I work as a consultant for Membership Matters - the membership sector’s leading research consultancy, which provides strategic research and consultancy services to associations.

I'm working on a voluntary basis for Fair Game, an organisation that is campaigning for the implementation of the White Paper on Football Governance and for a fairer and more sustainable distribution of finance across football, underpinned by the Fair Game Index. I lead on coordinating the research programme, academic partnerships and the Fair Game Index of football clubs' off-field performance.

I have undertaken a project for the Association of Accounting Technicians. I worked with their Director of Professional Standards and Policy, who was looking to establish a policy and strategy team to take forward the 2030 Strategy that AAT was developing. I worked with AAT to provide advice on the scope and purpose of the new team, how it would work with the rest of the organisation, the roles and skills the team would need and the key steps in taking the work forward. I drew on my experience and that of others I've worked with to tailor my recommendations to AAT's specific needs.I have worked with Membership Matters to support the Institute of the Motor Industry to grow the impact and effectiveness of its policy and campaigns functions. I worked closely with both organisations through a series of workshops, expert interviews and in-depth discussions to make a number of recommendations. These related to issues such as the focus and objectives of its campaigns and approach to them, how it worked with government and members and the role played by key areas such as research, media and communications.

I had responsibility for policy; government affairs, media, research, strategy and funding. I helped to achieve significant improvements, including a more effective relationship with government. This delivered a number of important investments such as the Construction Skills Fund that has prepared thousands of potential recruits and the first occupational traineeships. I worked with colleagues and employers to shift CITB’s funding to where it makes the biggest difference such as apprenticeships, higher level skills such as leadership and management and addresses industry-wide problems such as providing work experience, modernisation, improving mental health and inclusion and diversity. I helped to develop mechanisms to help small firms access greater funding. I led the strategy work to achieve agreement and clarity on the outcomes CITB should work towards, what its role should be and how its specific interventions would achieve them. This approach helped it to respond quickly when the pandemic shrunk its income massively, and transformed industry’s priorities. I helped CITB move rapidly to rethink, communicate and implement its response to Covid. Key to achieving the above was using CITB’s research capability more effectively. I helped its talented research team get much closer to internal and external customers to understand their evidence needs and to communicate its findings more clearly and succinctly. I helped to raise its profile, by working with the team to focus on more compelling areas such as industry modernisation and migrant workers. All of the above helped CITB to secure industry agreement to continue with the levy when pressures such as the introduction of the Apprenticeship Levy, rising input costs and the pandemic weighed on employers. I built strong teams led by confident capable people by helping them to understand their role and customers better and by giving them the confidence and platform to succeed.

As a parent-governor of a growing school, I have supported it as it moved to new premises and expanded its intake, helped it to appoint a new headmaster and to develop its approach to potentially becoming an academy.

Undertook consultancy project for Food and Drink Federation on its strategy. I researched the issues facing the industry, discussed these with its employees and made a report with a number of recommendations

I joined as Chief Economist, responsible for the policy and research work of the economics team. Over time, I picked up responsibility for other policy areas such as skills and energy, as well as its overall research work. This led me to put together an overall policy team and I subsequently picked up the media and government affairs work. When I started at EEF in 2000 the pound’s strength made it hard for manufacturers to compete, at the same time as the rise of lower cost nations such as China. With negligible chance of securing action on the currency, I refocused EEF’s influencing work on areas where it could work with government to secure lasting Improvements in competitiveness by supporting investment in new technologies, new and improved products, in skills and in growing exports. In doing so, I helped EEF to develop stronger relationships with government to achieve important policy wins. This included the development of its manufacturing strategy and a recognition of the need to act on energy competitiveness. I also ensured members got more involved with EEF’s influencing work and improved their awareness of it through regular engagement and communication. I’m particularly proud of how I helped EEF to secure a lasting change in pensions policy that addressed the problem of insufficient savings for retirement. Working with a colleague with pensions expertise and a group of industry employers, EEF influenced the Pensions Commission to recommend a system where individuals were automatically enrolled in a national pensions savings scheme, where their contributions would be matched by employers and by government. We also worked with the government on its implementation. I helped to grow EEF’s profile and reputation by developing a research programme focused on areas of greater public interest such as new products, services and markets, developing media relationships and appearing frequently in the media.

I initially joined as Senior Economist to work on forecasting publications and on various economic projects, including impact studies. I helped the Henley Centre to fuse its economic analysis with its work on social trends. I led on its Local Futures programme and raised its external profile significantly. After being promoted to Chief Economist, I took its forecasting work forward and was in the Sunday Times Top 5 most accurate forecasters on a number of occasions and won The Independent’s Golden Guru award.

I worked in the Employment Affairs and Education and Training Directorates on research and policy issue, the latter under future Director-General, John Cridland. I led on the development of a major Training Presentation that CBI took out to members and to government.