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Fresh growth opportunities beckon for software consultancy

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Rapidly growing Leeds-based company Burendo is not resting on its laurels and has its sights set on expanding to new cities.

The software consultancy, which specialises in business transformation, went from being a start-up to a staff of 65 and a £10m turnover in just three years.

It was set up by Glenn Crossley, Austen Bell and Gary Green who previously collaborated to launch the Blended Agile Delivery (BAD) Toolkit.

Crossley, whose earlier roles have included a stint as head of IT delivery and agile transformation at Hitachi Capital (UK), said Burendo had “flown under the radar” for its first 12 months while it cemented its reputation with clients.

He added: “We know that we have had phenomenal growth but also have a philosophy to grow at a pace that means we can still deliver a quality services as we did on day one.

“To sustain this quality, we have invested properly in a structure that will help us scale and grow for the future.

“It’s easy to get attracted by the numbers but we’ve seen before that other companies scale too quickly and lose out on quality.”

Crossley, who served with the Royal Marines in the 1990s, said Burendo has invested heavily in its staff.

“Our employees are our biggest asset, and we are keen to ensure everyone is fully supported and equipped with the tools they need to help our customers solve their problems,” he said.

“We’re always planning for the future. There’s a lot of what if scenarios and uncertainty in the economy at present but we’re keen to keep delivering a first class service, which will naturally attract further growth.

“We’re hoping that with lockdown lifting there will more opportunities for us as more sectors resume operating – such as airlines and retail.

“We’re already looking at scaling to other cities and we’ll probably end up with a London presence.”

During the pandemic, Burendo has supported companies as far afield as Atlanta, Georgia in the US, where it has been training and providing consulting to over 60 people per week.

Crossley said: “We’ve grown by 600% during the pandemic. It’s been hard work mentally both for our people and our clients and it’s been difficult working from home.

“But we’ve adjusted by using more online collaborative tools and we’ve actually been able to deliver more working from home that we did before.

“I think there’s a balance to be struck between office and home working. It’s probably never going to go back to how it was.

“When there’s more collaboration needed it’s still good to work person-to-person but a lot of technical work can be done remotely.

“Covid has killed the concept that you can’t work from home. The last 12 months has shown that it is possible to do this and still deliver projects at pace.”

He said despite the firm’s fast expansion it has successfully managed to attract talented staff.

“We’re constantly recruiting and looking for people who can add value to the company,” he added.

“We’ll probably have about 100 people towards the end of this year, and we’re also increasing our client base.”