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Chair: Alan Hodgart – Alan is Principal of H4 Partners. He has specialised in working with professional firms for over 20 years on strategic development and on aligning their organisation to their strategic goals through practical steps. Alan has an extensive client base throughout Europe, the US and Asia Pacific.
William Arthur is a consultant with KermaPartners, which he joined in October 2008. KermaPartners advises Professional Service Firms in North America, Europe and worldwide on a wide range of strategic issues. In a career of over 30 years with Barclays Bank he held many senior roles, the last eight as Director of Professional Practices. In this role, William had overall responsibility for Barclays' involvement with major Professional firms in the UK, USA and Europe.
Susie Becker has had an extensive career in HR. Currently running her own consultancy practise, she was HR director at accountancy practise Moore Stephens for a number of years and one of the founding committee members of the PPF (Professional Personnel Forum) a forerunner to the current MPF. Susie has worked in manufacturing with Bowaters, service and distribution with Grundig and also had a period as an advocate at Employment Tribunals.
Pete Belsey - Peter is Business Director for Professional Services at Huthwaite International and a director of HuthwaiteFleming, who provide specialist training and consultancy to the legal profession. Having worked for Huthwaite for 20 years, Peter brings a wealth of experience from behaviour change projects with a wide range of major professional services firms, insurance companies and banks, all to help improve their business development skills and performance. Peter has spent his entire career in financial and professional services and before Huthwaite he qualified and worked with Ernst & Young for nine years.
Steve Blundell - Steve is Managing Director of Gracechurch Consulting whose clients include many of the worlds leading professional services and financial services organisations. He has 20 years’ experience advising on strategy and business development.
Neil Cameron is the Managing Director of the Neil Cameron Consulting Group, a specialist legal technology which advises law firms and legal departments on strategic issues relating to the use of IT systems to aid in efficiency, effectiveness, business development, profitability, client relationship management and commoditisation. He was originally a Barrister, then worked for LexisNexis and then Allen & Overy before joining KPMG Management Consulting in 1986; since then he has worked with over 150 law firms of all shapes and sizes (including half of the top 100 in the UK) from all over the globe on furthering their businesses with IT.
Colin Carnall, Professor of Strategic Management - Colin has joined Cass Business School as Chief Executive Officer of CassExec. He worked at Warwick Business School from 2003 to 2008, where he was Associate Dean Executive Programmes and Professor of Strategic Management. He served on the senior faculty of Henley from 1974 to 2003, including appointments as Director of Graduate Studies 1989-1998, and Director of Executive Development 1998-2003. He has held non-executive roles both in the UK and Europe, including organisations such as the Henley Centre for Forecasting. He has undertaken research and consultancy with organisations around the world. His fields of interest and expertise include leadership development and strategic change. He has published research and books in these fields and worked with major corporates, governments and third sector organisations on problems in these fields. He has long experience in the design and delivery of both open and customised solutions and programmes and contributes to corporate events and conferences around the world. His most recent publication is Managing Change in Organisations published by FT Pearson Prentice Hall in 2007 and now in its 5th edition. He is currently working on a book on Leadership Development to be published by Oxford University Press.
Peter Chivers is the founder and owner of Calnex Ltd a consultancy which works with client organisations to develop, deliver and implement overall corporate strategy and knowledge management approaches. With a background in performance improvement, he was previously CKO at KPMG UK. Peter is now based in Toronto, Canada working with clients across all sectors, both sides of the Atlantic.
John Collier – John is a Director of Clive & Stokes International , London’s oldest executive search firm where he specializes in finding non executive directors and CFO’s for listed companies. He was a partner with Price Waterhouse for 11 years and also spent nearly five years as the Secretary General of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales where he continues to serve as a Council member.
David Cunningham is Managing Director of Baker Robbins & Company, the leading law firm and legal department technology consultancy and now part of Thomson Reuter's Technology Consulting Services. For the past 20 years, he has led the firm's technology strategy services and worked with executive and IT management of the majority of the world's largest firms. David leads quarterly executive briefings on the state and business implications of legal IT benchmarks.
Ray D'Cruz is a principal of the Centre for Professional Services Management, an Australian based consulting firm. He works with clients in Australia, Asia and Europe in the areas of client loyalty and learning and development. More recently he has focused on developing online performance management and career development tools for the professional services sector. Prior to consulting Ray was a lawyer with Freehills and head of learning at Clayton Utz.
