One Year in Lockdown

Chris Hill, SETsquared Investment Programme Coordinator 

Best Entries

Chloe: “Look at them… they can’t hide their jealousy about my new toupee… now try not to look too smug about it…”

Andrea: “Chris knew he needed to pull himself together if he was going to get any fringe benefits from his job, or bangs for his buck!”

Winning Entry

Ashima: “Suspect found in the local wig shop burglary”

Sophie Causon-Wood, Scale-Up Programme Innovation Advisor – University of Bristol 

Best Entry

Emma B: “Sophie had no idea who these tiny humans were and what they were doing in her house.”

Winning Entry

Andrea: “I’ve been teaching my kids the Elf-abet during lock-down…”

Rosie Bennett, SETsquared Investment Programme Manager 

Best Entries

Chloe: “WHO’S TAKEN MY TIN FOIL HAT…OWN UP!!”

Miles: “Questions raised over quality of CGI in remake of Alien”

Winning Entry

Chris H: “Welcome to SETsquared Invest 2021! I’m coming to you live from an undisclosed location. My bandwidth is low, my script was stolen by badgers, this is going to be IN-TENTS!!!”

Simon Bond, SETsquared Innovation Director 

Best Entries

Hannah: “The top pupil in the Year 1 Peacock Classroom is rewarded with a star for getting 100% in his online training.”

Karina: “Caught off guard on a normal Sunday afternoon Simon could only hope that his impromptu meeting with Research England would still go as planned…”

Winning Entry

Emma B: “It was sad to see, but Simon had clearly never got over his failed audition to join the Pet Shop Boys.”

Steve Mayers, Scale-Up Programme Manager 

Best Entries

Sylke: “They told me they were Labradoodles when I bought them last year…”

Karina: “As Steve sat there wearing his wife’s lipstick on what felt like his 100th lockdown birthday call, he began to wonder at which point during the last year he actually lost the plot…”

Winning Entry

Colin: “SETsquared’s VIP bodyguards hold back the crowds, as Head of Scale-Up Steve Mayers pops out for a spot of lunch”

Tracey Bennett, SETsquared Finance Coordinator

I think Trace is THE unsung hero here! Without her, we’d be completely lost, and probably jobless cause the budget would have run out much quicker HA! 😉

She works so hard continuously and in the background (sometimes you might forget she is there!) She is patient, understanding and always has a smile on her face, or a cheeky laugh, and on top of that, she is always there to listen to anything you want to talk about.

She is the unsung hero of our numbers. She manages all our finances across the programmes, makes the impossible happen with getting POs signed off and seems to pull rabbits out of hats when  making the books balance. Not only that, she always is laughing and giggling, and her laugh is infectious.

Not to mention, she knows where all the money is!!! And online or offline she’s such great company – I’ve enjoyed laughing our way through lockdown with her.

Joanna Mieszczak, SETsquared Programme Coordinator 

Joanna has taken on lots of new tasks this year – accounting, ERDF project management and being a wife. She excels in a quite unassuming way. I have been assured not only by her colleagues but her husband too 😊 She is just all round fab to work with and the coolest cookie in the box.

Chloe White, Scale-Up Project Coordinator  

Chloe has always been supportive, honest and real. She has integrity & scrupulous accuracy, so much so she made us wait a reaaaaally long time to agree the figures, to take KPI3 into the green zone.

Hannah Dennis, Research Project & Finance Co-ordinator

Hannah has been amazing at getting not just one ERDF, but three off the ground this year. She is amazing and has become a wonderful part of our team.

Emma Blunt, SETsquared Marketing Consultant

Does she ever sleep? does she ever stop to have food? how fast can she type, tweet, research, plan, create, invent, imagine? Emma you are a superhero. The amount of things you do in a day is just staggering! And you always make us forget we are just one of your many clients.

If something’s new, she’ll make it newer. If something’s big, she’ll make it bigger. And if something’s good, she’ll make it the best ever!

Andrea Kelly, Senior Programme Coordinator

This woman is a one woman show! She’s such a force of nature, a creative thinker, a natural leader, and a real laugh. She puts 110% into everything she does and she’s the ‘spotlight’ queen. Plus when her screen freezes, her pose is always hilarious!

Miles Davies, SETsquared Consultant

Another fab entertainer… jokes aside, he’s great and so very professional. I’ve learnt an awful lot with him.

Serena Giaminardi, SETsquared Programme Manager

She leads her team from the front and always has time to solve a problem. She’s equally confident in front of clients or planning the delivery of lots of different projects. I haven’t heard her complain once during lockdown (maybe I missed that meeting!).

Her leadership is inspiring – she always thinks, ‘team first’! There’s no ‘I’ in Serena!

Karina Moore, SETsquared Programme Coordinator

She reminds me of the roadrunner. No sooner has she been briefed on a task she has come back with it done. It is hard to keep up with the super efficiency and speed at which she can complete work. We have also been entertained daily by both her dogs and Jordan. Not sure who is cuter 😊

Jenny Downard, SETsquared Programme Assistant

You know that person who silently but tirelessly works behind the scenes to make things better, is always a step ahead, ensures everybody feel connected, and really makes you feel that things are under control. That’s Jenny. A thoughtful, considerate, fun, compassionate, creative and hard-working super-woman!

Not only does she keep her s**t together, she keeps everyone else’s s**t together too – thank you Jenny, I never want to do another pandemic without you!

Chris Hill, SETsquared Investment Programme Coordinator 

Watching him transform his whole house from a pre-70’s pre-loved semi detached into something worth of an Ideal Home photoshoot in the background of our many zoom calls over the past year has been one of the highlights of lockdown.

[…how long can they hold out against the primary colours and zen-destroying beepy plastic toys..?! Stay firm Chris – beige and taupe lego, is the only way forward…]

He is so funny – Mr Entertainer.