I joined the Trust on the 20th June 2023 and have just celebrated my one year anniversary at CCC!

Prior to this, I’ve worked in various non-clinical roles across multiple NHS organisations over the past 18 years. My first role in the NHS was actually working as a cleaner for three years at Aintree Hospital alongside my uni studies!

But before joining the Trust, I worked as an Innovation Consultant as part of the Innovation Team at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital.

I have definitely tried other career paths (although always within the NHS), and what I studied at university has nothing to do with what I now do in my job which I think is fairly common for a lot of people! I initially wanted to be a psychologist or an academic researcher, and studied Psychology at the University of Liverpool (graduating in 2009) before going on to study my Master’s degree in Psychological Research Methods on a part-time basis with The Open University (graduating 2014).

I remember as a young student feeling a lot of pressure and stress about deciding what I wanted my career to be, and not having a clue! It took me a long time to realise that sustainability was the field that I wanted to work in. It was only really in 2023 (at the age of 35!) when I joined Clatterbridge that I realised that it was what I had been looking for all those years.

Sustainability is something that is really important to me in my personal life, and we all have a duty to play our part in the protection and preservation of our planet. I think I had never considered working in sustainability before because I knew that I wanted to stay in the NHS, but didn’t realise that this type of role would become available. Following the NHS’s commitment in 2020 to reaching carbon net zero by 2040 there are now many sustainability roles within the NHS, which is just fantastic! For me, this position is a really nice blend of what interests me in my personal life, coupled with my professional experience of working in the NHS for such a long time. I think having a passion about what you do in your career is really important.

I love working within the field of sustainability as I care very much about the health of our planet and its inhabitants, and I love working at CCC! I think because we are a smaller specialist Trust it has a real family feel to it, like we all know each other, and I get the feeling that people are very happy working for this organisation. We have a fantastic Chief Executive who provides us with monthly video updates and is very present across our different sites, regularly hosting in-person drop-in sessions, which is something I haven’t come across before.

To anyone else wanting to start a career here who may be worried they don’t have enough experience, I would say don’t over-think it. I have been successful in obtaining jobs in the past without necessarily having all of the experience listed in the job ad. If there is a role at CCC that you are interested in I would say just apply and see where it goes! I feel like this Trust is really committed to staff development and, for me, this is the happiest I have ever been in my professional life.