Hawes is known for his work with the Spice Girls, Five, Hear'Say, Sugababes, Mutya Buena, Monrose, Aaron Carter, No Angels, Cinema Bizarre, Aggro Santos, Jimmy Blue and Stefanie Heinzmann.

Learning guitar at the age of 13 Hawes combined his already noticed talent for poetry with his newfound musicality and started writing songs.

[2] His involvement on the project led Hawes into a publishing deal with BMG and a period of writing which included the song "Satisfied" which featured on the 3.5 million selling debut album of boyband Five.

Hawes's association with Safe Management led to an introduction to and subsequently long term writing and production partnership with Pete Kirtley.

The song found its place in the Guinness Book of Records that year as the fastest selling debut single of all time.

Further releases with Cinema Bizarre, Monrose, Jimmy Blue, Tata Young, Stefanie Heinzmann and Aggro Santos cemented the Hawes/Mhondera writing and production partnership which continues to present.