Nikki Masterman’s journey spans from supermarket checkout assistant to founder of Inspired HR. Overcoming personal challenges and embracing neurodiversity, she built her career through determination and self-learning. Now, she advocates for inclusivity and inspires others to reach their potential.
Nikki Masterman always knew she was impulsive and got bored easily.
After achieving just 40% attendance during her final year of school, she moved from her native North East to Norwich at 17 after becoming engaged.
She briefly attended college to study computer programming but dropped out after only two months. Nikki took a job as a checkout assistant at Tesco in Norwich, where she became known as the “gobby Northerner” whose colleagues would nominate to speak to the personnel manager whenever they were unhappy with something.
At 19, Nikki’s world was turned upside down when her beloved dad died from asbestosis. His dying wish was to take a Mensa test, which he did from his bed. The results revealed that Nikki’s dad was in the top 2% in the country for IQ and intelligence. Inspired by his determination in his final weeks, Nikki decided she wanted more from life. “I felt as though I’d let my dad down, and I wanted to prove what I was capable of,” she recalls.
Wanting to support Nikki’s ambition, her two older brothers paid for her to take a Pitman Beginners Typing Course. Shortly afterwards, Deb, the personnel manager at Tesco – who spotted that Nikki was capable of more – asked if she would be interested in applying for an HR administration position to help her recruit 500 staff for a new store.
“Deb knew I wanted to make a difference in my life, so she invited me to attend an interview with her and the new store manager. I took my dad’s gold pen with me – and got the job!”
This appointment was a pivotal moment for the 19-year-old, who went on to hold numerous manager roles at Tesco.
Nikki spent 11 years with the company before being headhunted by Asda, where she worked for a further eight years. Over that time, she methodically built up a wealth of skills and experience in HR and people management. “It was all self-taught through curiosity and a keenness to learn,” she adds.
After eight years in South Wales and following a divorce from her first husband, Nikki moved back to the North East with her daughter to be close to her family.
Following a decision that she needed to learn more about HR outside of food retail, and a better work-life balance with her daughter as a single mam, she left her secure role in ASDA to do interim HR roles for Tommee Tippee, BGL Group, and Game, which had just acquired Gamestation.
Nikki then joining Serco and Costa Coffee, where she held a regional role covering an area from the Midlands to Aberdeen.
Nikki describes “absolutely loving” her job at Costa Coffee, but says she was treated poorly upon returning from maternity leave and decided to leave. She took the company to an employment tribunal and won, but the experience temporarily led her to step away from HR.
“I did network marketing for 18 months, which was a real eye-opener,” Nikki reveals. “It gave me skills I’d never gained in HR, including business development, sales, lead generation, and networking.”
Despite her career change, Nikki often helped friends and family with employment issues, so much so that she was constantly being asked the same question:
“Everyone kept saying to me, ‘Nikki, you’re brilliant at HR and so passionate about it – why not set up your own business?’”
In March 2017, Nikki established Inspired HR – and has “never looked back”. Describing her goals for her HR consultancy, she says: “I wanted to simplify HR and make it easier for smaller businesses to access it. I’m also passionate about standards, quality, service, and building relationships with people, and I wanted to create a business known for going above and beyond.”
Now in its eighth year, Inspired HR has grown from a sole HR consultancy to a nationwide business. Nikki’s first appointment was, Mark, one of her brothers who paid for her Pitman typing course years earlier. Besides being ex-military, Mark had over 30 years of experience in owning and running small businesses and could bring essential experience and knowledge to the business. He continues to be an essential part of Inspired HR and looks after the recruitment arm as well as being a “rock and shoulder to lean on” for Nikki.
Based in Blyth Workspace, Inspired HR offers bespoke and highly personal services to SMEs and large businesses on a Pay-as-You-Go or retainer basis. They provide full end-to-end people services covering HR, mediation, coaching, recruitment, and training and also recently launched a specialist arm to their business called Inspired Minds providing neurodiversity screening, ADHD coaching and specialist neurodiversity support and advice to individuals, businesses and HR teams.
