UK IT Channel News | IT Channel Oxygen
  • News
  • Topics
    • Vendor
    • Distributor
    • Partner
    • Indepth
    • Sustainability
    • M&A
    • People Moves
    • AI
    • Tech trends
  • About Us
  • Partner with us
  • KOcycle Zone
Members
Must-Know Distributors
Oxygen 250
No Result
View All Result
  • News
  • Topics
    • Vendor
    • Distributor
    • Partner
    • Indepth
    • Sustainability
    • M&A
    • People Moves
    • AI
    • Tech trends
  • About Us
  • Partner with us
  • KOcycle Zone
No Result
View All Result
UK IT Channel News | IT Channel Oxygen
No Result
View All Result
Home Careers & Skills

Former teacher and carpenter on bagging £1m deals in the channel 

How easy is it to start a new career in the IT channel? Westcoast's Olly Jeffery and Ampito's George Lavender tell all

Oxygen staff by Oxygen staff
24 February 2025
in Careers & Skills, Indepth, Video
Former teacher and carpenter on bagging £1m deals in the channel 
Share on LinkedinShare on Twitter

A former teacher and carpenter have opened up on their experiences of joining the IT channel from other professions (see above for edited highlights and bottom for full video).

George Lavender and Olly Jeffery both featured in Oxygen Influencers 2024, in association with Nebula Global Services, which highlighted 25 women and men driving positive industry change from outside the boardroom.

Former PE teacher Lavender switched careers to become an account manager at Ampito in 2023, while commercial carpenter Jefferey joined Westcoast as a BDM a year earlier.

How easy did the duo find the transition, and how can the channel tap into more talent from other professions?

We sat down with the two 29-year-olds to find out.

In this podcast, they open up on:

  • How their career changes came about
  • The difficulty of dealing with acronyms in a new profession
  • Their proudest moment in their new careers so far, including bagging seven-figure deals
  • Whether they think the IT channel could benefit from hiring more people from other professions, and how to go about doing this
  • Their main areas of focus over the next 12 months
  • Their dream walk-on songs
Download Oxygen Influencers report

Tags: AmpitofeaturedNebula Global ServicesTrendingWestcoast
Previous Post

Bridewell’s French fancy creates 1,000-employee cyber giant

Next Post

‘Why would we dial back?’ Softcat makes DEI pledge as it waves off Davies

Related Posts

Clare Barclay, Microsoft
Careers & Skills

‘Speechless’ – Barclay joins UK tech elite as she receives Damehood

14 June 2025
Marc Sumner 2025
Careers & Skills

My 8 key takeaways from the Recruitment Advisory Board Launch

13 June 2025
11 MSPs that have recently become B Corps
Sustainability

11 MSPs that have recently become B Corps

13 June 2025
Rob Tomlin and Paul Eccleston, Exclusive Networks
Big Interview

‘I think it’s important to resellers’ – Exclusive Networks VP’s €1bn boast

9 June 2025
‘Vendors without a channel focus were quite lonely’ – 6 leaders give their Infosec 2025 verdict
Cybersecurity

‘Vendors without a channel focus were quite lonely’ – 6 leaders give their Infosec 2025 verdict

5 June 2025
‘An important moment’ – Microsoft partners hail government Copilot experiment showing 26-minute daily saving
AI

‘An important moment’ – Microsoft partners hail government Copilot experiment showing 26-minute daily saving

4 June 2025
Jesse Westgate
Careers & Skills

Softcat’s maiden acquisition sends a clear message to recruiters

2 June 2025
Elisha Kirkham, Softcat
Careers & Skills

‘How’s this not been done before?’ – channel talent pros unite to tackle common challenges

30 May 2025
Next Post
Anushka Davies, Softcat

'Why would we dial back?' Softcat makes DEI pledge as it waves off Davies

Follow Us

IT Channel Oxygen keeps you informed on the UK IT channel and its sustainable transformation. Learn more

  • About
  • Our Team
  • Partner with us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms & Conditions
  • News
  • Cookie Policy (UK)

© 2025 IT Channel Oxygen

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}
No Result
View All Result
  • Oxygen 250
  • Must-Know Distributors
  • Member area
  • KOcycle Zone
  • Big Interview
  • News
  • Indepth
  • About
  • Partner with us

© 2025 IT Channel Oxygen