Here at Get Ahead our people are everything. Our ever-growing team has a wide range of highly skilled professionals with different backgrounds, expertise and even different personalities to ensure that we can find exactly the right Expert to match our clients’ requirements. 

Here’s 60 seconds with our expert Nicola 

Name: Nicola  

Area of expertise:  Business Administration and HR Coordination  

When & why did you join Get Ahead:  I originally joined Get Ahead in November 2019 but stepped back into permanent employment in 2021.  After unfortunate redundancy in 2024, I decided to rejoin Get Ahead as I really enjoyed working with the team and different clients.   

What did you do before you joined Get Ahead:   

I was an Operations Business Partner supporting a globally distributed, remote-first start-up organisation with general EA duties and People Operations support.   

I have 16 years’ experience as an Executive Assistant supporting C-Level execs in start-up organisations and big corps and am very competent with general EA duties and project management.  

I also have 2 years’ experience within a HR Generalist position and 7 years’ experience within a HR administrative/coordinator function. I have already gained my CIPD certificate in Training Practice and am currently in the process of completing the Level 5 CIPD Associate qualification during personal time. 

I have been the main point of contact for globally distributed employees for employee relations matters, onboarding/offboarding, recruitment, performance management, payroll, benefits queries/administration, and general administrative duties (such as contracts, generation of reports, employment verification and HRIS maintenance).  

Career highlight to date: 
In my previous company, the HR Manager unfortunately went on long term sick leave and did not return.  I had to step up and fulfil cross functional duties, so on top of supporting the CEO & Founder as his EA, I also fulfilled the role People Operations Generalist.  I successfully ran 2 rounds of redundancies, facilitated performance improvement plans and formal grievances on top of my everyday general EA responsibilities and HR administrative tasks . The company unfortunately went into administration and I worked with the Chief of Staff to close the company.  It was an incredible learning curve. 

Plans for the future:  

To complete my CIPD Level 5 Associate in Human Resources Management.  

I also want to learn more about AI and Web3 and how they can benefit my skills as an VA.  

I really enjoy working as an VA and supporting multiple clients, whilst having the work life balance to support my family.  Other than the above, my plans are to continue with what I’m doing!