Luke is a Board Director of LCA and was made an equity partner of the company in 2005, having originally joined in 2003.  At LCA he now leads the agency’s busy transport and health sectors.
 
Luke is a former political and industrial correspondent who spent 10 years in journalism before switching to a career in PR and corporate communications, where he has worked both in-house and as a consultant.

He began his career on local newspapers and worked his way up to the Westminster lobby, where he joined the Evening Standard in 1993.  He left journalism to work with London First on a campaign to win more funding for the London Underground and then joined the Design Council as media relations manager in 1997. 

In 2000, he moved into consultancy, working on Virgin Trains, the National Crime Squad and MOD, among other clients.  He was also seconded as full time media relations manager for congestion charging, in the run up to its successful introduction in Central London in 2003.

At LCA, Luke has subsequently undertaken a number of senior secondment roles, such as interim Director of Communications for NHS North West London, for Transport for London, for the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, and the same role for a major acute hospital.

Luke has perhaps not surprisingly gained strong relationships in the media throughout his career, as well as developing expertise in broader financial, personnel and management skills.

He has attended Harvard Business School, won and judged industry awards, is a regular columnist in PR Week, speaker at conferences on health and transport, and a Member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.  He has three children and lives in North London.

Karen is one of the founders of marrkettiers4dc (parent company, broadcast PR specialist) and is a board director at group level. Since marrkettiers4dc’s establishment in 1994, she has been instrumental in the growth of the company from 3 people to 90 and has been responsible for a wide range of clients including brand and agenises from health, food, consumer, finance and B2B sectors Karen took on the role of MD of Opinion Matters (research division) in 2008.

Nick is Managing Director of 4CM, a leading B2B media and eting communications agency.
Nick has over 30 years experience in eting and media relations.  During this time, he has provided strategic communications consultancy to a number of leading edge engineering and technology organisations from SMEs to multi-national companies.  Nick's focus is on the development, implementation and management of effective integrated communications strategies, using a wide range of tools to build brand awareness, penetrate new ets and generate business opportunities.  He leads an agency holding CMS accreditation, staffed by a multi-talented international team, offering a range of specialised P.R. and media services to clients in the technical, scientific and engineering sectors.
Nick’s leisure activities include motor racing, where he competed at club sport level for a number of years, microlighting and hill and long distance walking.

Darren Caplan is the Chief Executive of the Airport Operators Association (AOA), the national voice of UK airports which represents some 70 airport operators and over 150 corporate and associate members. Prior to going in-house, Darren spent 14 years in politics and public affairs consultancy as Director of Public Affairs at Brands2Life, Head of London Office at Morgan Allen Moore and an Account Director at PPS Group. He has also worked for the Conservatives party and was a candidate for them at the 2010 general election, where he stood against Labour’s Diane Abbott.

Matt Carter | Burson-Marsteller

Dr Matt Carter was appointed CEO of Burson-Marsteller UK in January 2010. He is also EMEA Chairman of Penn, Schoen, and Berland Associates, an office he co-founded in the UK at the beginning of 2006.
 
Matt provides senior counsel and advice to clients of both Burson-Marsteller and PSB in the UK and internationally.  He has worked with a wide range of major consumer and corporate accounts including Accenture, Coca-Cola, Sky, Shell, Sony Ericsson and Dell.

Formerly, Matt worked for Prime Minister Tony Blair as General Secretary of the British Labour Party. In this role, he was responsible for organizing Labour’s 2005 General Election campaign.
 
Previously Matt taught politics at the University of York, where he earned a Ph.D. in Politics. He has published a number of books and articles on politics and campaigning, and has spoken at several conferences on politics around the world, in Spain, Germany, Austria, Romania, and Egypt. Matt is also a Trustee of Tamasha Theatre Company, one of Britain’s leading Asian theatre companies.

After London University, where he read psychology, law and economics, Jonathan Choat joined Lever Brothers and embarked on a career of eting and sales management including  for Texaco, Lyons Foods Division, Burmah Oil , marketing director in two major advertising agencies and his own et research and new product development company.

His PR agency, Nexus Communications Group is now a leading independent, UK public relations consultancy with two specialist divisions-  Fmcg, food and drink and Health Care & Nutrition . The company is expert in developing  strong , distinct , commercial positions for branded and industry based campaigns and creating long term positioning strategies which produce tangible sales results and  targeted perception penetration.

Al is an experienced communications specialist who has worked at board level across the last two decades. He is a specialist in the motor industry and was elected Chairman of the PRCA-affiliated Motor Industry Public Affairs Association this year.

A Director of his own communications consultancy Al Clarke Ltd since 2009, he was formerly the Commercial & Brand Director for Ferrari in the UK, and prior to that was Head of Communications for the motor industry trade association SMMT. His background includes a decade as a BBC radio journalist and presenter.

His work as a consultant includes advising the Royal Automobile Club on the Future Technology Run, BBC Top Gear Live, Autocar & Kuoni. He has been a judge for many award programmes and in 2009 created the Autocar Courland Next Generation Award to encourage the brightest students to pursue careers in the motor industry.

Shimon Cohen is the founder and chairman of The PR Office a London based public relations consultancy. He is a media relations and reputation management specialist who has advised a wide range of clients ranging from multinational corporations, to public and voluntary sector organisations.

