Sarah Palmer achieved a 1st class honours degree in Business Management from Greenwich University and was awarded a prestigious scholarship to Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, USA in 2006.
Sarah has a successful career in business and management across different business sectors including retail, recreation and financial services. She qualified as a bookkeeper and established her own practice, ‘Women Who Count Ltd’ in 2009. She has developed that business into a successful enterprise employing a team of eight staff and managing over ninety clients.
Her recent business awards include, runner-up in the Kent Women in Business awards for Leadership and finalist in The Business of the Year & Employer of the Year at the Independent Business Awards Kent.
She supports nurturing bookkeepers and their business and holds the UK licence for the global organisation, ‘Pure Bookkeeping’. She has contributed to industry leading publications and is a regular columnist in the bookkeeping press.
Complementing IAB’s worldwide reach Sarah has established her own effective networks within the bookkeeping industry which extend to Australia and Canada. She has also built relationships with UK corporates including Barclays.
Recognised as an industry leader within bookkeeping Sarah was invited to become a director of the IAB in 2017 and took on the role of Chief Operations Officer in August 2019. At IAB, her aim is to raise the bar in bookkeeping; changing the mindset to challenge and build standards for professional practice amongst bookkeepers.
Alongside the CEO she has been the driving force at IAB instigating modernisation; completely restructuring the organisation and re-defining its focus on integrity in process, practice and performance.
