THINK OUTSIDE THE BANK

We are expecting to lend more in the next year than we have in the previous five, supporting even more small business owners recovering from the pandemic. It will be a transformational time for their business and ours, as we’ve just announced a massive new £100m funding arrangement with Barclays Bank and a large global investment firm – read more here.

man standing in front of Edinburgh Castle

We are LendingCrowd.

LendingCrowd has spent the last two years supporting SMEs impacted by the pandemic  while improving and enhancing our tech platform and lending capability.

We are now gearing up for a sustained period of hyper-growth, fuelled by £100m in funding to lend – you can be fundamental to this success story. We have doubled our sales account management team and also our credit team to manage this step-change in lending.

We aim to be the trusted source of SME financing, helping fund and fuel small businesses to achieve their ambitions.

At LendingCrowd, we believe in ‘Do the right thing’.

We believe that we can drive our purpose as a business and our position in society by creating and developing a positive culture. We do the right thing for our clients by supporting borrowers and funders to get the best outcomes for each other. We strive to help where we can and play a positive part in enriching their lives and circumstances.

We do the right thing for our team by supporting and nurturing a work environment where openness, transparency, honesty and integrity will support growth and commercial success, not replace it.

Our five key values are the ‘RIGHT’ behaviours and attitudes we expect at LendingCrowd, as individuals and as a collective.

  • We are performance-driven
  • Our targets are known and understood
  • We achieve results through fair and appropriate behaviour
  • We are solutions-focused
  • We are active participants with accountability
  • We celebrate success!
  • We are always respectful and professional
  • We value fairness
  • We are compliance-focused
  • We have a moral purpose
  • We are true to the company and each other
  • We fight for every customer
  • We strive to enrich the lives of employees, customers and shareholders
  • We believe in growth through scaling, rather than risky high-growth strategies
  • We are entrepreneurial, proactive and use our initiative
  • We encourage personal growth
  • We value passion, emotion and conscience
  • We treat people as we would want to be treated
  • We always add a personal touch to our work
  • We are open and humble
  • We recognise and reward each other
  • We work together … as one unit
  • We believe in nurturing a diverse, inclusive team
  • Our team creates an enjoyable place to work
  • We value work/life balance
  • We believe in ownership and responsibility

Would you like to join our team?

Are you an ambitious, experienced and performance-driven senior sales or growth leader? Do you love the world of fintech start-ups? And most importantly do you always strive to do the right thing? Denholm Associates are delighted to be partnering with fintech scale-up LendingCrowd in its search for a Head of Sales.

With funding to lend and ambitious plans in place, LendingCrowd is looking for a talented commercial leader to a play a pivotal role in this next key growth phase. You will join a collaborative and dynamic team, and be responsible for driving loan origination and sales generation, and driving volume, value and quality of applications. Passionate about people, you will lead and develop a high-performing sales function encompassing the Broker Account and Sales Support teams, providing thoughtful coaching to ensure continuous improvement and success. A deep understanding of the sales funnel and conversion rates is critical, as well as reporting against key KPIs, utilising data to make informed commercial decisions.

To be successful in this role, you will come from a Financial Services background and understand the world in which LendingCrowd operates. Vital to this role will be your ability to work with partners and intermediaries to identify business opportunities that will bring benefit to all, through a customer-focused and commercial lens. You will be experienced working with CRM systems and reporting on KPIs and data, providing demonstrable experience on how data shapes a sales strategy and decisions. Moreover, we are looking for someone with the confidence to bring in fresh ideas and processes, and who thrives in working in a team-focused culture.

In short, this is a phenomenal opportunity to join LendingCrowd in a senior management role and have a significant and recognised impact on its growth while helping SMEs achieve success and bolster the economy.

We're searching for the right growth mindset.

“As Head of Sales you will work with the Chief Marketing Officer to expand our growth plans and lead our broker and direct channels – pivotal to the success of the business. 

As the company expands, so will this role. You will have the opportunity to develop the skills and capability of a dedicated account team. Nurturing and proactively driving a success culture within the team can make this a career-defining role for someone with the right growth mindset.”

Find out more.

If you’re interested in this exciting opportunity please contact Gareth Glen at Denholm Associates today.

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Andy Brady

HEAD OF HR

Andy Brady is a seasoned HR recruitment specialist, with over two decades of expertise in the field. With a foundation in Human Resource Management from the University of Derby, Andy swiftly transitioned into specialised HR recruitment. His diverse portfolio spans FMCG, Manufacturing & Engineering, Financial Services, the Third Sector, and Supply Chain, working at all levels from entry to executive positions.

