Testimonials

Following a tender process, Health Education England awarded Kate a contract to assist the Commission on Education and Training for Patient Safety to write its report. From the beginning I was very impressed with Kate's flexible approach, the way she immersed herself in this complex subject area and quickly encouraged us to cut through the jargon, drafting content with hard hitting language and to help set a clear structure and tone for the report. Kate accompanied the Commission on regional visits, stakeholder meetings and focus groups around the country over a number of months and was able to rapidly synthesise the findings from each visit and to write powerful case studies about innovative improvements on patient safety education and training. The case studies are what bring the report to life. Kate is a skilled writer and editor, was a huge support during this project and it was a pleasure to work with her. I would not hesitate to recommend her services.

Anna Lee Project Manager - Patient Safety / Global Health, Health Education England April 6, 2017

Reference for Kate Philbin Consultancy Ltd

I have worked with Kate on two recent projects and have been extremely please with the work produced. The first project required Kate to edit and 'Plain English' two lengthy documents with complex formatting and the second project was to develop a number of case studies for use across a communications campaign. Both projects required delivery within tight timescales and Kate rose to the challenge, turning around both projects on time to submit excellent work.

Kate's vast experience in writing and editing is clearly evident in the quality of her work and her attention to detail is superb. I have no hesitation in recommending Kate Philbin Consultancy Ltd on the basis of the quality of work and flexibility to meet deadlines.

Fiona Bell Senior Marketing Manager, Department for children, school and families March 15, 2017

I can confirm that Kate has been a supplier to the NHS Institute of writing services for the past five years.

We have used Kate’s skills to help us develop a wide range of programmes, products and materials, providing writing services for a number of media including manuals, publications, copy for the website etc.

Kate is conscientious and meticulous and has never failed to respond to and fulfill a brief to our complete satisfaction and on time, despite our often demanding timescales and sometimes changing requirements.

Kate is a delightful person, very personable and energetic and I would have no hesitation in recommending Kate’s work or in working with her in the future.

Annie M Taylor Head of Marketing and Communication, NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement March 14, 2017

Kate Philbin was appointed to write the new Food and Drink brochure for UK Trade & Investment, following a competitive tender.

She has done a thorough and professional job of researching and writing the document, using a wide range of source material. Kate has worked in close collaboration with the design agency appointed to the project, Brahm, and the end result is a thorough and well-presented brochure that achieves our objectives for inward investors.

I have found Kate to be helpful and friendly throughout this project and I have no hesitation in recommending her services.

Grace Zhao Marketing Manager, UK Trade & Investment March 13, 2017

I just wanted to say thank you for producing such good text for our youth friendly report. It, together with our two main reports, was published last Friday and got good feedback (including from my in-house teenager).

lan L Johnson Head of Democratic Engagement Branch, Ministry of Justice March 12, 2017

I have worked with Kate on a number of occasions over the last two years, and have found the quality of her work to be very good.

Kate wrote the case studies for the Joined up care programme, and more has more recently written a longer, more detailed Case study for the ambulatory emergency care delivery programme, which I would be happy to share with you as an example of her work.

Kate has excellent communication skills, and is able to interview a range of staff and service users with great tact and sensitivity, and pull together a range of complex ideas and views into something succinct and readable.

Kate always goes the extra mile to understand the subject that she has been asked to write about, doing extensive research until she fully understands the concepts.

She is very flexible and adaptable, which has been invaluable during the refining and editing process, always responding to constructive criticism positively, and her work has always been completed in a timely way.

I have no hesitation in highly recommending Kate .

Carolyn Robertson Associate, NHS Institute of Innovation and Improvement March 11, 2017

Kate has asked me to write a few words about her working with me on Reconnect magazine (www.reconnecronline.co.uk).  In fact, I could point you towards thousands of them - the huge number of stories she wrote and edited for me during my editorship of the magazine, up until I handed the business over to the new owner/editor Scott Williams, at the end of 2016.  Kate’s main role was to write stories for the Wellbeing section, usually from notes supplied by therapists and practitioners.  On a technical level her work was faultless: all stories were run past the contributors and even those she had needed to completely rewrite were approved, normally without a change.  On a more personal level, Kate was a delight to work with: always quick to understand what was required; and always calm and friendly (even when faced with my unreasonable deadlines).  Although our professional relationship has ended, Kate and I remain good friends and I wish her every success for the future.  She deserves it.

Martin Foster Former Editor Reconnect Magazine March 9, 2017

It gives me great pleasure to provide this open reference for Kate Philbin in her capacity as a Marketing and Press Release Consultant.

Kate and I have worked together in the fields of Lifescience and Healthcare over a period of four years. I was introduced to her through the South West of England Regional Development Agency when I was the Director of BioApproaches SW (a former membership network supporting the Lifescience Industry in the South West of England).

At this time Kate provided very lucid and well balanced features and case studies for a number of the region's biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, including, Biovault, Plymouth Marine Laboratories, Thermo Fisher Scientific (Maybridge), the Health Protection Agency (a govemment public laboratory).

Alongside specific case studies I was always impressed with how she quickly articulated complex subsectors such as marine biotechnology and biomanufacturing in promotional features supporting the region's Lifescience industries.

It was therefore a relief to find that I was working alongside her more recently in the summer and autumn of 2009 tackling both the Lifesciences and a greater, more complex, Healthcare sector for further promotional material for the South West of England. This time in my capacity as the Head of Biomedical the commissioned work executed pieces for inward foreign direct investment.

In all these instances I have been repeatedly impressed by her incredible professionalism, often rearranging her diary to meet strict deadlines, and working long hours to manage the customer's best interests. She has been a delight to work with a great sense of humour and interpersonal skills that allow her to manage the expectations of the most difficult and financially constrained project managers.

