Suzanne Watson has come a long way since she spent a week’s work experience in the newsroom of the Bradford Telegraph & Argus around 30 years ago.

After working initially as a journalist before going into public relations, Suzanne now owns one of the biggest and most successful PR firms in the region, Approach PR in Ilkley.

And now she has taken on another huge challenge after succeeding Nick Garthwaite as president of the Bradford Chamber, a key body for businesses around the Bradford district.

Initially shocked by the prospect of taking a senior role in the Chamber when asked by Nick to be his vice-president, Suzanne is now relishing the chance to help shape the voice of businesses in the Bradford district.

She took some time out of her increasingly manic schedule to talk to Bradford Means Business about her journey to one of the very top roles in the district’s business community.

Suzanne first joined the Chamber not long after launching her company Approach PR Ltd in 2001. She felt it was important to have the support of an organisation like that in the early days of setting up on her own.

“I’ve really valued the networking opportunities and events. Nothing beats getting away from your desk and spending a couple of hours with like-minded people. Yes, it can be about finding new business but it’s also about finding your sanity, finding friends and often finding comfort in the knowledge that other business owners and operators are experiencing the same challenges as you are,” she said.

Suzanne was asked to join its Leadership Group in 2009, and in 2017, Nick Garthwaite of Christeyns – an international chemicals and detergents manufacturer – asked her to be vice president.

“It was a huge shock as I wasn’t aware of a small business owner having been in the position before. I arranged to meet and talk with current vice presidents, presidents and past presidents to find out how the role and the experience had been for them,” she said.

“While I felt privileged to be asked, I had to think carefully about the impact on my business of taking on such a responsibility. At Approach I am still very hands on because, quite frankly, I love my job so I wanted to talk with the team about the impact on all of us and of course to my husband and family. The role, I knew, would bring longer days, late nights, more events and new commitments.

“I realise now that having a president who is a small business owner rather than being part of a large organisation is a very relevant & reflective representation of the membership. An incredible 99.4% of Bradford’s businesses are SMEs (small to medium enterprises with under 250 employees) and 88% are micro businesses with 10 staff or less. This makes my position, my experience and my track record relatable to over three quarters of the local business population.

“Because of that – and because of my commitment and passion for the role – I hope to be a motivating and an authentically representative president for the next two years.”

Suzanne knows only too well the challenges that setting up and running a business can bring, and says it took pretty much a decade for her to comfortably feel that Approach was here to stay.

“When we hit our 10^th birthday in 2011, I finally realised that yes, we’re established, we’re not going anywhere and after ten roller coaster years of four office moves, 10 PR awards, one brush with the bailiffs, providing employment for 12 people and riding out the crippling downturn, here was a business I could and should be proud of and one which I could see a future for,” she said.

That long career path to running her own successful company started as a journalist in the early 90s.

Born in Halifax General Hospital she lived with her mum, dad and brother Chris in Rastrick near Brighouse before moving to Outlane and then to Gomersal in Cleckheaton.

Suzanne loved English at school, particularly creative writing. Authors who inspired her included Enid Blyton, and then in her teens, the Brontes and the way they captured the mystique of the moors.

And it was this love of writing that nudged her towards her choice of profession.

“Careers advice back then was very basic – a 20-minute conversation where usually teaching, nursing or admin was suggested,” she said.

“But someone somewhere had mentioned journalism which got me thinking about how this would use my love for writing. I put pen to paper and wrote to the T&A and got myself a week’s work experience in 1989.

“I’ll never forget how exciting it felt as I arrived the first morning, walking up to the imposing front door on Hall Ings. The buzz of the newsroom, the noise of the keyboards, phones ringing. I had my first trip to City Hall with the civic reporter. And I was lucky enough to go out with one of a team of photographers, whizzing around the district on several jobs a day. We were always walking out of the door at a real pace, so much sense of urgency. I loved the thrill of seeing the story unfold and from that week on I was hooked.”

Suzanne says she has always felt you have to make your own luck, and when she found herself living in North Wales, she decided to write to the local newspaper asking for work experience.

She was accepted by the North Wales Newspapers Group, which produced the Wrexham Leader and the Evening Leader, and one week became two, and then she was interviewed for and given a role as a junior reporter.

“While there I covered everything from Poll Tax riots in Wrexham town centre to a family reunited after the coming down of the Berlin Wall,” she said.

She moved back to Yorkshire to work on the Spenborough Guardian and has many happy memories of her time there.

“It was incredible in so many ways – the building housed its own printing press and as a team of young reporters we were involved in every part of news gathering from finding our own news – my ‘patch’ was Heckmondwike – to writing it up on one of just two computers (much was still written by hand) to proof reading, working with the compositors where we’d see our stories getting laid out and pasted onto a board before being transferred to film for printing and then watching the paper come hot off the press, bundled and put into the vans for delivery,” she said.

“I feel incredibly privileged to have seen and been a part of news production that is now mostly consigned to history.”

But while she loved the people side of being a journalist, the finding a story, creating news and seeing it materialise into print, she was uncomfortable with other areas, like ‘death knocks’, laborious council meetings and the ‘news at any cost’ mentality that she saw in reporters from other local papers.

“It just wasn’t me. I went to the local library to research careers relevant to journalism and found a book on PR. I realised this was the source of the occasional press releases that we wrote and so began the start of my next chapter. You guessed it… writing to as many PR companies as I could find with my CV and portfolio of news clippings under my belt.”

Her first PR job was as a junior account executive with Quadrant PR in Mold, North Wales in 1993. The company’s clients included Kimberly Clark, Hamilton Oil, Glaxo Pharmaceuticals, Warwick International and the Tobacco Alliance.

