History

For over a decade, holly blue has been built on one conviction: employment law advice should solve problems, not create dependency on it.

That conviction comes from founder Julie Barnett. Her career began in HR at Yarrow Shipbuilders, where she learned first-hand how complex, and how high-stakes, the relationship between employers, unions, and employees can be. She went on to deepen that expertise across local authority, public-private partnership, and education sector roles, before joining RBS Mentor, where a pattern became impossible to ignore: too many advisors kept clients coming back for the same problem, rather than resolving it.

"Julie founded holly blue in 2012 to do it differently, with advice designed to close the issue, not extend the relationship."

That principle has shaped every stage of the company's growth since. Today, Julie leads holly blue's next evolution, a US-based practice combining her employment law grounding with AI-driven tools, built to give clients faster, sharper support without losing the personal judgement that got them results in the first place.

She still treats every client's business as if it were her own, because for over 14 years, growing one has been exactly what she's done.