She has a quiet, calm and confident manner that marks her apart from other marketing specialists that I have worked with and has always provided fiffor-purpose material of the highest calibre. I have no reservations to provide further feedback should it be required.

Gagan Lushai Head of Biomedical (Director of Project), South West of England Regional Development Agency March 8, 2017

Kate’s ability and enthusiasm for the written word is quite frankly, remarkable. Her ability to convey information, passion and enthusiasm in a free flowing way has enabled the message which I wished to impart to my customers, to come across loud and clear. Kate has great focus, as well as a wonderful ability to work with you, both in a creative and dynamic way which can be evidenced in the work that she produces. I highly recommend Kate for all your written work and would not hesitate to use her again in the future.

Julie Makarewicz www.getgoingwithbmt.co.uk March 7, 2017

Kate was commissioned to carry out editing work on a number of modules in the Productive General Practice programme and also to write case studies. Kate has also developed case studies for the Building Safety Improvement Skills (BaSIS) programme recently.

Kate is a pleasure to work with. Her work to is of a high quality and accurate. She is conscientious and very flexible in her approach and has always met the required deadlines, which sometimes have been very tight. She has a vast amount of experience of writing case studies which means that she can provide valuable input into planning and very useful guidance on the approach to be taken.

I would not hesitate in commissioning Kate again in the future for writing, editing or case study work.

Louise Butler Associate, Marketing and Communications, NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement March 6, 2017

BioApproaches South West is the Biotechnology and Life Sciences Network for the South West of England. We work closely with companies and research institutes in a diverse rance of sectors including industrial and medical biotechnology and pharmaceuticals.

Kate has worked with us over the last few months to provide case studies of regional organisations. These studies are to be used to showcase these sectors both within and beyond the region. In this capacity Kate has interviewed a number of key organisations across pharmaceuticals, diagnostics. nutraceuticals. medical devices and marine biotechnology.

It has been important to provide concise, informative case studies with the correct amount of detail and focus. Kate has achieved this very effectively; in some cases distilling complex scientific and business information into a highly readable format. I have been very pleased with the work we have received from Kate and would not hesitate to recommend her services to others.

Should you wish to discuss any aspect of this in more detail please feel free to contact me.

Dr Pauline Lee Network Manager, BioApproaches SW March 5, 2017

This is to confirm that Kate Philbin has been working as a freelance copywriter for Avon Cosmetics for over 2 years. During that time I have found her to be a talented and creative writer with sound commercial sense. She is full of ideas, highly conscientious and an enthusiastic and popular member of the team. I can unreservedly recommend her.

Sharon van Dam Creative Manager, Avon UK March 4, 2017

Over the past six months I have employed Kate Philbin as a freelance writer for around 3 days a week.

During this time Kate has illustrated that she can grasp complicated concepts quickly, liaise with a huge number of internal staff and partner organisations as well as making the dull sound interesting. In addition to providing an extremely high standard of work to tight deadlines, I have always found Kate flexible, patient and able to achieve fantastic results in the face of adversity.

I would happily continue to work with Kate if budgetary constraints allowed, but unfortunately this is not possible, despite Kate's clear value for money.

I would be happy to confirm the above details or discuss Kate's performance in more detail if you would like to telephone me on OI827 252 O55.

Clare Bampton Communications Manager, British Waterways March 3, 2017

I have been familiar with Kate’s work since the early 1990s. She was involved in the launch of the export newsletter I was responsible for whilst Marketing Manager at the British Chambers of Commerce, Export Zone, and remained our sole writer on the publication for nearly 10 years.

Throughout that time, I found Kate to be professional, adaptable and an accomplished writer. She was frequently asked to interview Managing Directors or International Development Directors of UK export companies and I was confident both in her abilities as an interviewer and her skill in turning relatively dry facts into lively and informative stories that would appeal to our target audience.

Occasionally, the people we had asked her to interview could prove quite elusive and I was impressed by her polite persistence in securing the information we needed. She also quickly developed a sound understanding of the issues and challenges affecting UK companies competing in a global marketplace.
Kate also adapts her approach and writing style to the client’s requirements with great ease, which means that she quickly becomes a highly valued member of the extended marketing team.

I would have no hesitation in recommending Kate’s services as a writer and would be happy to discuss her work further if you would like to contact me.

John Harrison International Trade Training and Consultancy, British Chambers of Commerce March 2, 2017

Kate Philbin was hired by the Health and Social Care Awards Team at the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement, to write précis for the 18 national Awards finalists. Kate was asked to take the full application forms submitted to the Awards which contained a large amount of information written in the applicant’s own words, and turn these into a 250 word summary which described the projects and the work they had done. As the timeline for the Awards was very tight this year, Kate was asked to complete the work within a 2 week urgent turnaround timeframe.

From the start, Kate made herself available to us despite the short time-frame, and the need for her to begin the work immediately. She listened very well to the brief that was given and hence produced a high quality product. Throughout the process, she was very flexible to adapt to our team’s way of working in order to make sure the work was delivered on time, which it was. She took feedback on her writing very well, and was easily able to change parts of what she had written in order to meets our needs. Kate was asked to write the précis for a health and social care audience- from GPs and nurses to social care workers. Her resulting copy was concise and easily accessible to a wide audience whilst retaining a professional tone. The entire process with Kate was conducted by phone and email, and this did not hamper her communication to us in the slightest.

I found working with Kate to be a pleasure. She was very professional, friendly and produced very good copy. I would use Kate again for any copywriting jobs and would not hesitate to recommend her.

Penny Newton Marketing and Events Manager, Health and Social Care Awards, NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement March 1, 2017