Ben Heald, CEO
Ben was one of the founders of Sift in 1996 and is one of the company's largest shareholders. He launched AccountingWEB in May 1997, now one of the UK’s largest online professional publishing businesses. He also took responsibility for the subsequent launch of AccountingWEB US, BusinessZone.co.uk, TrainingZone.co.uk and TravelMole. He acted as the first editor, then Community Director of AccountingWEB, then Director of Communities for Sift. In 1999 he formed PracticeWEB, Sift's Software as a Service (SaaS) business for the UK accountancy market. He was appointed CEO of Sift in September 2002.
Having studied psychology at Bristol University, Ben trained as an accountant with KPMG, spending six years in their London office, before 3 years running his own accounting and consulting practice. He sits on the committee of the ICEAW’s IT Faculty.
His fourteen years at Sift has given him a wide range of experience building and launching products within the technical sector and running online businesses. He is a regular speaker at industry events on online business. Ben believes that his job at Sift isn’t about delegating tasks and monitoring results, it’s to imbue the company with a sense of responsibility for the business.
Having recently taken up the piano again after many years, he passed his Grade 8 exam in March 2010 (after failing first time round three months earlier).
Read Ben's latest blog on the Sift.com site.
