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Board of trustees
Sir Richard Sykes (Chairman)
Sir Richard is Chairman of The Royal Institution of Great Britain and also Vice-Chairman at Swiss life sciences company Lonza Group. He remains Chairman of The UK Stem Cell Foundation, Chairman of the Careers Research and Advisory Centre (CRAC), Non-Executive Chairman of Circassia Holdings Ltd, Non-Executive Chairman of Omnicyte Ltd, Executive Chairman of Toumaz Holdings plc and is an Advisory member of Siemens Holdings plc and the Virgin Group Advisory Board.
Prior to that, he was Senior Independent Director, Non-Executive Deputy Chairman and Chairman of the Remuneration Committee of ENRC from 2007 – June 2011, Chairman of NHS London from December 2008 to July 2010, Rector of Imperial College London from 2000 – 2008 and the Senior Independent Director of Rio Tinto plc from 1997 to 2008. He has over 30 years of experience within the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, serving as Chief Executive and Chairman of GlaxoWellcome from 1995 to 2000 and then as Chairman of GlaxoSmithkline until 2002.
Internationally, he is Chairman of the International Advisory Board, A*Star Biomedical Research Council, Singapore and a Board member of EDBI. He was awarded Honorary Citizenship of Singapore in 2004 for his contribution to the development of the country’s biomedical sciences industry.
Sir Richard holds a number of degrees and awards from institutions both in the UK and overseas. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and Academy of Medical Sciences, and Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, Royal Society of Chemistry, Royal Pharmaceutical Society, Royal College of Pathologists and Royal College of Physicians. He is also President of the R&D Society, a position he has held since July 2002.
He is a Fellow of Imperial College London and Imperial College School of Medicine, King’s College London and Honorary Fellow of the University of Wales, Cardiff and the University of Central Lancashire.
Sir Richard received a Knighthood in the 1994 New Year’s Honours list for services to the pharmaceutical industry.
Dr Mary Archer
Mary Archer has been chairman of Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust since 2002. She is also chair of the East of England Stem Cell Network and a trustee of the UK Stem Cell Foundation. She read Chemistry at St. Anne's College, Oxford and obtained her PhD in Physical Chemistry from Imperial College, London. After post-doctoral work at St. Hilda's College, Oxford and the Royal Institution, London, she moved to Cambridge and for ten years taught chemistry for Newnham and Trinity Colleges.
From 1989 to 1992, she was a member of the Council of Lloyd's of London, the insurance market, and from 1993 to 1998 she served on the DTI's Energy Advisory Panel. From 1990 to 2000 she chaired the National Energy Foundation (a Milton Keynes-based organisation which promotes energy efficiency), and is now its President. She is also President of the UK Solar Energy Society and of the Guild of Church Musicians (which fosters musicianship among church choirs and organists), and a board member of the Britten Sinfonia. She is the author of Rupert Brooke and The Old Vicarage, Grantchester (1989), and co-editor of Clean Electricity from Photovoltaics (2001), Molecular to Global Photosynthesis (2004), and The 1702 Chair of Chemistry at Cambridge (2005). In June 2002, she was awarded the Melchett Medal by the Energy Institute.
Chris Last
Chris Last joined the Ford Motor Company in 1979 as a graduate trainee and built a highly successful HR career working in generalist and specialist roles in the UK and the US. His first role was as a personnel officer in Dagenham, and went on to cover every aspect of the HR delivery model from Labour Relations to Compensation Strategy. His final position was as the business partner to the Executive Vice President in charge of all Ford Motor Company activities in Europe. In 2008 Chris joined the Department for Work and Pensions as the Director General of HR. Chris is a board trustee for CRAC: The Career Development Organisation.
Shiona Llewellyn
Shiona Llewellyn is an independent career management consultant with more than twenty years' direct experience of 'helping people to help themselves' within the modern working and educational world. In 1982, following a decade in management within the media, she made a positive decision to take her analytical and communication skills into the careers world, joining the University of London Careers Advisory Service at a time of considerable change. This experience provided a unique professional training, which laid the foundation both for her subsequent style of working, and her understanding of different occupations and organisations. In 1985, following the birth of her first daughter, she began to work independently, and since then has consulted successfully with a portfolio of blue-chip organisations.
