About Emma Ross

My roots in creative enterprise

During the late 1990s and 2000s, I worked within Cardiff's independent music scene, including working for Ankst Management, the artist-management side of Ankst Records. My work included developing web presence and providing promotional and live-performance photography for bands including Melys, whose song 'Chinese Whispers' reached number one in John Peel's 2001 Festive Fifty, Topper and Derrero.

I later established Petrified Records with the late James McHardy, supporting independent artists and bringing creative projects into the world. One memorable highlight was seeing my video for Nameless' 'The Salt Flats' included on the MTV2 playlist.

That period gave me direct experience of independent enterprise, creative collaboration and the practical work involved in making things happen. At the same time, I felt pressure from others to get a 'normal' job, rather than continue pursuing a less conventional career in the creative industries.

 

A career across different worlds

My interest in how things work began early. While I was still at secondary school, I was involved in software testing for my dad. Later, while studying for my degree in animation, I worked at NTL, providing feedback on the user experience of its intranet to help improve it across three regional sites. Around the same time, I was also one of the skippers of the Cygnet, one of Cardiff Bay's original water buses.

Over the years, I've worked across creative businesses, technology and public services. This has included involvement in the design, build and launch of customer-facing mobile applications and accompanying website refreshes for Cardiff Community Housing Association and Cardiff Council.

These experiences have allowed me to see organisations and services from different perspectives: the people creating them, those responsible for delivering them and those who rely on them. They've taught me to look beyond how a service or process is intended to work and consider how it is experienced by the people delivering and using it.

Many years after working for Ankst Management, I found myself moving into another kind of angst management, qualifying as a mental health counsellor.

 

Why this work matters to me

I grew up seeing both the freedom and the vulnerability that can come with self-employment. My dad was entrepreneurial, creative and hard-working, but when a spinal injury left him unable to work, we lost our family home.

That experience stayed with me. It gave me an early understanding that decisions about work, business and financial security don't happen in isolation. They can affect families, relationships, opportunities and the choices people feel able to make.

It's one of the reasons I've remained interested in the relationship between work, ambition, financial security and the wider lives we want to lead.

I understand why people want to build successful businesses, develop their careers, take on new challenges and create greater financial freedom. I also know that there can be a cost when achieving those things demands more time and energy than we can sustainably give.

I've experienced burnout twice, the first time badly, and it's not an experience I'd wish on anyone. It has influenced how I think about work, wellbeing and the pressures people place on themselves or find themselves working under.

I don't believe that building a business, pursuing a career or fulfilling professional responsibilities should automatically mean sacrificing our health, relationships or the things that matter to us. Nor do I believe that people's wellbeing or the environment should be treated as acceptable collateral damage in the pursuit of success.

That doesn't mean there are always easy choices or straightforward solutions. Financial responsibilities, organisational pressures, personal circumstances and competing priorities are real, and they can make change difficult.

What matters to me is helping people explore those complexities thoughtfully, rather than assuming they simply need to work harder, become more resilient or push through.

Across my work, I value creating space for people to consider their experiences, understand their circumstances and make choices that are meaningful and appropriate for them.