David Bush

David Bush

David is a qualified Chartered Accountant who has enjoyed a successful and varied career both within the Retail and Logistics sectors as well as lengthy spells in Corporate Finance and Restructuring with both Ernst and Young and Grant Thornton

After qualifying with Price Waterhouse, David became Chief Internal Auditor at Wincanton Logistics where he had his first exposure to a commercial role as he became Interim Site Accountant for the Company’s biggest operational depot. In this role, he contributed (with a new Management) to improving both operational performance and financial reporting

David joined Early Learning Centre as Chief Accountant and within four years had become Finance Director which was a role that he performed for seven years. During his 11 years with the Company (during which turnover quadrupled and the number of stores doubled) David was responsible for Finance, Internal Audit and IT. Whilst contributing to a profitable expansion of the business, he also ensured that internal controls and IT systems more than maintained pace with the Business’ expansion. He was responsible for introducing new financial packages, significantly reducing major cost categories and implementing procedures which specifically reduced stock and cash losses

On leaving Early Learning Centre, David worked as an Independent Consultant for Data Design Limited which had been subject to a recent MBI. David was successful in upgrading internal controls to a commensurate level as well as providing credible financial reporting to both 3i (PE investor) and Royal Bank of Scotland (Bank lender)

David next worked for Ernst and Young’s Assurance and Corporate Restructuring service lines and was able to expand significantly his Retail sector experience by working with companies such as Alldays, Furniture Village, Radio Rentals, Brighthouse, Staples, Lidl and Iceland. During his time with Ernst and Young, David enjoyed a successful secondment at Royal Bank of Scotland within the Bank’s Global Restructuring Group which provided valuable experience in reviewing and determining the Bank’s strategy towards a variety of under-performing companies in sectors as diverse as Sport and Education

Whilst seconded to Royal Bank of Scotland, David was head-hunted by Grant Thornton to set up a specialist Retail function. David successfully achieved this whilst combining a continued commitment to performing Business Reviews on behalf of banks with lends to under-performing businesses. The key elements of these reviews tended to be as follows:

David successfully generated incremental work with Retailers who were not previously Grant Thornton clients through a sales programme of selling in a range of products and solutions on a cross-service line basis. David headed a sales team that was responsible for delivering annual incremental revenue targets. In addition, he raised Grant Thornton’s profile in the sector by embarking upon a strategy of generating regular and relevant Retail thought-leadership and comment that became extensively quoted in the national quality press. Additionally, David regularly appeared on TV and Radio to discuss current Retail topics; most notably on “Wake Up To Money”, “The Today Programme” and “BBC 6 O’Clock News”

David made the decision to set up his own Independent Interim Management business at the end of 2010, specialising largely in SMEs. His successful routes to market have included:

Call David on 07887 635356, or email him at [email protected]

Click here to view or right-click to download David’s current CV