In mid-2020, Tim Warren CA became the primary carer for his child, who had a serious illness. This gave him time to reflect on his career and work out what he really wanted to do.

Having held roles as Chief Financial Officer for a number of established companies and start-ups, Warren realised that his passion and professional future lay with nascent businesses. 

“I came to the conclusion that the best way I can add value was to assist those scaling up a business by delivering sound financial advice, having gone through those challenges in many roles myself,” he says.

The perfect opportunity to dive into this new career path came when he heard about CA Catalyst’s CA in Residence program. “It happened so fast,” he says. “Within two weeks I had a meeting with Stone & Chalk, and I was in.”

‘The big take-away for me was being able to immerse myself in the ecosystem, to understand the challenges these startups are facing, and to give the advice that's going to help them succeed.’ 

Despite Sydney being in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic during the latter half of 2021, Warren worked with 15 different start-ups over the following two months. Stone & Chalk publicised his availability and during the one day a week of his residency, time slots quickly filled with founders seeking free advice. 

“They all had such a range of issues I could help them with, such as financial modelling, market expansion, business strategy, pitch decks, investment strategies or being a sounding board for recruitment,” he says. “And I thought ‘hey, I really like this stuff’.” He also realised they needed continuity and consistency. 

Once lockdown ended, Warren extended the residency to two years. Every Wednesday he sat in the Stone & Chalk startup hub and made himself available for consultations. He also delved deep into helping develop robust models for businesses to become financially sustainable and creating pitch decks with meaningful numbers for potential investors. Additionally, he also offered a course he had created called ‘Top Tips in ScalingUp’. 

“The big take-away for me was being able to immerse myself in the ecosystem,” Warren says, “to understand the challenges these startups are facing, to give the advice that's going to help them succeed.” 

He also served as a judge on two pitch nights with Fishburners, another start-up hub in Sydney, when six founders presented their business ideas to a panel. This experience enabled him to network with investors, accelerators and other parts of the start-up ecosystem. 

Through this experience, Warren discovered his professional calling. “Doing the CA residency program turned out to be the kick-start I needed, to network with start-ups to get their positive feedback and realise that there was a market opportunity for the kind of consultancy I wanted to do.”  

During his residency, he founded ScaleUp Advisors and some of the start-ups he helped in their infancy are now paying clients. He was also inspired by the start-ups' tenacity. “You need a significant degree of resilience to start something new, it’s all too easy to abandon your dream and go get a full time job.”