Paul Denvir, Partner, The PACE Partners LLP - Paul is a founding partner of The PACE Partners LLP, the professional services business development consultancy. Paul is co-author of the books 'Creating New Clients', 'Managing Key Clients' and 'Growing Your Client Base'. He has led many successful assignments in the professional services market-place over the past 18 years. These assignments have covered process, strategy, management and skills development, focused on retaining quality clients and developing profitable business. www.thepacepartners.com
David Haigh - David is the CEO and founder of Brand Finance plc, the leading independent brand valuation consultancy. David qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Price Waterhouse in London. He worked in international financial management then moved into the marketing services sector, firstly as the Financial Director of The Creative Business and then as Financial Director of WCRS & Partners. He left to set up a financial marketing consultancy, which was later acquired by Publicis, the pan European marketing services group, where he worked as a director for five years. David moved to Interbrand as Director of Brand Valuation in its London-based global brand valuation practice, leaving in 1996 to launch Brand Finance. Over the years, David has led various value-based marketing, tax and technical valuations for blue chip in a range of sectors, including; alcoholic beverages, drugs and healthcare, financial services, food and beverages, information technology, leisure, petrochemicals, retail, telecommunications, transport and utilities. He writes regularly for various marketing and financial publications on the topic of brand valuation and has authored numerous publications.
Andrew Hedley - An architect by profession, Andrew has an MA and MBA focused on professional services strategy and business development. He has approaching twenty years experience of managing and advising professional service firms including ten years in the legal sector. His firm, Hedley Consulting (www.hedleyconsulting.com), advises European professional service organisations on strategy and change.
Dr Mark Jenner - Mark advises organisations on how to build their leadership capability. He brings an architectural approach, designing and implementing creative leadership development solutions to support collective and individual performance improvement. Mark has a track record of innovation in learning and development. While at Ernst & Young Mark led the design and implementation of a ‘Virtual Business School’ which won the prestigious Corporate University Xchange European Excellence Award in 2000. Mark is an experienced coach and facilitator, and has trained with the Institute for Group Analysis and the Gestalt Centre. He has presented at conferences, and lectured at business schools, on teams, leadership and organisational change. Mark previously held senior learning and organisation development roles in Barclays Bank, Ernst & Young and Bovis Lend Lease.
Margaret Lang is Chief Executive of Intelligent Office UK Limited. Prior to joining Intelligent Office, Margaret managed a $100m business in New York providing outsourced office services to leading US investment banks and law firms. In 2001, she returned to the UK with the aim of bringing US outsourcing best practice to UK firms. She completed an MBI to a digital printing business which was then sold to the management team in 2005. Mags can be contacted on 07968 764 953
Steve Lee is founder and partner of Aretai, a consultancy working with organisations to identify solutions to business challenges through the engagement of people. Prior to founding Aretai, Steve was Global HR Director of Heidrick and Struggles, the world’s largest listed executive search firm. A chartered accountant, his earlier professional experience was at Andersen where as HR partner he was responsible for all HR matters for both partners and employees.
Helen J Meekings is a senior manager at ENVIRON within their international financial initiative and sustainability practices. Helen has worked for a variety of clients internationally providing environmental, social and sustainability advice and services from a strategic level through to practical, implementable sustainable solutions. She has a strong technical and commercial background having worked in the oil and gas, power, international financial institutions, mining, waste, water, land development, infrastructure and public sectors (central and regional government).
David Miller – David is the Managing Director of ITDYNAMICS™ which helps clients to achieve greater business success by maximising the impact of IT. He is an experienced director, general manager, independent management consultant and a leading authority on IT management. He advises boards and takes leading Interim roles (CEO, COO, CIO) with businesses in high profile, complex, and culturally challenging environments. His latest book published by the British Computer Society and available worldwide is described by CIO Magazine as one of three books that every CIO should have on their "to read" pile. Works and speaks throughout the world.
Richard Oakes - Richard has held senior level leadership roles in some of the world's most progressive professional services and retail businesses. He has delivered change projects and has a proven track record in re-connecting strategy, leadership behaviours and bottom line results. He has worked with clients in major financial institutions, FTSE 100 and Fortune top 50 organisations. His work has been part of a Harvard Business school case study. Richard is a leading thinker on change in the professional services market and has lectured in the US, Asia, Europe and Australia on the subject.
Stephen Perry is a Social Business and Knowledge Management Advisor with over 25 years experience in four professional services firms: Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, KPMG, Hill Samuel Bank and Ashurst. He has been working in knowledge management since the mid 90’s helping organisations share knowledge and collaborate across organisational boundaries. While at KPMG, Steve led the implementation of KClient, the client collaboration solution and was part of the global implementation team for KWorld, the global knowledge sharing system. Steve also worked on client advisory assignments in Financial Services and Government.