Zoe Lumsden

Business Support & Employee Engagement Executive

Zoe joined Denholm in 2022 as Recruitment Administrator, after working in administration roles for nearly a decade. Most recently within the recruitment industry, she joins us with experience of supporting consultants, clients and candidates at all levels. Zoe has a passion for helping people and applies her positive attitude and approachable manner to support our team and deliver the best possible service to our clients and candidates at all times.

Callum Beveridge

SENIOR CONSULTANT - TECHNOLOGY, CHANGE & TRANSFORMATION

Callum has been working in recruitment since 2018 where he has solely focussed on the Technology, Change and Transformation market across the UK and ROI. He works closely with his clients and candidates to build long-lasting relationships across several industries, including Technology, Financial Services, Professional Services, Healthcare, Education, Public Sector and more. He specialises in engineering roles across Software, Infrastructure, Systems, DevOps and Cloud, along with Software Testing.

Michelle Weir

Senior Finance Executive

Michelle is enthusiastic, practical, and adaptable – with 15 years experience across Finance. She is known for being trustworthy, hardworking, and enjoying a challenge. Michelle excels, both independently and as part of a team, bringing a methodical approach to her work. Combining a friendly and professional demeanor, allows her to effectively engage with colleagues and clients at all levels. Client and candidate care is paramount to Michelle and to Denholm.

Alana Sim

DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR - CONSUMER

Alana has been working in recruitment since 2012, predominately within the FMCG & Consumer markets. Having recruited in both the UK & Asia Pacific markets, Alana has a sound knowledge of local & international recruitment. Partnering with brands to attract & hire the best sales talent in the market, Alana focuses on mid to senior level Sales appointments within the Consumer space. With a strong commercial & sales background, Alana identifies and engages the best commercially focused talent for our clients.

Scott Caithness

CLIENT RELATIONSHIP PARTNER

Scott started his career working for one of the leading Advertising & Comms agencies in Edinburgh where he spent 7 years before moving in to recruitment in 2011. As such, he is well-networked in the Marketing & Comms space across Scotland. With a friendly and consultative approach, Scott is genuinely passionate about providing a positive journey to both candidates and clients alike and believes communication plays a big part in this.  A “thinking-outside-the-box recruiter”, he is known for helping candidates portray the best version of themselves and helping clients find talent for those hard to fill roles.

Andy MacEwan

HEAD OF TECHNOLOGY, CHANGE & TRANSFORMATION

Andy has been recruiting in Technology, Change & Transformation since 2001. Delivering tailored resource solutions as trusted advisor to clients ranging from start-ups through to global blue-chip organisations across contract, permanent, fixed term, and managed service/statement of work solutions. He has experience providing candidates for Helpdesk through to CIO and takes great pride in providing excellent customer service and ensuring each candidate journey is a positive one. An expert in his market he can provide guidance across current market trends.

Our Community

As well as working in close collaboration with our clients, and the online marketplaces, we are active members of groups that have been established to combat illicit trade. These include the Scottish Anti-Illicit Trade Group, the European Intellectual Property Office, The Scottish Business Resilience Centre, the Anti-Counterfeiting Group, and the China Britain Business Council. Members of our senior management sit on the boards of ACID (Anti-Copying in Design), the Scottish Ministerial Trade Board, and the European Union Intellectual Property Office’s Observatory Panel for SMEs, amongst others.

Each team member nominates good causes or charities that are supported on both an individual and corporate basis. Wherever possible, we support the employee’s involvement whether through time or fundraising events.

Our Environment

We deliver purpose-driven work from an extremely welcoming environment near the City Centre. We actively encourage the responsible use of resources, from using public transport to reuse, recycling, and, of course, a minimal impact office environment. We have benefited from the advice of the Energy Saving Trust and Resource Efficient Scotland. Our waste contractor also provides us with a monthly report on volumes and types of material and the carbon emissions avoided through recycling.

Over 80% of our employees can walk or cycle to The Lair and, pre-pandemic, 10% were using public transport as their normal daily commuting mode. Without doubt, online meetings will replace considerable miles, going forward, saving resources, time and energy. Where possible, when possible, the train remains our preferred option. 

Our People

Our people are our most important asset, and their mental well-being and happiness are core to our success. We love our diverse workforce, actively embrace flexible working (even pre-pandemic!) and encourage a healthy work-life balance. We have been recognised as one of the most diverse SME workplaces in the UK and are holders of the Scottish Business Pledge which exists to promote a fairer Scotland. We have also just been included in the 2021 Culture Leaders Top 25 – an accolade of which we are very proud!

