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Kern Analytics, End-Dated: Why Closing the Company Isn’t Failure

By Tim Nightingale October 2, 2025 Posted in Contracting
Kern Analytics, End-Dated: Why Closing the Company Isn’t Failure

Kern Analytics, End-Dated: Why Closing the Company Isn’t Failure

It didn’t work out. I tried going it alone—set up Kern Analytics, stepped into the big, scary world of contracting—and it just wasn’t to be. So I’ve set the end date on the slowly changing dimension and closed the book.

Through a mix of personal circumstances and stubborn optimism, I defaulted to starting a company. Contracting certainly opened my eyes: I learned a lot, met sharp people, and—true to form—made things harder than they needed to be. Given the lack of work, that didn’t help.

In between searching for the next employer, I became a professional driver, delivering vehicles all over the UK. It’s an odd side road that turned out to be unexpectedly rich. Driving across the country gave me time to think, to enjoy scenery and roads I’d never normally see, to find my way to and from remote places—one way in a vehicle, the other via public transport—and to meet some brilliant people.

There were moments I wouldn’t trade: sitting at the harbour’s edge on the Isle of Skye waiting for sunrise; threading the Lake District’s country roads at night while the M6 glowed under repair; learning just how many tolls we have; and even discovering that ten UK railway stations have a platform zero. Then there were the vehicles themselves—from battered vans bound for auction to £140k sports cars. They all have their quirks; they all have their own kind of fun.

None of this has dulled my passion for data and analytics. If anything, it sharpened it. I’ve kept learning new skills and technologies, and because I travel so much, secure networking is now second nature—I can work wherever I am.

Still, the lack of work in my main profession, plus personal issues, has taken its toll—mentally and financially. It’s rough out there. I genuinely feel for everyone trying to land a role right now. But tomorrow is a new day, and it isn’t yet written. So I get up, and I try to remain positive.

What’s next? Keep looking for that elusive role. Keep driving around this great country. I might even be the one delivering your next vehicle. And for the record: this isn’t failure. It’s a Type 2 change—history preserved, business gracefully closed, me carried forward. The row is inactive; the story isn’t.