Like many people who own their own business, graphic design or otherwise, being 'in the chair' is a lonely place to be at times. When the going gets tough you don't want to display the tension you feel internally or share the grief and equally it's good to be able to celebrate success with a peer group member in addition to the team.

To this end and through recommendation from a client company, we have recently started working with a person who is external from Brackenhill in terms of executive responsibility but who meets with us, collectively, every three weeks or so to discuss the previous period and review what the current objectives are for the upcoming period.

The conversations aren't all about work but some of the softer issues as well in terms of communication, psychology and emotions - gleaning how people are feeling about what they're doing.

This has been tremendously helpful in terms of maintaining focus on the priorities and ensuring that even in what is a small business that the team members actually know what's happening rather than just assuming they do.

For my part, apart from the opportunity to have someone acting as a sounding board and sense checking the strategy, the biggest benefit is that it keeps me 'honest'; In fulfilling the commitments I personally make from one meeting to the next it has introduced a level of accountability that wasn't present before.