Science graduate, professional information scientist, part-linguist, part-musician, part-editor, part-wife and mother – flexibility and understanding in many fields as a result of a good, broad Scottish education.

The diversification from a specialist career in science led to the information world, with Aslib in London, and to employment in such varied posts as the Edinburgh School of Agriculture, the National Coal Board Institute of Occupational Medicine, Aberdeen Rowett Research Institution Commonwealth Bureau of Nutrition and the Robert Gordon University School of Librarianship in Aberdeen.

My subsequent post as a research fellow in Aberdeen University, always fickle, as these unfortunately are for many people, folded, and I took the experience which I had gained there and throughout my various employments to a new ‘mad’ venture of setting up a remote working system, installing a twenty-four hour email and file transfer system from home, and establishing a home-working business.

Early clients were immediately international and prestigious – Information Access, California; Longman Cartermill publishers; GmbH & Co. (German automotive industry); Oilcats – and gradually the network ‘QIN’ developed into a fully internet-based remote work management system, www.remote-work.com, still alive and well.

Our current business network, QIN, uses teams of specialists and project managers worldwide to work remotely on projects, largely editing, scientific writing and database design, and the umbrella company Remote Work Management offers consultancy to organizations on the management of professional staff working from home.

Work-life balance has been a keynote of my career to date. Balancing the benefits of family and personal life with a dedicated attitude to work, without the daily battle of commuting and office stress leads to quality experience in both.