A rapidly growing company is not for everyone, but is often deeply rewarding.

A rapidly growing company is not for everyone, but is often deeply rewarding.
March 16, 2020 recruitment

Future has room for every role, and no shortage of opportunity for growth, but the intense pace of a company changing so quickly can be challenging or exciting, depending on your personality. Meet one of our Finance Managers, to whom the challenge is a perfect fit.

Harriett Colbourn would do just about anything to avoid sitting still. “I have this goal. I want to visit 30 countries before I’m 30. And I’ve only got six or seven more to go in the next two years, so I think it’s doable.” She said with a smirk from a small corner of the Future office in Bath. There’s no doubt in my mind she reaches that goal, either, because everything about Harriett’s work life and home life is about setting goals and reaching them.

While she’s only been with the Finance team at Future for just under three years now, Harriett has taken every opportunity to attack new challenges head on. She’s been in five different roles since she started, doing everything from working directly with Future CEO Zillah Byng-Thorne to helping with the integration of the Washington DC-based SmartBrief after it’s acquisition, and some Project Management opportunities in between. When asked why she didn’t stay at one task for terribly long, she smiled and explained the explosive growth of Future right now presents so many opportunities to face new challenges and move up in the company, it would be silly to sit idle with all of that happening around you.

In a company full of people who touch the latest gadgets before anyone else or explore deep science with some of the more brilliant minds of our generation, the title of  Senior Commercial Finance Manager might leave you with the impression that it’s somehow less exciting. Harriett would disagree with you immediately, and with good reason. From her position, Harriett is working with the Executive Leadership Team at Future to help shape the next steps of the company. She’s directly involved in helping make decisions across nearly every aspect of the B2B side of the company, which is a significant part of Future’s overall growth. And the results from her work with our new family members  at SmartBrief couldn’t be more clear.

When she’s not tackling the next challenge to cross her desk or planning a trip to another country, Harriett is in the middle of preparing for her wedding. While she can handle massive proposals with the biggest companies we partner with easily, Harriett admits surprise at how much work it really is to deal with things like seating arrangements and table linens in the lead up to her big day. It’s all a sign of becoming an adult, Harriett explained with a laugh, right next to swapping out Friday nights at the pub with Friday nights in with her closest friends who are already having kids. But like everything else, Harriett seems to embrace these challenges with a warm smile and a fresh perspective.

That perspective, the drive to tackle a new challenge and immediately hunt for the next, is without a doubt the most important part of Harriett’s success at Future. When asked what she thought she’d be doing here in another two years, Harriett had no idea. “Everything about Future has changed so much in the last two years. I used to be a part of a team of six, and we’ve already doubled that. Who knows what the Finance team will look like in two years!” Where that rapid growth might make others a little nervous, Harriett remained excited. She knows there will be new opportunities to try new things, and that motivates her daily. “It’s impossible to be bored at Future right now. It’s a lot of work, for sure, but if you’re willing to put in the hours and you’re the right cultural fit, Future is an incredibly rewarding place to work.”