Meet the team - Kelly

We wrap up this current series of Meet the Team pieces by taking time out for a good old catch up with our Company Director, Kelly.

So get yourself a brew and come on in as we ask Kelly what it’s like to work with her husband and what fires her up about work and life in Greater Manchester.

What is it that you wanted to achieve when you set up Euan Kellie?

That’s a big question to start with! It’s quite something to look back over a decade and think about our original business goals and whether we’ve achieved them.

We wanted to offer an alternative to the large, corporate consultancies, and set out our stall for how we felt a planning consultancy should be run – embracing a positive working culture and values.

It was all about being agile and working collaboratively and responsively. And, of course, acting on a conviction that we were really good at what we did and wanted to have a positive impact in placemaking.

10 years on, I feel pretty happy about how things are going. We’re staying true to our original goals, and really enjoying it.

Did you ever think twice about going into business with your partner?

No, there was never any question about us working together. We met at work, so we knew we worked well as a team.

For us, it was a really positive thing; we could pool our resources and efforts so that work was a lot more focused. And there’s no need to download at the end of the day when we’ve just been talking things through in the office.

My sister, Donna, joined the business in 2023, so it really is a family affair!

What’s your professional background?

I’d always been interested in town planning so, after human reading geography at the University of Reading, I did a two-year town planning masters in Liverpool (Master of Civic Design). It’s what brought me to the north west and I’ve never looked back.

One of my first jobs was involved in masterplanning and visioning at BDP. The role was fascinating and gave me plenty of opportunity for creativity, but I also learnt firsthand the reality of how long it takes for high level masterplans to be delivered. I worked on plans for Stockport town centre, including the bus station site; 20 years on, its transformation has only recently been realised. It’s a real testament to the skill and hard work that goes into delivering major projects like Stockport Interchange.

After moving to Drivers Jonas, I learnt that the faster-paced projects were a better fit for me. I enjoy securing planning permission and then seeing things getting built within much shorter timeframes.

What makes Euan Kellie different from its competitors?

I like to think of us as a boutique consultancy. We’re a small team so we’re not going to work on every project out there, but our clients know that if they want someone to be wholly dedicated to a scheme, they come to us.

Our whole team is really passionate and I honestly don’t think any of us see it as “just a job”. We’re invested in having great client relationships, and we work hard to deliver the best.

And we like to have some fun and add a bit of colour to our working day.   

What do you bring to the team?

As one of the Company Directors, I place a huge importance on looking out for and cheering everyone on. I also look for ways to push them on in their careers.

In my day-to-day, I do spend a lot of my time on the business itself, so I’ve learnt to be someone who will have assertive conversations and make sure the business is moving forwards like we want it to be. I also love looking after our lovely clients well.

When it comes to project work, I’m more of a details person. I like EIA work, because there’s an established process to work through and a legal structure to follow.

What I love about our team is that we all bring something different to the table, and we work to our strengths. But be warned, if I see some potential in you to grow in a particular skill professionally, don’t think I won’t push you out of your comfort zone!

What’s your particular area of expertise?

I’m a generalist and enjoy the variety of getting to work on development proposals from across the sectors.

I do love discharging planning conditions, probably for similar reasons to why I like EIA, though I think it’s also because I relish getting to see things take shape on the ground. When you’re discharging conditions you need a commercial understanding and to grasp the critical path for a successful construction project. I enjoy the juggle, the tight timeframes and the forward thinking that’s required to get conditions discharged and to unlock a project so it can start on site.

What fires you up?

It’s simply about getting results for our clients and seeing developments we’ve worked on take shape in real life.

It’s just really fun being at the frontline of development and regeneration, seeing the city change before your eyes and knowing that you’ve played a role in that.

I love being able to advise how clients can work with the planning system to achieve their goals. We work hard to understand a client’s objectives, find solutions to problems and deliver the right planning permission for them. There are so many different ways to approach a problem, and when you can find an innovative way of resolving a client’s issue it’s really satisfying.

More often than not, we know a client’s planning permission better than they do, and we’ve ensured it has the right amount of flexibility to be deliverable and valuable to them. Our scheme at Castle Irwell is a case in point.

Describe your perfect working day

I like to start the day checking in with my brilliant team mates, especially Donna and Katie who both work remotely.

Then I’ll get stuck into some actual fee-paying work and enjoy getting my head into the detail of a project to get a result or move something forward.

I’ll have a client meeting, too, for the interaction with people and discussing – and solving, of course! – a problem.

My perfect day ends by walking our dogs, Ted and Ronald.

What do you do for fun?

We spend a lot of time in the Yorkshire Dales, it’s one of our favourite places to go walking with the dogs.

And I enjoy cooking and entertaining. The rest of my family all still live down south, so I love to invite the whole family over and host them at ours for a good old get together.  

Tell us something we don’t know about Donna

Donna’s a real numbers person, and I’m not at all. So I definitely feel like our strengths complement each other and we make a good team.

Even though I’m her big sister I always rely on her for advice. She’s the wise one of the two of us. She’s so wise that when we were younger, she had her own language that only she could understand!