Rising from the ashes

As one journey ends, another begins

For many years I worked in the IT industry. First on a Helpdesk, next as a field engineer, moving on to middle management and finally to owning my own limited company. Little did I know that COVID was just a few short years away. Ironically the two years of COVID were pretty good. What came next was not. An energy crisis, prices rising, businesses failing all around. 2023 to 2025 were some of the hardest I had ever experienced but I continued to push forward. Managing to clear debts that had accrued, taking on new customers to replace those had had failed and, by the end, starting to grow.

These years had taken its toll on me and I started to question if what I was doing was worth it. In IT you normally only deal with people when they are already upset and stressed because something does not work. You might get a thank you and some appreciation but it is a high stress environment. Most Helpdesk staff only ever last a couple of years before moving on and few are ever really happy doing what they do. I had been lucky, staying in quite a few top hotels and getting to travel Europe whilst dealing with some top companies. It sounds more glamorous than it is. It normally means being alone for many days at a time and you only social interaction is a brief, daily call home, or talking to staff where you re deployed. Meals alone in good restaurants but without the company to make it worthwhile.

Dealing with retired clients, who had spent a good portion of their working life without even seeing a computer, is a lot more rewarding. You feel like you are actually doing some good. You are helping people who never really got to grips with the pace of change that now dictates our lives Each visit to a persons home becomes less time critical, you can stop and take time to talk to some very interesting people with great stories to share and a lifetime of knowledge & skills.

I reached a point where I had to decide to keep fighting and pushing my limits to continually grow or to just walk away and start over. The decision was not easy but something had to change. The decision got made and I decided to give up everything I had built over a decade and start again. This time just catering to those that would benefit from my 30+ years of skills working in several parts of the IT world.

this brings us to where I am now. You will see that a lot on the website – “I”. I am not a big business, ‘nor do I ever intend to be. I am a man that is now firmly rooted in middle age with decades of experience. I am someone that cares deeply about how his actions affect others, something that is reflected in my work. Not feeling like someone has had my best from me can eat away at my mind for days afterwards.

My new form, intended to carry me to finally reaching retirement, is to provide the same high levels of service that I have always given. Just this time to exclusively residential clients. The online store exists because it is something I know how to do but it does not make me a big business, it just means I am using all the tools I have to supplement my income to keep hourly rates as low as is possible, whilst keeping the pricing as honest as I can. No VAT as I am not VAT registered. No messing around with HMRC trying to bleed all small businesses dry. Just a simple sole-trader business doing what I do best.