LAST month, Trustmarque Solutions announced plans to create a further 23 jobs, increasing its headcount to 140 by September.

The value-added reseller has been growing since Scott Haddow was appointed chief executive and refocused the business on finding IT solutions to business challenges rather than overcoming IT challenges, he said.

“The business was very one- dimensional in that we were fulfilling customer demand as opposed to creating it.”

Scott said the business has changed dramatically, particularly in the last 12 months.

“We are a very different business from what we were.” The value-added services to business have increased the number of businesses the company works for and make up 15 per cent of both its bottom line and top line.

The past year has been one of significant investment, increasing staff numbers from 93 when he took over and expanding geographically, he said.

“Even in a big investment year we have experienced a considerable peak in our profits, so in the next 12 to 18 months that investment will be making it even more successful.

“We have gone against the market,” he said. “A lot of our competitors were waiting to see what happened and how big this horrible crash was going to be. We took the challenge to the market. To survive and grow, you have to do something differently.”

Scott sees further growth on the horizon with the advent of cloud computing.

“We see the approach of cloud computing as an enormous opportunity and probably the biggest thing that is going to happen in the industry over the next ten years.

“People are looking to drive costs out of the IT infrastructure and running costs. Cloud computing will be unquestionably a gigantic proposition to capture,” he said.

The £130 million-turnover business has also invested in obtaining accreditations to be an approved Microsoft reseller and CITHS supplier, which means it has been approved to carry out work for the public sector.

Scott said the business relies on its people and has invested in the skills and training of its employees. It operates flexible working practices and won an award from Graduates Yorkshire in April for having the best graduate internship programme in North Yorkshire.

But he has had to build up loyalty with employees since he was asked to take over as chief executive by Lloyds Development Capital (LDC), which backed former boss Ross Miller when he led a £30 million buyout of the company in August 2006.

“You have got to have the willingness of the employees of the business to want to change. Where you don’t find that, you have to change the people. You have to find those that are willing and able and want to adapt to change.”

He said about 35 per cent of the staff in the business has changed in the last 12 to 18 months, and it hasn’t been difficult to find good quality recruits.

“While it’s a big industry, in some ways it’s a relatively small industry. People know each other, and Trustmarque is seen as a company that’s made significant investment and has been successful driving market changes. People want to be part of that success story,” he said.

In a nutshell

Scott started his IT career in 1999 as an account manager for financial services clients for Computacenter UK in Edinburgh. He worked his way up to become managing director of Computacenter’s Scotland and Ireland business, essentially running its financial services business.

In 2007, he joined global IT training company New Horizons as group managing director, where he acquired and integrated two companies, built a UK management team and re-aligned the business strategy to focus on services-led solutions and propositions.

He joined Trustmarque Solutions as chief executive in February 2009.