Abi Briggs, Indirect Tax Partner at Deloitte.  Read More

Career in Indirect Tax vs. Career in Eastenders? by Guy Barrand

We’re not really hot on ‘labels’ here at BLT, but it struck me as I was watching the latest depressing episode in Albert Square, that much as storylines seem to get repeated every five years, so do the stock characters! Could the same be true of the characters one finds in the world of Indirect Tax? If one too readily identifies yourself with any of these character types – then be warned, sooner or later you may come to a sticky end (or get axed when the next cast reshuffle comes around). We’d suggest that the trick to a long and successful career in the soap opera that is Indirect Tax could well be to diversify and consider picking up some of the more palatable personality traits of your fellow cast members. Take the following as examples: Read More

ALL ABOUT YOU! The Life and Times of Senior Women in Indirect Tax…

I am delighted to present the seventh in a series of profiles of senior women in Indirect Tax. The aim is to showcase the talents, experience and stories of these amazing women, and provide some insight into their professional and personal lives, what inspires them and what wisdom they can share. My seventh interviewee is Audrey Fearing, Indirect Tax Partner at RSM.  Read More

Networking Groups for Women – Emerging Talent

In June last year I wrote an article celebrating the 1^st anniversary of the Women in Indirect Tax networking group. Since then, another group has launched successfully and the number of members has grown rapidly. We also now have members who have moved into broader based tax leadership roles from an indirect tax start, and women from other niche areas of tax and the law. This has added a new, richer dimension to the membership profile.

So the next initiative for 2019 is a networking group for women at an earlier stage in their career. This has come about for two primary reasons. Firstly – demand! Several existing members would really like other women in their teams to enjoy the same benefits of belonging to such a group, but with those in their own peer group. Read More

‘Nice’…so underrated….by Tariq Siraj

Time (and tiredness) often get in the way, but if you’re anything like me then you read as much as you can – newspaper articles, online blogs, magazine pieces or a bit of a novel when you can – and occasionally something really jumps off the page at you and sticks in your head. Recently, ‘The Kindness Quotient’ – an article about New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern did just that. At a time when everything and everyone seems so polarised, when scaremongering is at an all-time high and the feel-good factor is probably at a low, and when strong-man populist political leaders seem to be the in-thing – reading about a head of state who consciously and unashamedly runs on a platform of kindness hit me like a brick wal…actually no – like a really good hug. Read More