After graduating from UCL with a BSc Chemical Physics, Jim took what he considers to be the first meaningful independent decision of his life and sought employment with a local building contractor as a tradesman, eventually qualifying as an NVQ3 level bricklayer. The experience was formative and those years were later to breathe life into the numbers when he became head of finance at Berkeley Group and later an investment director at a real estate focussed private equity firm. Jim is now a cofounder in a new venture with Steve Sanham, placing environmental and social impact as principal priorities, especially in relation to climate change and homelessness.