Charterpath in amongst it at Accountex Summit Manchester
There are a whole lot of mixed emotions going on in the accounting sector right now…
Nervousness about jobs being lost (not helped by a major Xero gaffe)
Excitement about cutting out a ton of admin and revolutionising customer journeys
Curiosity about what’s to come - and how far we can push the envelope
And for me, that made this year’s Accountex Manchester Summit that much more important.
3,300+ finance professionals, 135+ exhibitors, 4 theatres (and hours of CPD).
Everyone from disruptors, trailblazers and start-ups to established market leaders all in the SAME room, having the SAME conversations. Not necessarily agreeing!
Charterpath is now pretty well established in the charity sector - it’s where we’ve built our name and our relationships.
But there is still soooo much more awareness-building to do in the finance world about the game-changing benefits of volunteering. And at a time of huge change in the profession, it feels extra important for us to be right in amongst it.
My real highlight from the day was hearing from so many finance professionals who came to the stand to share their own stories of volunteering…
Magali Phil Lovell - stepped in as a volunteer to help save her local leisure centre in Wales
Sorrel Miller - talked about the professional benefits of volunteering for her and teams she has worked with
Laura Cullen-Day - a low-key volunteer with an all too recent experience of the critical role that charities play in our society
Ryan Pearcy - an accountancy disruptor by day and volunteering for a multi-academy trust in his spare time
Joshua Lambi - a young trustee for a charity in Uganda and exploring independent examinations as a time-boxed way to give back
Julie Breckon - a prolific volunteer whose sister chairs a grassroots American football club in Chester
And the fabulous Gabriela Chiscareanu, who signed up to Charterpath at Accountex 2025, found a role with the PMDD Project and has absolutely smashed it as a super-volunteer.
These stories weren’t all rosy, to be clear. There were some moans too (that's a story for another day)! But everyone agreed volunteering was a life-changing experience and worth the effort even on the toughest of days.
I will be coming for all of you volunteers to persuade you to share your stories on the Charterpath website to inspire more finance professionals to follow your lead.
There were plenty of new ideas brewing too.
It was exciting to chat to Chris Barlow at the University of Liverpool about rolling out a scheme for student volunteers building on our success of the University of Manchester partnership
To meet YouTube legend (of the accounting world) James Wright - yes please to a future collaboration and promoting volunteering to the next gen on socials
And Jim Holland is perhaps the only time I’ll permit accountants to volunteer with a spade rather than their skills, through Carma.
Last but not least, it was brilliant to catch up with existing Accountex friends.. Jonathan Stocks at AAT; Alice and Megan at First Intuition; Rachel Harris and James Harris at Strivex; Rosie Berridge on a panel; and Ashley Leeds, who remains suitably unconvinced by Charterpath’s long-winded slogans 😂.
As ever, the biggest thanks must go to the indomitable Accountex team for being brilliant corporate partners, sharing their platform with us as official charity partner, and recognising that volunteering deserves some airtime alongside AI agents, robots and influencers.
Because for all the talk about how technology is going to change the accounting profession, there’s another question worth asking too...
What are we going to do with the time, skills and capacity it gives us back?
We’ve got a few ideas.