Nikki describes herself as a “perfectionist with high standards” and “highly values-driven” in her approach to life and work.
Her company values – family, real relationships, integrity, enthusiasm, no-nonsense, dedication and simple (FRIENDS) – are the drivers of everything she and her team do to support their clients.
“Doing our best work for our clients, for me, is everything – we genuinely care about them, their business and their people,” she explains. “We know HR and managing people can be stressful impacting both employees and employers. It’s important to us to deliver our services to a very high standard, but also with warmth, humour and a pragmatic approach to support .”
Nikki now has a core team of ten looking after their national franchise-style licence holders and North East head office, whom she describes as “the most fantastic, loyal, and hard-working team.”
Their dedication has allowed Nikki to explore the impact of neurodiversity in the workplace – a subject that has profoundly impacted her both personally and professionally: “The journey started three years ago when one of my clients, who specialises in ADHD, noticed a trait called ‘stimming’ in my son. I had suspected he had autistic traits due to his challenges with food, but I hadn’t realised the ADHD traits that also potentially existed,” she reveals.
“In conducting research for my son, I found a person with ADHD traits could get bored easily, be impulsive, become overwhelmed, get burnt out and were often a people pleaser.
“I thought ‘oh my god – that’s me! It explained why I was never in school, why I got so bored, why I made a snap decision to move to Norwich – all those things.”
After identifying these traits and many more since, Nikki has sought to understand the impact of neurodiversity in the workplace. She has become an advocate for workplace change and recognition of neurodiversity, offering support to employers and employees through Inspired Minds.
This strategy has proved fruitful, as cases involving neurodiversity now form a significant part of Inspired HR’s business.
“Most of our employment tribunal claims in 2024 were from people who were diagnosing or self-diagnosing but didn’t fully understand their condition,” Nikki says. “I always tell people that recognition or diagnosis is the beginning of your journey, not the end. It’s important to understand the conditions, strengths and challenges they bring to live the best life you can.”
Nikki, a certified civil and workplace mediator, with more than 30 years in the HR field, is now also an ADHD coach and neurodiversity screening specialist.
She says neurodiversity can be tricky to navigate in the workplace.
“The need to support individuals with what can sometimes be complex neurodiverse conditions has risen so quickly over the last few years that management and HR haven’t had the time or access to experts to keep up. They therefore don’t always have the knowledge needed to support them or set appropriate boundaries and expectations.
“Employers are responsible for providing reasonable adjustments to give employees an equal playing field in their role, but quite often, neither party truly knows what this looks like, leading to a common misunderstanding that the full responsibility for adjustments and behaviours sits with the employer, which is not the case.”
In addition to its work with Inspired Mind, the company also recently launched a territory licence, enabling the Inspired HR to expand its HR support nationwide.
Under the model, individuals can pay a licence fee to operate their own consultancy under the Inspired HR brand, benefiting from its proven and successful business structure and receiving ongoing mentorship from Nikki, while also running their business on their terms with the flexibility and hours they choose to work. “It’s like a franchise model, but with more freedom,” Nikki explains.
“I’m currently in talks with several people but it’s quite a long process. They have to have the right experience, and knowledge, align with our values and have high standards for service because it’s my brand and my reputation at risk if I don’t get it right.”
Inspired HR also hosts an annual programme of events, including HR & legal webinars and business networking events, while Nikki recently launched her own podcast – The HR Business Blueprint.
Giving back and inspiring others is a priority for Nikki, who is an avid public speaker, mentor, and school governor.
“I believe your life is what you make of it, and it helps to have a role model to look up to -especially if you’ve struggled in education or are neurodiverse.”
Over the years, Nikki has more than fulfilled the ambition she set herself when her dad died to show what’s she’s capable of. But she has no desire to slow down any time soon:
“My brain never switches off. I’m a 1,000-mile-per-hour person – that’s the ADHD in me. I doubt I’ll ever fully retire.”
For more information visit Inspired HR at www.inspired-hr.co.uk
