I didn’t grow up wanting to be an accountant. At university, I was far more interested in markets than management accounts.
I spent a lot of time trying to understand how money moved, picking stocks and convincing myself I was running a very small version of what I imagined would one day become “Bajaj Hedge Funds”.
It was informal and self-taught, but it gave me something important early on. It made me curious about outcomes; about why some decisions work and others don’t.
It was this curiosity, not accounting itself, that pulled me into finance. Becoming a Chartered Accountant was a pragmatic decision. I saw it as the most efficient way into the world I was interested in.
What I didn’t fully appreciate at the time was how important my training as a Chartered Accountant would become.
The qualification, particularly through Chartered Accountants Ireland, gave me more than technical knowledge. It gave me credibility early in my career and a way of thinking that I still rely on today.
Our training teaches us how to approach problems, break things down and operate with discipline, no matter how fast-paced the environment we work in on any given day.
“You build confidence by doing”
I started my career in audit with KPMG Ireland, which gave me a strong grounding, but the real acceleration in my career came when I joined Ocado, the online grocery retailer, in the UK in 2013.
At the time, Ocado had a relatively small finance function. This meant there was a lot of opportunity if you were willing to take it. I didn’t move through roles in a structured way. I got involved in things, and over time, more responsibility followed.
I ended up running multiple parts of Ocado’s finance function at different points—accounts payable, accounts receivable, financial reporting and treasury. It wasn’t a neat trajectory, and it wasn’t always planned. It was a case of seeing where there were gaps or opportunities and stepping into them.
One of the more defining moments for me came when I took on the tax function. I qualified as a Chartered Tax Adviser with Chartered Accountants Ireland as part of the inaugural cohort, which proved pivotal when I was asked to set up and lead Ocado’s tax function.
Without this qualification and the “street credibility” that came with it, I don’t think this opportunity would have come my way. It gave me authority in a specialist area and played a significant role in shaping the development of my career.
My work in treasury was another turning point. On paper, I had a very small team—just one operational cashier, essentially. In reality, however, I was heavily involved in the strategy, working alongside Ocado’s chief financial officer on capital structure, funding decisions and investor engagement.
Over time, I was involved in raising over £2 billion of capital across a range of instruments—debt, equity, rights issues and convertible structures. At the outset, I didn’t know about any of this in a practical sense. I had read about it and had an academic understanding of it but doing it in real life is very different.
My approach has always been the same: “I’ll figure it out. How hard can it be?” This mindset pushed me into situations I might not otherwise have felt ready for. It meant I learned quickly.
You don’t get the luxury of perfect preparation. You have to understand things as you go, ask questions and build confidence by “doing”.
Being that close to capital markets activity changes how you think about finance. You’re not just reporting what has happened, you are actively shaping what comes next. You are involved in decisions that determine how a business grows; how it is funded and valued externally.
The experience sharpens your understanding of credibility because investors will challenge you. They will go into detail and, if you don’t understand your own numbers, they will find the gaps very quickly. This forces a level of rigour that stays with you.
Becoming the decision-maker
Moving to Rohlik Group as Group CFO was the next step in my career. Rohlik Group is a pan-European online retailer operating in five countries.
When I joined in 2024, the business was valued at €1.6 billion with revenues of €500 million. By the time I left, it had hit €1.2 billion in revenue and was valued at more than €2 billion.
As the CFO, I was, for the first time, fully accountable, rather than contributing. The shift is quite stark. You are no longer supporting decisions; you are owning them.
One of the defining experiences for me during this time was leading a $170 million fundraise at a $2 billion valuation in a much tougher funding environment.
Every assumption is tested and you are constantly balancing growth, risk and capital. This reinforced something I’ve come to believe strongly. Finance is, at its core, about trust. The numbers matter, but the judgment behind them matters more.
Now, at Holland & Barrett, I’m working in a business with a very different profile, but equally as complex. Ours is a brand people know well, but the business is also in the middle of a significant transformation.
What I’ve found over time is that the role of CFO is often described in terms that fall far short of its true breadth and scope in reality.
At Rohlik, alongside my CFO responsibilities, I took on the position of Chief People Officer for a period. This wasn’t something I had done before, formally, but it made sense for the business at the time.
It gave me a completely different perspective on how organisations operate, particularly around culture, leadership and how teams scale.
My role at Holland & Barrett is similarly broad ranging. It covers finance, legal and internal audit, but also extends to group-wide procurement, the business transformation office and property.
For the first six months, I was also asked to step in to run our distribution centres and take ownership of the end-to-end supply chain while we were hiring a new Chief Operations Officer.
What I have learned over the years is that the CFO role is one of the few that can genuinely cut across the entire business.
You have visibility across how everything connects, and you are often in a position to step into areas where there is a gap, or where decisions need to be made. How broad the role becomes largely depends on how each CFO chooses to operate.
Coming full circle
As my career progressed, I came to realise I needed variety beyond the day-to-day of a full-time executive role.
I found myself looking for something different, and this led me to advise and invest in small- to medium-sized businesses and start-ups globally.
What started as a side interest has become a genuinely rewarding second track, where I get to work closely with founders and CEOs at very different stages of their journeys. There’s something quite grounding about this work. In larger organisations, you’re often dealing with scale and complexity. In smaller businesses, the challenges are more immediate, and the impact of decisions is very visible.
Being able to mentor, challenge and support founders in this environment has been one of the most enjoyable parts of my career.
This work also led to an opportunity I would never have predicted: I was asked by the University of Cambridge Judge Business School to mentor students on their master’s programmes.
It has been an incredibly rewarding experience, not just sharing knowledge, but also learning from people at the very start of their own journeys. It’s also one of those experiences that prompts you to stop and reflect.
I don’t think I would have imagined, growing up in Limerick and studying at the city’s university, that I would one day be mentoring students at Cambridge.
When it happened, I went straight back to the Dean at the University of Limerick and asked if I could support them also. Now, I sit on the advisory board for UL’s Kemmy Business School—the business school that made my career.
Funny that, eh?
“Above all, graft”
One mindset that has stayed with me throughout my career is a simple one: I ask myself, “how hard can it be?”
A lot of the opportunities I’ve had came from putting my hand up for things I hadn’t done before, or stepping into situations where I didn’t have all the answers at the start.
I’m often asked, particularly as a female leader, how I deal with imposter syndrome. The honest answer is that I haven’t really experienced it, as it’s often described.
This doesn’t mean I’ve always felt completely ready, but I’ve never seen it as a reason not to go for something.
My approach has always been to ask for the opportunity. If the answer is no, you have something to work towards. If the answer is yes, then you step up.
If you don’t ask, you don’t know. And if you want something, you just have to go after it. When I look back, I don’t see a perfectly planned career; I see a series of decisions, some intentional, some instinctive, that built over time.
For me, my role as CFO is only one part of my career. It is not the endpoint and I don’t intend for it to be.
For anyone starting out or looking towards their next step, my advice is simple: seize opportunities when they come up. Put your hat in the ring, even if you’re not fully ready. Build your network properly, because relationships matter.
And above all, graft. There is no shortcut.