Meet Graeme Brown: Client Services Director

Post by Mearns & Company in News

Graeme Brown, Client Services Director at Mearns & Company, talks about his role.

Describe  your role is at Mearns & Company

I am the Client Services Director at Mearns & Company. My role encompasses quite a lot. As a Director of the company, I have leadership responsibilities. I manage the teams within the servicing side of our business to ensure that our clients get the best possible service.

Could you describe your route to Mearns?

I have worked at Mearns & Company since 2001, pretty much from straight from school. At school, finance was something that always interested me, so when the opportunity came to join Mearns & Company, it was something that I jumped at.

What does a typical working day look like for you?

I’m not sure there is a typical day. Because of my role. I’m involved in quite a lot of different areas. Certainly every day will include some kind of leadership and management of the teams whether that’s providing training or supporting them if they’re unsure about which direction to go in with something. I’m also involved in ensuring that we’re meeting our compliance requirements and ensuring that everything is running smoothly in the business so that our advisers can give our clients the best advice.

How do you balance these varied responsibilities?

I think it’s all about planning and ensuring that work is spread out throughout the year. For example, making sure that the various reports that I am responsible for are not all due in one part of the year. It’s important to allow yourself a couple hours a day without meetings so that you can try to focus on detailed work without interruption.

Do you have any projects in the pipeline?

I think the main one at the moment is in our private client team, where we are in the process of moving to a MPS (Managed Portfolio Service) for our investment proposition. We are midway through this project, which has been running for about five months now.  It’s been quite a long project, but it’s been interesting to be part of.

For anyone who might not know what an MPS is, would you be able to explain that?

It’s a service where a professional discretionary manager manages investment portfolios to ensure that clients get the best possible returns. We oversee the MPS provider and conduct regular due diligence to ensure that they’re meeting the objectives that we have set them.

To finish on a light hearted note, if you won the National Lottery, what would you do?

I think it would be nice to go on a long holiday, although whether that would fit with my work commitments, I’m not sure! But it would be nice to maybe go to see different parts of the world. I’ve never been to places like Australia, definitely somewhere with sunshine!