Financial services firm Smith & Williamson announces 6 new Bristol promotions

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Nicky Godding

Smith & Williamson, a financial services firm which is part of leading wealth management and professional services firm Tilney Smith & Williamson, has strengthened its senior team in Bristol with the announcement of several new promotions.

Helen Bassett, formerly a director in the Assurance and Business Services (ABS) team, becomes a partner.

Helen leads the Business Outsourcing Services team in Bristol and has more than 20 years’ experience helping high growth businesses to achieve their financial and business ambitions. Skilled in accounting-related compliance and advisory, Helen is a specialist advisor to tech businesses across sectors including fintech, cyber security, agencies, medtech, AI, animatronics, SAAS, mixed reality, realtech, gaming, product development and experience tech.

Kirsten Thompson has also been promoted to associate director in tax and Leigh Cecil a senior consultant in financial planning.

There are also four new senior managers at Smith & Williamson in Bristol - Natasha Bennett and Jon Rennicks (ABS) and Robert Davies and Tara Meadus (tax) - and two new investment managers, Emily Lunt and Rory Mason, plus four new assistant managers.

Nigel Hardy, managing partner in the Bristol office, said: “The fact that Helen joined the firm as an apprentice and has worked her way up to partner shows that we are always ready to recognise and reward rising talent.

“Her promotion - and that of her senior colleagues - demonstrates that post-merger, Tilney Smith & Williamson in Bristol continues to go from strength to strength.”

Tilney and Smith & Williamson merged last year when the business was renamed Tilney Smith & Williamson. The Group said there will be no immediate changes to its existing principal client facing brands: Tilney, Smith & Williamson and Bestinvest.

The merger created a wealth management and professional services group with more than £47 billion of assets under management (AUM) and around £530 million of pro forma revenue. Tilney Smith & Williamson is the third-largest UK wealth manager when ranked by revenues and fourth when measured by AUM. It is also the sixth-largest UK professional services group by fee income.

The merged business has around 290 investment managers, 265 financial planners and more than 140 professional services partners and directors located across an extensive office network across the UK, including offices in Bristol, Cheltenham, Hereford and Bracknell.

Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe. After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts. She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.