Promotions & accolades

Duncan Bedhall, Senior Partner

I would like to open this report with thanks to my predecessor, Tim Shuldham, who retired from the Equity Partnership last year. Tim’s contributions to our success, as a Partner, as Deputy Managing Partner from 2013-19, and subsequently as Senior Partner, are substantial and he continues to work closely with the team in Doncaster as a Consultant Partner.

In his final act as Senior Partner, Tim confirmed the re-election of Managing Partner Andrew Bridge for a further three years from 1 April 2022, and the election of myself into the role of Senior Partner for a three-year term commencing 1 October 2021.

One of the great pleasures of being Senior Partner is announcing the promotions of colleagues who have demonstrated excellence in their areas of expertise. In 2021/22, we promoted 55 colleagues with a further 46 progressing from 1 April 2022. The high number of promotions is recognition of our firm’s growth and the success of our career progression framework, which gives everyone the opportunity to advance in the firm if they aspire to do so.

Our Partnership has also grown during this time and we were pleased to promote Helena Tibbitts to Partner on 1 October 2021. A former RICS Matrics Young Surveyor of the Year, Helena leads our rural and residential valuation team and first joined us as an administrator in 2006. She is the epitome of what our career progression framework aims to achieve – a structured progression route with no limits on what they can achieve.

We were also delighted to welcome Miles Youdan to the Partnership in the autumn, joining our Doncaster team to head up our investment agency service. With more than 30 years’ experience in the property investment market, Miles brings a wealth of knowledge to the firm and will open doors for further growth in this area, for us and our clients.

I am also pleased to congratulate Matthew Hodgetts, Matthew Trewartha and Yan Gittins who all progressed within the Partnership.

It has been another successful year for our graduates with 14 individuals passing their Assessment of Professional Competence (APC) in both surveying and planning routes to become chartered professionals.

It is thanks to the dedication of our Graduate Team that our APC success rate remains exceptionally high at 98.2% for the last five years. It has been fantastic to see the team recognised for their commitment to early careers development by being shortlisted for a second, consecutive time for Best Development Programme at the National Undergraduate Employability Awards, facing much larger competition from the likes of IBM, Lloyds and SAP. We have also been placed 69th in the Top 100 Best Student Employers 2022 in our first year of meeting the criteria, having previously been listed in the Top 10 Medium-Sized Schemes in 2021.

Many of our colleagues hold prestigious posts with industry bodies and this year we are pleased to see more individuals flying the Fisher German flag. Reaffirming our longstanding relationship with the Pipeline Industries Guild, Rachel Bridge was appointed Deputy Chair of the Guild, meanwhile Jenny Salt replaced Rachel as the Chair of the Midlands Branch. Rachel Kirk was also elected Chair of the Chester Association of Property Professionals.

We were shortlisted as a finalist in the Insider’s Midlands Residential Property Awards 2022 in the ‘Deal of The Year’ category for the sale of a 100-acre site off Watery Lane in Curborough, Lichfield to Redrow Homes. The site has planning permission for up to 750 homes and a gross development value in excess of £240 million.

Two senior appointments

Charles Warrack has joined our Birmingham office as an Associate Partner who will specialise in the sale, letting and acquisition of offices. He joined our commercial agency department, further strengthening the team’s knowledge and expertise.

Emily Halpin has joined us as Associate Partner to expand our valuation team based at our Banbury office.

We welcomed Miles Youdan who joins the firm as a Partner within its commercial agency department. Miles is an investment agency expert with more than 30 years of experience in the UK property investment market, with a historic focus in the Midlands, Yorkshire and North East regions. He provides specialist knowledge and advice on investment sales and acquisitions, including forward funding developments and sale and leasebacks, to a client base of primarily property companies and institutional investors.

We were recognised as a finalist in the Best Development Programme and Best Student Employers categories in the National Undergraduate Employability (NUE) awards. These awards reward and celebrate the outstanding achievements of employers, agencies, students and universities in undergraduate work experience across the UK and showcase the passion, innovation and dedication of those who are making a difference in the industry.

We welcomed Tom Giddings as an Associate Partner to the minerals team in the rural property management department. Our in-house expertise for geology and mineral property issues is second to none, and we are excited to expand this team to meet the growing demand for this niche knowledge area in the portfolios we manage.