Christmas Presents in Belfast

Fed up with the crowds at Christmas? Too cold to go out?
Or just lazy!!

For all your Christmas Gift needs, click here and shop from the comfort of your own home.

Christmas in Belfast

Belfast Enterprise

Enterprise in Belfast

UK Enterprises

Belfast-born Melanie Simpson, 38, collapsed in the street after a two years of constant travelling and long hours took its toll. She was diagnosed with an inflammation of her brain lining and told to rest and reassess her priorities.

Like many successful managers, Ms Simpson had dedicated her life to her job because she enjoyed it. “I loved my job and was successful and earned a reasonable amount of money. I was responsible for the P&L of a £50m turnover business,” she said.

She had worked at that level for two years, following a sales and marketing route and using her language skills to reach the top. She was then put in charge of delivering a contract for a new client. “It was a high profile win for the business. It was imperative that we threw ourselves into it. The way I got hit hardest was because I was running around all 10 countries and building a management team from scratch.”

Ms Simpson says she never felt stressed but the long hours and the demands of constant international travel took their toll. “I don’t think I was stressed, I just think I was busy,” she said. “I was getting back tired on a Friday. Going out and seeing people was becoming a bit of a bind.” Home was in Muswell Hill, north London.

Then one day in a Paris hotel she began to feel “very strange”, “there was a dizziness”, she recalls. She made it back to the UK and over weekend the headaches got worse. She awoke at 4am on Monday morning with a severe headache and emailed work to say she would not be in. “I went out to get it checked out and collapsed on the way to the bus stop,” she recalls.

Doctors said to reduce the inflammation of her brain lining she had to have at least one month of complete rest. “There was no way I could operate in the role that I did with that instruction. I just had to take it easy, which bored me. It was difficult to stop but I had to,” she said.

She decided to take an unpaid sabbatical and began to build up her strength. First it was the gym then a trip to Mongolia to explore and ride horses. “It was a dream. I spent some time with the nomadic people and learnt quite a bit about their life. It’s very simple.”

The experience prompted her to began looking at different options. She came across Teddy George, the founder of a new venture called George Jacobsen, who needed a business partner after her initial partner dropped out. The business offered small, growing businesses the chance to outsource things they did not want to do, from marketing to finance, HR and data management.

Ms Simpson went for it. “I just liked the idea. I was able to do what I was doing before, just in a much smaller scale; to bring my experience to SMEs in their early days.”

The business launched in January and has established a core base of customers. Ms Simpson has few doubts that she has made the right decision. “There is the moment when the large salary does not arrive, but to be honest, no, I have no regrets. I hope that I did learn a lot when I was running at 100mph and can bring that experience of a large company to the micro level.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/yourbusiness/