Sozen Leimon: My slimline business that thrives on crisis

Ten years at management consultancy giant gave Sozein Lemon the experience and contacts to go it alone in a start-up consultancy venture. Last year, the company's sales hit £4m.

When Sozen Leimon's husband was contacted by headhunters from a start-up consulting firm, he told them to speak to his wife. "He knew I was looking for a new challenge." After more than a decade at management consultancy giant Accenture, Leimon felt "disconnected". She'd been promoted to partner but felt she was "spending more time managing and raising my profile within the business than doing the job I liked". So she met the start-up consultancy's boss, Claire Arnold. They "hit it off straightaway". Leimon left Accenture in 2001, and within the year the pair had set up Maxxim Consulting.

The firm's modest size gave it some advantages over larger rivals. "We could specialise instead of trying to be all things to all men." Looking for areas where they could help, they targeted small firms that had seen sales rise sharply, but hadn't yet changed the way they were organised to reflect that. Other clients would include established firms "who found that in a changing market, doing what they always did, didn't make them money any more".

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James McKeigue

James graduated from Keele University with a BA (Hons) in English literature and history, and has a certificate in journalism from the NCTJ. James has worked as a freelance journalist in various Latin American countries.He also had a spell at ITV, as welll as wring for Television Business International and covering the European equity markets for the Forbes.com London bureau. James has travelled extensively in emerging markets, reporting for international energy magazines such as Oil and Gas Investor, and institutional publications such as the Commonwealth Business Environment Report. He is currently the managing editor of LatAm INVESTOR, the UK's only Latin American finance magazine.