I started my business career as a Chartered Surveyor with Whitbread Retail Division managing, buying and developing real estate across restaurants, hotels, country clubs and fast food. I moved on through the Burton Group [now Arcadia] developing shopping centres and landed at London and Edinburgh Trust [LET Plc] some 29 years ago. More leisure operations and real estate focus followed as we owned and developed the Riverside Racquet Centre, Espree Health Club and European golf course businesses with my role being Development Director. I was also real estate advisor or development principal on other related business projects including theatres and residential development. For the last 22 years I have been developing the Aspria clubs, spas and hotels business across Europe as its CEO. We have grown from a staff of just 2 people to over 400 and built a business from scratch into one spanning 9 operating clubs and hotels across 3 countries providing 5* services and facilities for nearly 40,000 members.I love the creativity that building new businesses involves and in identifying opportunities to turn businesses around. I serve as a Non-Exceutive Director on the boards of several companies and enjoy the variety that this delivers as well as the opportunity to use experience gained in one business to assist the successful development of another.