Commissioned by HR Directors to develop and deliver a diversity of career management and development projects, including ‘bespoke' graduate and postgraduate recruitment, she works with individuals and larger groups across all levels of modern organisations. Recently, an interesting development in her portfolio has involved a range of consultancy projects within UK universities. Passionate in her belief that high-quality, client-focused 'real world' careers guidance and information can have a positive influence on peoples lives, Shiona is increasingly interested in the educational and career decision making and career planning relating to bright and capable young people as they embark upon the critical first few years of their lives following school or university. This interest led to standing for election to the Council of CRAC, which she joined in November 2004, and accepting an invitation to join the icould board of trustees in 2008. She is also a member of the CIHE Advisory Forum, a Fellow of the RSA, and a member of the Careers Writers' Association.
Married, with two graduate daughters, Shiona enjoys living in, and working from, her home in Kew, west London.
Doug Richard
Having appeared in the first and second series of Dragons' Den, Doug is the Founder of School for Startups (http://www.schoolforstartups.co.uk/ ), Chairman and CEO of Trutap (http://www.trutap.net/), Founder and Member of the Cambridge Angels, Chairman of the Conservative Party Small Business Task Force and non-executive director of AlertMe (http://www.alertme.com/), VizWoz (http://www.vizwoz.com/), and BeatsDigital (www.beatsdigital.com)
Doug is a successful entrepreneur with 20 years' experience in the development and leadership of technology and software ventures, both in the US and in the UK. Between 1996 and 2000 he was President and CEO of Micrografx, a US publicly quoted software company. Prior to that he also founded and subsequently sold two other companies: Visual Software and ITAL Computers. Doug holds a BA in Psychology from University of California at Berkeley and a Juris Doctor at the School of Law, University of California at Los Angeles. In 2006 Doug was an Honorary Recipient of The Queen's Award for Enterprise Promotion. In 2007, Doug became a fellow of the RSA.
Brian Stevens
Brian Stevens is a Modern Languages graduate with a further degree in the acquisition of primary and secondary languages. He taught for seventeen years in the south of England, latterly as one of the senior staff helping to establish the Godalming Sixth Form College in Surrey.
From 1983 to 1985, he was Goldsmith's Industrial Fellow, working with BP, NatWest and the Institute of Education at the University of London.
In 1985 he was invited by the banks to become the Director of the Banking Information Service, which was part of the banks' trade association, the British Bankers' Association, where he stayed until 1995. During that time, he established the BiS as one of the lead private sector organisations working with the education sector. Extending BiS at the wishes of the banks, he also set up the Banking Lead Body to develop the banking industry NVQs. This in time grew into the Banking Industry Training and Development Council, a strategic Council on training issues, which became the Financial Services NTO, and is now the Sector Skills Council for the financial services sector.
From 1995 until the Spring of 1996 he was Director of External Relations at the British Bankers' Association, an advisor to the Commons Select Committee on Education and Employment and the business representative on the then Secretary of State's Advisory committee on School Improvement.
After some re-structuring at the BBA, involving the closure of BiS, he left the BBA to set up FEdS in July 1996. FEdS is a lead edge consultancy company working as a catalyst between some 50+ national and multi-national companies, the Government and the Education/Training sectors to bring greater understanding between them and to promote the importance of life-long learning.
- in 1998, with Sir Nicholas Goodison, he established the Goodison Group
- in 2001, on behalf of Microsoft and the DFEE, he set up the eLearning Foundation
- in 2003, the Goodison Group in Scotland was established under the chairmanship of Dr. Andrew Cubie
- in 2004, he chaired the Employers' group for the Tomlinson Review.
Since 2001 he has been developing the Signposter Programme, providing free electronic access for all individuals of whatever age or stage to information on learning and employment opportunities.