Meet the Clipsham IT Team

Kay Bruen

Kay is the founder and owner of Clipsham IT which was established in 2009 to provide a new professional recruitment company specialising in cyber security.

Kay has over 20 years’ experience of working at the forefront of security technologies. She started her career at Integralis which sparked a passion for IT, and then moved into a sales role within distribution which she loved as it paid her to do what she enjoys most which is meeting people, and building strong relationships. She was head hunted by Risc Technology (a French security distributor) in 2003 to become the Managing Director of their new UK arm which she established from scratch and built into a successful competitor to the established companies in this space. The Risc Group were subsequently acquired by NOXS Europe, and then again in 2007 by the Westcon Group. Kay was chosen to lead the new merged security practices in the UK, and successfully grew the business to become a significant player in the market.

Having established a business for someone else, it was inevitable that as someone with entrepreneurial spirit she would eventually set up her own company, but it was not anticipated that it would be in recruitment! Initially Clipsham IT was established as a consultancy business to provide strategic development services for emerging technology vendors who wanted to build a market presence through channel in EMEA. Once established, it was logical that these vendors would need to hire regional teams, and this was an additional service offered to those companies. In time, many vendors who had worked with Kay in distribution discovered that she was offering recruitment and asked her to work with them as she had a unique understanding of their business, culture and requirements, and as a result of demand, Clipsham IT is now solely a senior level head hunting company.

As a person, Kay is highly competitive, extrovert, straight talking, honest, sociable and fun loving. She derives great satisfaction in having built a successful business of her own, and using her people skills, industry knowledge and experience to delight clients with a first class service, and help senior people forge rewarding careers.

Caroline Johnson

Caroline started working for Clipsham IT in 2015, a professional recruitment company specialising in cyber security.

Caroline completed a degree in French at Reading University and then went off to gain some “business experience” before applying for a role that needed business skills and French. That role led her into the world of IT. Caroline worked for LanBase, a networking reseller for four years selling networking solutions until a project selling networking and firewalls turned her head. She decided that she wanted to specialise in security solutions. Caroline moved to Allasso to gain more focused experience in the security arena and then enjoyed 15 years working in security distribution. She worked for Risc Technology, Noxs, Westcon and Avnet TS selling security solutions to both the channel and to end user clients.

In 2003 Caroline was instrumental in helping to set up the UK office of Risc Technology from scratch. Here she learned a huge amount about the channel and new and emerging security vendors. The Risc Technology team helped vendors (often in the early stages of penetrating the UK market) to choose the most relevant and proactive channel partners. Caroline has worked as an Account Director, managing the largest System Integrators and Consulting partners and as a Product Manager working with Blue Coat, Fortinet, RSA, Palo Alto Networks, F5 and CyberArk and many others.

At Clipsham IT Caroline learned from Kay how recruitment should be done, with honesty, integrity , respect and discretion. Caroline has found a passion, one of helping friends and contacts whom she has made along the way find a role and company that is right for them. Nothing gives her more satisfaction than matching candidates and clients whom she knows will just “gel”. She loves coaching candidates through the recruitment process and providing a true 360 view of an opportunity. Caroline’s aspiration is to make the recruitment process easier, smoother and with a personal touch.

As a person Caroline is considerate, sociable, tenacious, competitive, has a great sense of humour, and enjoys having fun. She loves working for a “boutique” head hunting business as it allows her to combine her enthusiasm for the cyber security space with a love of helping people on their journey to find a great position. Quite simply she has found an unexpected passion in head hunting.