Meet the Team

Helen Dalton-Hare BEM
CEO & Founder
Helen founded About with Friends around her kitchen table in 2002 with nine initial members and a handful of volunteers. She served on the Board of Trustees until About with Friends became a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) in April this year. She continues to lead the organisation as CEO and attends Board meetings in this role. Helen is from London and worked in Social Services for over 30 years. As a youth worker, she ran the London Brent PHAB Club before joining Barnet Mencap to lead a project with people with Autism and behaviours that challenged, and then moved to Harrow Mencap to lead a project integrating children and adults with learning disabilities into the community. Helen relocated to Norfolk in 1996 and was the Paston College Community Outreach Lead for students with Disabilities before starting About with Friends. She received the British Empire Medal in 2014.
Held a brown belt in judo, and has an ambition to see the world.

Sam Harwood
Deputy CEO
Sam joined About with Friends in 2016 after spending 11 years working as a school administrator and working with young children. Although her title is Deputy CEO she does much more than that, from helping in our catering department on events to manning our charity shop. If help is needed Sam will always be the first to raise her hand.

Jamie Moses
Operations Director
After spending many years as a business development manager Jamie moved on to a career in Business Finance and progressed to the position of General Manager at Honda. In 2010 He decided to try something new and moved to Norfolk. Having enjoyed a fantastic time volunteering at AWF an opportunity came along to join our support staff team and he has worked his way up to his current position.

David Register
Finance Manager
After many years in commercial finance, David became our Finance Manager as well as keeping a tight hold of the Charities’ finances you will regularly find him helping out in our lunch club or delivering a buffet for our catering team. If the job involves money or food David won’t be far away.

Hannah Pennington
Workskills Manager
Hannah joined us from “Jeesal” as Deputy Workskills Manager, her vast experience in support care has had a positive effect on all areas of our service. With her extensive training in Mental Health-Autism and person centred planning, our service has gone from strength to strength with new ventures being added to our range of services regularly.

Katie Wade
Outreach Manager
Katie has had experience both in Health and Social care.
8 years working for the NHS as an Assistant practitioner after completing an FDSC in health and social science graduating in 2014 and 3 years working at Sidestrand Hall School as a residential childcare officer.
Katie is a true Yorkshire girl. She is very bubbly bringing lots of fun and positivity within her workplace.

Laura Smith
HR
After 12 years in Construction recruitment both in Norfolk and Cambridgeshire Laura took 5 years out to raise her 3 young children. After relocating back to Norfolk, she took a part time post with About with Friends as our HR Administrator, she is now an integral part of our strong back office team managing and overseeing our staff recruitment processes.