We are a fully inclusive and nurturing employer and, despite being in tech, the majority of our team are women, leading to accolades in the Computing Magazine Women in IT Awards and the Amazon Growing Business Awards. We currently represent 15 nationalities and speak 20 languages. Age is no barrier, and we recruit for attitude, providing and encouraging appropriate learning and training for each and every role.

We are also proud members of IP Inclusive, a network of professionals working to make the intellectual property industry more diverse.

Our Purpose

Our aim is to combat illicit online trade by identifying and removing counterfeits for sale. Counterfeits not only damage brands, their reputations, and revenues, but can cause significant harm to the end customer – whether as a fake toy or a fake medicine – and the consequences can be life threatening.

Counterfeiting is a significant economic and social issue.

The OECD reports that counterfeit and fake goods make up more than 3.3% of the world’s global trade. Those involved in the trade of counterfeits have been linked to people trafficking, prostitution, and drug dealing.

As such, reducing illicit trade is about much more than brand protection but also about human rights, safety, and social equity.

And this is what we do, every day.

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Communication Advisors

We’re a passionate and professional team who thrive in issue-rich environment and we’re looking for Senior Communication Advisors, Communications Advisors and Communications Executives to join their fast-growing team. 

You’ll have previous agency experience at Senior Account Manager or Account Manager level and be passionate about delivering excellent results for clients. You might be a specialist in PR and media relations who produces compelling editorial content across a range of topics and sectors or you might be a public affairs expert who understands the policy landscape and helps clients build influential relationships. Whatever your specialism, you’ll be an excellent writer, full of creative ideas, with proven client management experience and the ability to provide expert advice our clients.

Your key duties will include:

  • Supporting the key account lead with day-to-day client liaison, providing strategic counsel on day-to-day account matters when required
  • Active involvement in planning and delivering global PR, marketing and digital campaigns
  • Managing content programmes, including mapping out content themes, spotting industry trends and story angles, writing copy when required which may include opinion articles, web and social
  • Building strong media relationships, creating pitches based on your story ideas and delivering content in-to suit the client’s target media and securing opportunities
  • Planning and running client’s social media programmes, and management of their channels
  • Continuously identifying opportunities to grow brand awareness and profile our client’s businesses within their target sector through events, webinars, thought leadership
  • Producing comprehensive and timely reports on client activity 
  • Supporting in the development of client proposals to help grow or win parts of the business


In addition, to be considered for this role, you must be able to demonstrate:

  • Proven background in account handling and direct client liaison – 4 years’ minimum
  • Experience in an agency setting focusing on B2B communication or PR
  • Strong communications skills, verbal and written
  • A background in delivering creative, digitally led B2B communications such as LinkedIn campaigns
  • An innate understanding of earned media, with the ability to create stories and generate coverage across traditional media, digital and social
  • Experience working on content management programmes, with an awareness of the changing way business audiences consume information and an appreciation of search, paid and wider customer marketing activity, and how it all fits together
  • A history of working with clients in a variety of sectors is welcomed but experience in the tech and energy industries is advantageous.

Communication Lead

We’re a passionate and professional team who thrive in issue-rich environment and we’re looking to add a Communication Lead to our fast-growing team. You’ll be a trusted advisor to clients across several sectors in all aspects of communication, external affairs, marketing and issues management. Coming from an agency or consultancy environment, at Account Director level or above, you’ll report directly to the Managing Director and be responsible for a small and busy multi-disciplinary team. You’ll have first-class project management skills, be solutions-driven and excellent commercial acumen too. Alongside the senior team, you’ll work to drive the strategic growth of Aspect.

Your core duties will include:

  • Working with the MD to develop and deliver growth strategies 
  • Attracting and retaining profitable clients across a range of sectors 
  • Leading the creation and execution of strategic communication programmes
  • Inspiring, leading and developing multi-disciplinary teams
  • Developing strong relationships with clients, colleagues and associates
  • Producing high quality pitches and proposals to secure new business 
  • Curating, nurturing and managing a team of talented associates.

You’ll be a skilled communicator, interested and knowledgeable about the key issues shaping the external environment. In addition, to be considered for this role, you must be able to demonstrate:

  • 7+ years of senior leadership experience within an agency or consultancy
  • Experience in Energy, Renewables, Financial Services or Life Sciences would be very desirable
  • Outstanding writing skills and the ability to engage and excite an audience
  • An impressive track record of client attraction, retention and growth 
  • The ability to thrive fast-paced environment managing multiple projects simultaneously
  • Strong influencing and leadership skills to motivate and inspire those around you
  • Excellent planning, evaluation and project management skills
  • To develop new processes, systems and ways of working to drive performance

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CVs and interviews will take you to Level 2. Our behavioural profile will take you to Level 3, vital to identifying future potential.

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LEVEL 2

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LEVEL 3

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