“My first mentor was a wonderful man who sadly passed away almost 20 years ago. Jeff was a former reporter in South Africa, he’d covered many news stories around Nelson and Winnie Mandella – his portfolio was incredible. I still follow his advice today and hear his voice as I write. I’m still close friends today with his family.”

Then in 1999, her daughter Melissa was born, and everything changed for her. She knew right from the start she wanted to continue working, but she also wanted to be in a position to get the most out of being a parent.

“While I still wanted a fulfilling career, I wanted the flexibility of knowing I could drop everything and be at every assembly, every concert, every sports day. I just wanted to be the best mum I could be – I’ve always known that those years are time you never get back and you have to make the best of them while the children need you,” she said.

“I’ve always wanted to minimise any regrets as far as parenting is concerned, don’t we all? But for me, the best way of creating the balance was to be my own boss and to take control. It was the scariest leap I’ve ever made and with my eyes wide shut, I took it.”

Initially working on a freelance basis from the spare room at home, Suzanne soon generated some strong contracts and started to think about an office.

“I wanted to create some separation from home and work. Before I knew it, I needed an admin person to help with all the paperwork, faxing (!) and photocopying. Step forward a few months and new business wins meant I needed to bring in my first PR account handler – and it continued to grow from there.”

Approach’s first office was in an old converted mill on Balme Road in Cleckheaton, then it moved into a larger space in Heckmondwike which was where the encounter with bailiffs took place.

“Our rent wasn’t getting passed on to the landlord and my team of four turned up one cold, Thursday morning in November only to find the doors locked with everything the business owned trapped inside. I manged to negotiate entry after several days of pleading phone calls and our options were to stay on at an increased rental cost or move out. We moved out and into shared office space in Parkgate House in Little Germany,” she said.

That was a key moment in the company’s history, putting it in the heart of the Bradford business community.

“We absolutely embraced the location becoming more active within the Chamber, holding events ourselves and becoming champions for the city and the district,” said Suzanne.

In 2012 the firm moved to Ilkley. “It’s a wonderful place to work with a very close community and is a place where we contribute to the town by working with local schools, community groups like the Soroptomists and Ilkley & District Good Neighbours and we’ve delivered the PR and social media for Ilkley Carnival since 2011 helping that event  to move from making a loss in 2011 to making just under £100k profit in eight years.”

She has no doubt that the success of Approach is down to its people. “A business is only as good as those within it and I’ve managed to attract, over 18 years, a series of like-minded people who share my values and work ethic.

“And for us, PR is immensely personal – we put our hearts and souls into understanding a client’s business objectives and working with them to put a strategic plan in place to make sure our expertise helps them reach those objectives. It’s hugely rewarding and I still get a real ‘newsroom buzz’ when stories we’ve created for our clients make it into the press. We have a victory bell for any good client news from securing coverage to winning new business – the best days are when it just keeps on ringing!”

Looking ahead to her new role, Suzanne said: “I am looking forward to the challenges and opportunities ahead through the Chamber presidency – I’ve absolutely no doubt this will be two years of real personal growth and development.”

The fact that she is president and her vice-president is Victoria Wainwright, managing director of accountancy firm Naylor Wintersgill, is a significant one, she said.

“For the first time in Bradford Chamber’s 168-year history, there is a female president and female vice president. We are both leaders in our own businesses, we are both parents and we both have a shared vision for supporting SMEs and micro businesses.

Bradford Chamber was a constant voice in issues of importance to the business of our district, and that was vital, said Suzanne.

“From helping to develop the objectives of the economic strategy to feeding back business views on infrastructure and connectivity, closing the skills gap and campaigning for a city centre station on the proposed Northern Powerhouse Rail line, the Chamber’s role is vital for keeping local business issues on the top of the national and local government agendas.

“If we can be an inspiration to other young people wanting to set out in business then that is fantastic. My mantra, whether talking to my own teenage children or the team here in the office, is simply to believe in yourself, be authentic and live every day outside your comfort zone. Only then do you see what you’re truly capable of and really fulfil your potential.”

“Without a Chamber of Commerce, a city and a district is mute. We’ve made a difference to this district for over 150 years – but this chapter, with the prospect of better connectivity, a strong pipeline of talent, and a cultural and an economic offering of which we are rightly proud… This is the chapter of unification, where Bradford comes together, fulfils its potential and takes its place again on a national and an international stage.

“I’m incredibly passionate about the connectivity of Bradford and making sure that we are on that Northern Powerhouse Rail line that will connect Bradford in seven minutes to Leeds and in 20 minutes to Manchester. I’m delighted to be supporting past president Nick Garthwaite in the delivery of the district’s second Bradford Manufacturing Week. I’m a huge supporter of the Chamber’s Raising the Bar initiative which recognises and rewards those businesses who are encouraging and delivering positive social impact in their local communities.

“And in my support of micro and SME businesses, I have launched a Business Support Toolkit which can be accessed on the Bradford and the West and North Yorkshire Chamber website.”

Talking about Bradford going forward, Suzanne said: “We’re all experiencing incredibly challenging times with the economy and so much uncertainty. It affects decision making, considerations around import, export and general confidence.

“However, Bradford has a £9.5bn economy and there is an emerging confidence among the business and the wider community, reinforced by our bid to be City of Culture in 2025 and by an ambitious economic growth strategy, which is fuelling a generation of business people who are determined to showcase Bradford for the business powerhouse it really is.

“As the third largest economy in Yorkshire and the fifth largest economy in northern England, never has there been such commitment and drive to get people into work, to improve the skills of our young population, to encourage even more entrepreneurs and to support and grow Bradford’s 15,500 businesses.”