At Freshfields, Steve was head of knowledge and business development systems and led the implementation of social business solutions including the enterprise-wide Confluence wiki intranet. Since November 2009 he has been advising law firms on social business strategy and implementation options.
Amanda Phillips is Director of AP Consulting (www.apconsulting.co.uk). Formerly a member of the PricewaterhouseCoopers global partner and leadership development team, Amanda has also held senior HR roles working with leaders to define and implement strategy, and building organisational capability through leadership development, talent management and people engagement. Amanda consults on people strategy and is a leadership development specialist working internationally with senior executives in both large organisations and in more entrepreneurial environments to create climates for sustainable high performance and innovation. Amanda works 1:1 and facilitates teams, up to and including board level. She has a particular interest in supporting the progress of women in their teams, organisations and wider business world, and strongly supports the view that inclusive working environments deliver better business results and real value. She is an experienced and fully accredited executive coach. She is also a supervisor of executive coaches and is coaching supervisor for the Oxford Brookes University Business School MA in Coaching & Mentoring Practice.
Marcus Potter – Marcus is Director of Membership for The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), the world’s leading chartered body for property professionals. After a career in finance with GEC, Allied Bakeries and Magnet, Marcus now leads RICS’ membership development program. With a particular focus on expanding outside the UK; Marcus manages teams across RICS’ 11 international offices.
June Smallwood-Rose set up Passionate about Marketing Ltd in May 2008 to provide expert marketing advice and valued support to professional service firms. Having spent the last 30 years working in professional services she wanted to put this experience to wider use. June was business development director at KPMG, Wragge & Co and most recently at Shoosmiths bringing clients a wealth of marketing experience. Prior to that she spent time as a practising accountant for ten years with KPMG and then spent 5 years in their HR and training team before moving into a business development role.
Adrian Smith - Adrian is Chief Executive of The Woolton Group LLC, a firm that provides board and advisory services to public and private companies in the USA and Europe. He is a non-executive director of Byotrol plc, RTI Biologics Inc., Addpower UK Ltd, Premier Credit and Klean Industries Inc. After 24 years of senior management experience with Procter & Gamble and Ecolab, he joined Arthur Andersen LLP in 1991 as a worldwide managing partner, Grant Thornton LLP as Chief Executive in 1997, and retired from Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu as a global managing partner – marketing in 2004.
Kim Tasso - Kim is an independent strategic marketing consultant, trainer/coach and writer. She has advised over 200 legal, accountancy and professional partnerships on all aspects of strategy, marketing, business development, selling, key account management and communications. Her first book was on selling in the professions and the second on media relations in the property industry. She started in the technology sector and then progressed to senior marketing appointments at Deloittes and Nabarro before setting up Practical Marketing Consultancy in 1994. She is qualified in psychology, marketing, coach/mentoring and management.
Paul Taylor is Director of Risk Assurance at Morgan Crucible plc, the advanced materials group. During his career, Paul has developed his expertise in risk management, governance and change management while living and working in 6 different countries. Prior to joining Morgan Crucible, Paul worked for 3 FTSE 100 companies before moving to Switzerland to work for a large private company. His business sector experience includes insurance, paper industry, logistics, retail, packaging, ceramics.
Erika Uffindell, Group Managing Director - Erika has worked with leading UK and global companies to transform brands for over 20 years’, developing complex brand strategies. Her experience covers M&As, MBOs, demergers, brand creation and repositioning projects, dealing with clients at board and senior management level. She has undertaken such work for a broad range of blue-chip clients including: RBS, Standard Life, Corus, Aromatherapy Associates, Sage, Sainsbury’s, John Lewis, HSBC and Milk Development Council. Her relevant skills and competencies are in managing global research programmes for blue chip clients and developing core brand strategies. Working with Executive boards and ensuring buy in to brand programmes at all levels within a client’s company is a key strength. She heads up the Consultancy team at UffindellWest and takes an active role in overseeing the strategic direction of all brand programmes.
Steve Warshal has been working with Greenpeace since 1985. He is a former board member of Greenpeace Ltd, was the founding editor of Greenpeace Business from 1991 thru 2007 and is currently chairman of the Greenpeace Environmental Trust. Steve also works with Centaur Media creating business conferences including the annual Lawyer Summit for law firms and in house counsel.
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