We caught up with Dave Pinnington, the CEO of our specialist financial brokerage, to find out about his values, motivations and plans as a business leader.
Find out what we’ve uncovered about the biggest successes and challenges Dave has faced throughout his career, as well as his managerial ethos and a little bit more about the person himself…
Who are you and what do you do?
I am Dave Pinnington, CEO of Finance 4 Business.
What does that entail? I look after every part of Finance 4 Business, focusing on driving the company forward to penetrate new markets, whilst ensuring we deliver the excellent customer experience we have built our reputation on. This includes continuing to build the team with the right skills so that we can offer to our clients, lenders and brokers an outstanding service.
In fact, as much as our standards are all ready one of, if not the best in the market, it’s important not to rest on your own laurels. It’s important that we are continually growing and striving to improve – just to make our offering and service even better. After all, we don’t want our competitors to catch us up.
Who has had a positive influence on your career?
I’ve been fortunate in my career to work with several influential people and have been surrounded by many strong figures.
One of the most inspirational people I’ve ever worked with is Russell Martin. He’s a charismatic, driven and entrepreneurial character that gives people the freedom to show what they can do, without the constraints of an overly corporate structure.
When you come from a corporate background, you tend to be restricted. Russell doesn’t work that way – he allows you to flourish and demonstrate skills you may not be able to showcase elsewhere.
I’ve also worked with other strong leaders within our industry such as Marie Grundy. We worked together at V Loans, and we both learnt a great deal from each other. She’s very intelligent and her people skills are second to none.
Even before that, I worked with numerous significant individuals at YorkshireBuilding Society and at SPPL, which was Lehman Brothers (a dirty word now I appreciate).
At 46 years old, I’m yet to stop learning. Regardless of where you are in your career, you always want to strive as an individual while making the business better, and the two go hand-in-hand.
What are your values as a business leader?
As a business leader, I want to allow people to grow and demonstrate their skills. Effectively, at Finance 4 Business, there are roles that we can create for individuals. We encourage people to grow within their role and offer flexibility on the direction they can go in.
I want to make sure that people have the freedom to progress how they see fit, while ensuring they have confidence that they’ve got the full backing of the management team, enabling them to deliver. It doesn’t have to be within the confines of what they’re particularly doing at that moment in time. The transparency and openness of the environment we’ve created enables people to flourish.
What have been the biggest challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My biggest challenge was trying to run a second charge business through one of the biggest recessions the world has ever seen. The market completely folded and created a catastrophic collapse for the finance market in 2009 onwards. The challenge of trying to steer and grow the business, let alone survive, was difficult.
The lesson learnt from that is how important it is to be conscious of how every pound within a business is spent. The return on investment becomes key.
Why did you want to be CEO?
Although I have held this position in other businesses, becoming CEO of Finance 4 Business came down to the entrepreneurship of Russell Martin. Over the last year, his time has been drawn to hugely successful growth of the ARMCO group.
It was then that I was made CEO. I had the experience, but I also understand Russell’s ethos and I’m able to walk alongside him culturally.
Russell founded Finance 4 Business over 15 years ago, and it’s a company he’s grown considerably in that time due to his passion for the industry. My role is to continue with this, and I recognise that it’s a very privileged position to be in.
What’s the most exciting part about the business?
The most exciting part about the business is how we are able to offer our clients an all-encompassing service by working with our internal partners in the ARMCO group.
We’re able to get involved with complex and large development schemes and have multiple parts of the group assisting one client. You simply can’t get that anywhere else. The client would have to go and outsource to another party. For example, they may have an accountant looking at the SDLT, a land agent reviewing their land and another business looking to finance the project.
As part of the ARMCO group, we are able to get into a room and provide multiple solutions and do it all under one roof. Growth in this area is key for us – it’s so unique within our industry.
What are your plans for the future?
My mantra would be to be the best that we can be.
I wouldn’t ever be arrogant enough to say, “to be the number one in the market” because too many people love to say it and it’s lazy marketing. Instead, we’ll let our clients, lenders and intermediaries do the talking for us. That’s the best testimonial you can have.
Finance 4 Business
As a company, we are excited to continue with our business growth and success, so we can ensure that our valued intermediaries and clients always receive the best advice and financial solutions for their requirements.
If you would like to find out more about us, get in touch with our team by calling 0121 309 0444.