In this episode of ScaleUp Radio, Kevin Brent is joined by Helen Bower, founder of Adder Bookkeeping, a practice she built from a solo venture to a thriving 8-person business over the course of two decades. Recently, Helen sold the business to Fresh Financials Group and now works part-time, having achieved her goal of a better work-life balance.

Helen's journey is a fantastic case study in growing a service-based business with purpose, resilience, and a bit of creativity. What began as a way to balance work and family life gradually evolved into a scalable, systemised business with a strong team culture and a focus on delivering value through strategic financial insight.

Together, Kevin and Helen cover three key areas:

1. The Business Journey – From solo bookkeeper to team-based practice offering high-value, tech-enabled financial services.
2. Scaling Challenges – Including team management, leadership transition, and the emotional and practical considerations of selling a business.
3. Quickfire Questions – Helen shares her perspectives, advice for other founders, and her experience with the ScaleUp Challenges.

You'll hear how Helen embraced technology and cloud-based systems early on, how she built a positive team culture through gamification and creativity, and why recurring revenue and financial metrics were central to her growth strategy. She also shares candidly about the challenges of staff management, getting pulled back into day-to-day operations, and the importance of planning for exit early.

Make sure you don't miss any future episodes by subscribing to ScaleUp Radio wherever you like to listen to your podcasts.

For now, continue listening for the full story from Helen.

Scaling up your business isn't easy, and can be a little daunting. Let ScaleUp Radio make it a little easier for you. With guests who have been where you are now, and can offer their thoughts and advice on several aspects of business. ScaleUp Radio is the business podcast you've been waiting for.

If you would like to be a guest on ScaleUp Radio, please click here:

https://bizsmarts.co.uk/scaleupradio/kevin

You can get in touch with Kevin & Granger here:

[email protected]

[email protected]

Kevin's Latest Book Is Available!

Drawing on BizSmart's own research and experiences of working with hundreds of owner-managers, Kevin Brent explores the key reasons why most organisations do not scale and how the challenges change as they reach different milestones on the ScaleUp Journey. He then details a practical step by step guide to successfully navigate between the milestones in the form of ESUS - a proven system for entrepreneurs to scale up.

More on the Book HERE - https://www.esusgroup.co.uk/

Helen can be found here:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenbowerbookkeepingpractice

https://www.adderbookkeeping.co.uk/

https://www.freshfinancials.com/

[email protected] (Put ScaleUp Radio and FAO Alex in the Subject line)

Resources:

Diary of a CEO podcast - https://stevenbartlett.com/doac/

The E-Myth by Michael E. Gerber - https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-e-myth-revisited-why-most-small-businesses-don-t-work-and-what-to-do-about-it-michael-e-gerber/82114?ean=9780887307287&next=t

The 33 Laws of Business & Life by Steven Bartlett - https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-second-book-by-steven-bartlett-keep-it-to-yourself-steven-bartlett/7257436?ean=9781529146523&next=t

Engager - https://engager.app/

Microsoft Teams - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software

James Ashford - https://jamesashford.com/