CRICKET lover Nick Ledgard knows there’s a lot to be said for teamwork.

As managing partner at Huddersfield chartered accountancy firm Walker & Sutcliffe, he helps foster a spirit of teamwork among the staff at its Greenhead Road offices.

And he encourages clients to take a team approach when it comes to strategic planning for the future – both in dealing with directors and employees as well as accountants, bankers and solicitors.

“That is what I enjoy,” he says. “Asking companies: ‘Where do you want to be in three years’ time?’ – and helping them achieve their business goals.

“You have a team of directors running the company, but you need an external team – accountants, bankers and solicitors – who are a team of advisers and who are there to help.

“Typically, the members on a board of directors have roughly the same ideas, but they are pulling in slightly different directions because they are not focused. We aim to help them focus on where they want to be and how they intend to get there – putting interim goals and targets in place.

“It is also about saying it’s okay to fail to hit those targets. Getting close to those targets is a lot better that if we had set no targets at all.”

Nick draws a timely analogy to explain the importance of planning in business. “You can’t sit in your car ready to drive away with your front windscreen frosted over – but a lot of people are potentially driving their businesses without being able to see clearly the way ahead.”

Having professionals in the team gives businesses an advantage, says Nick. “Many of the issues and problems are the same for all firms. We can help companies sort them out because other clients have had the same issues.

“We are also a sounding board – someone removed from the day-to-day issues, who can offer support and encouragement.”

Says Nick: “Companies face more and more regulation and there are more areas where you can be caught out. As the boss you should be working on the business – not in the business, but it is extremely difficult for small firms to devote time to strategic planning.

“We advise that business bosses take time during the week to look at strategy, instead of getting too involved in the nitty-gritty.”

Nick believes in teamwork to help raise his own game – and in so doing benefit his clients.

He is a member of Vistage, an organisation for managing directors and managing partners which holds monthly meetings for its members in the Huddersfield, Halifax and Harrogate areas to listen to expert speakers and discuss common concerns.

“Vistage has helped me and it has helped Walker & Sutcliffe,” says Nick. “Members are not allowed to trade with each other, so we are entirely objective about our businesses. The advice and information I get from being a member of Vistage, I can pass on to the rest of the team and our clients.”

At school, Nick says his ambition was to be a civil engineer, joking: “But my father said I was not very civil! In the event, my brother was training to be an accountant and I thought that was for me. I was always good at maths.”

Nick, who hails from Mirfield, was also good at cricket. He was captain of the cricket team in his final year at Woodhouse Grove School, Applerley Bridge.

Originally an all-rounder – until losing his bowling action during his teenage years – Nick has kept faith with the game. He has played for the same club for 35 years – Mirfield Parish Cavaliers and its forerunner Dewsbury Cavaliers – and has won prizes at all levels from under-13s upwards.

Although Nick no longer plays regularly, he still turns out when the team’s a player short. “One day, my wife Debbie and I were making the teas when I was asked to play,” he says. “I opened the batting so I could get the teas ready, then after tea took two wickets to win the match. One of the opposing players was complaining that they had lost the game to 10 men and a tea lady!”

Now Nick swings a golf club at Huddersfield Golf Club and has set a target of reducing his handicap of 22 by the end of 2011. “If you have played ball games, there’s no feeling like timing a shot to perfection,” he says. “You get a lot of camaraderie at golf and it’s also good for your health. The way I play, it’s a five-mile walk even when the course is only three miles!”

One of Nick’s proudest moments didn’t involve a cricket bat or a golf club. “I played the violin when I was young, which led to me going on a tour of West Germany with the National Scouts and Guides Symphony Orchestra in 1985,” he recalls. “On our return, we played Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance No 1 in the Royal Albert Hall. I have not played a note since I left school, but I will never forget that experience.”

Nick graduated with a BA in accountancy at Liverpool Polytechnic and began work for a firm in Headingley, Leeds, where he received a good grounding in general accountancy practice. He later joined Bell Moorby in Huddersfield – where he met Debbie. They married in 1994 – the same year Nick qualified as a chartered accountant.

In 1997, he joined Walker & Sutcliffe, a general practice covering everything from personal tax, corporate tax and inheritance tax to accounts, book-keeping and audit. He became a partner in 2000.

In recent months, the well-established firm has had a change of image, introducing a new logo and a new look as well as upgrading its website.

It has also established a joint venture with wealth management specialist Robertson Baxter as well as referring clients to Eastwood and Partners for some matters.

“It means we can offer everything,” says Nick. “Our mission statement is all about the client and getting the client to where they want to be. I think we can now say we fulfil our mission statement.”

Nick is keen for the firm’s new-look website to provide a forum for client firms to help each other. “The idea is for them to form a ‘peer group’ in the clients’ area of the website where they can pose questions and get answers from other clients and professionals.

“I am optimistic about the next five or 10 years – for Walker & Sutcliffe and for Huddersfield and its businesses. It can really drive forward. I am enthusiastic about that and about being a part of helping people achieve what they want.”