If you had asked a young Ian Sadler what he wanted to be when he grew up, Head of Global Outsourcing would not have made the list. Vet was the first answer, until the reality of chilly fields at 3am, a perpetual aroma of manure and a less than pleasant boss made him rethink life choices. Cue a shiny red sports car heading to court one summer’s day, and suddenly a suggested career in law looked a lot more appealing. “I wish I could say it was a carefully planned career decision,” Ian laughs. “But really, the thought was more like "here’s an excerpt from Boston Legal, that looks fun, let’s do that.”
So, law it was, until contract law’s fine print dulled the shine. A brother-in-law suggested finance, Price Waterhouse offered an ACA training contract, and from there Ian discovered tax. Not thrilled with all that detail again perhaps but then came the project that changed everything in 1996: building a Brummie processing centre to handle 11,000 tax returns. “That was the lightbulb moment,” Ian recalls. “It was not about tax anymore. It was about process, technology, strategy and outsourcing. Making toast and tea in parallel, basically. And I loved it.”
From there, his career zig zagged through the Big Four and beyond; it crossed borders from living and working in Australia, India and the US. At EY, where he joined (rather unexpectedly) as a partner for over a decade, he built a team focussed on international tax compliance and reporting, finance function outsourcing and general business transformation – wrangling 110 EY offices to deliver outsourced finance and tax services for a global telecoms business, winning the best LexisNexis Tax Team award and even relocating thousands of hours of compliance work to Bangalore.
After a short stint as a Deloitte partner, which Ian admits was probably not the right cultural fit, and a contract role at Grant Thornton, where politics got in the way of this turning into a global leadership role, he spent a further decade building global and UK outsourcing practices at RSM with a US colleague who turned him into a Green Bay Packers fan.
Were these moves meticulously plotted on a whiteboard? Not exactly. “Honestly, a lot of it was chance conversations, networks, and instinct,” Ian admits. “Some decisions were smart. Some less so. But I have always trusted that if you enjoy something and it feels straightforward to you, that is probably your sweet spot.”
Now, post RSM, Ian is looking forward. He is back at Business School whilst leaning into AI and advisory roles, including his work with Hansel, helping the next generation navigate careers that are, to borrow his own phrase, gloriously squiggly.
His advice? “Arm yourself with enough information to make good decisions at the big turning points but stay flexible. Careers are not linear anymore. And do not underestimate those human skills, empathy, negotiation, just picking up the phone. AI cannot do that for you.”
Oh, and one more thing. “Never forget to check what is on your screen before you share it in a meeting,” Ian grins. “Or you will end up explaining why half of EY has just seen your complex spreadsheet predictions for Aston Villa in the Premier League. Trust me, once is enough."
Do you have a real life career story to share? Get in touch and let us know you'd like to share your views on working in audit, risk, compliance, data analytics, ESG or cyber security in your own article.