He advises an eclectic collection of companies across all business sectors. He works with clients in professional services, business, entertainment, sport, technology and the voluntary sector. He currently advises Chairmen, CEOs and a number of high profile sports and media personalities.

From 1983 to 1990, Shimon served as executive director at the office of the Chief Rabbi and as private secretary to the Chief Rabbi, Lord Jakobovits.

Brendon Craigie is chief executive officer and responsible for the Hotwire’s work, offices, sister agencies 33 Digital and Skywrite, and affiliates. Brendon joined Hotwire in 2001 after a career at Shandwick and has held a variety of UK and international roles at Hotwire Group over the past 10 years. Brendon’s client experience includes Microsoft, Research In Motion, THUS, Ciao and Tiscali. Brendon won an IPRA award for his campaign for THUS.

Jenny Caven is Slimming World’s PR Manager. Educated in Zimbabwe and South Africa, I graduated with a BA in Politics and English from the University of Cape Town and followed a career in journalism after completing a Masters in International Journalism from City University, London. In the mid-1990s I worked for a corporate communications consultancy in London and edited a local weekly newspaper in Southwark, before returning to Zimbabwe where I worked as a senior copywriter for an Ogilvy & Mather associated advertising agency. In 2001 I moved back to the UK and began working as a freelance PR adviser before joining Slimming World in 2006. My first role was to conduct an audit and review and propose a completely new approach to Slimming World’s monthly newsletter for its 3,000 Consultants. I’ve been the in-house PR manager with responsibility for consumer, health and public affairs activity since 2007. 

Ian Crowder manages the award-winning insurance and financial services PR for the AA, including the acclaimed bench British Insurance Premium Index, which tracks the movement of car and home insurance premiums.  He has considerable financial services public relations experience, both consultancy and in-house. Before joining the AA he was head of communications at NYSE listed Lincoln Financial Group.
 

Christian is communications director of the TUI UK and Ireland Mainstream Board. He is responsible for Public Relations, Internal Communications and Sustainable Development. Christian joined TUI in 2009 with a wealth of experience from some much respected household brands, including Sky and Waitrose.



 

Leigh Daynes is director of advocacy, campaigns and communications at international children’s development charity Plan.
 

He has extensive communications experience overseas, including in conflict zones, at the International Committee of the Red Cross’s HQ in Geneva, and at the Red Cross’s permanent observer mission to the UN in New York.

 

Helen Dickinson began work as a graduate trainee at the BBC (radio) from where she moved to Thames Television. Initially working on children's programmes she then moved to the documentaries department where she was an Associate Producer on a raft of major documentary series. Subsequently as a Producer/Director she  went on to make a range of features programmes including writing and producing a documentary on the life of JRR Tolkien. For a short while she headed up media relations for the Food and Drink Federation before joining Waitrose as Head of Press & PR and in 2000 she moved to take on the same role at John Lewis.  Having recently been given the responsibility for Internal as well as External Communications, Helen now has the title “Head of Communications”.

Rob is one of the partners at Red Lorry Yellow Lorry. Founded in 1998, and accredited by the PRCA, the lorries are a PR Week Top 150 agency. With client-side experience gained at technology and media companies in both the UK and USA, Rob has helped develop the lorries into a global technology, media and telecoms communications specialist.

 

David Flynn currently PR Manager at international law firm Pinsent Masons, has over 11 years’ experience in PR. After working at a number of agencies including Lexis and VLP, David spent five years at law firm Bircham Dyson Bell, where he created an in-house media team, advising high-profile clients during divorce cases. He left to become Director of Communications at The National Deaf Children’s Society, where he oversaw the creation of the first social media website especially for deaf children. At Pinsent Masons he is responsible for the firm’s PR activity across the UK, the Middle East and Asia Pacific.

Nicky is managing director of food and drink agency Phipps and with 15 years behind her in the PR world she has almost managed to keep her youthful looks and sense of humour intact. A frustrated ad creative at heart, Nicky turned to PR and has never looked back. She sees it as the eting discipline for thinking people and is known in the industry for her perceptive and intuitive approach. Nicky likes to ski, run and drink good wine.

Graham, 45, is the founder and CEO of Frank PR, one of the UK’s most respected and award-winning consumer public relations consultancies.
 

Heading a team of over 70 professionals, clients include the likes of Unilever, Disney, Nestle, Activision, BlackBerry, Alton Towers & npower.  The company was started by Graham in September 2000.   He negotiated the sale of the business in October 2007 to The Photon Group, an Australian eting services firm.  In April 2009 he set up a Frank PR in Sydney and it has already become one of Australia’s fastest growing PR agencies.
 

Prior to Frank, Graham set up a dotcom venture in mid-1998.  Originally called Funmail, then re-branded another.com, the Internet service offered free web-based email ‘with a twist’ – users could choose their own addresses after the @ sign allowing them to express themselves with email for the first time.  The service proceeded to attract 2m users rapidly, with Graham taking responsibility for all commercial and eting activity and taking a central role in capital-raising.  It abandoned its plans to float on AIM at the last minute, accepting an offer instead from an investment company to purchase a 20% stake for £6.5m, valuing the fledgling business at £31.25m.  Graham, together with one other founder, sold his stake in the company a year later, before the dotcom bubble burst.
 

Graham’s working life before dotcom fever set in was spent in public relations at the hottest PR shop in the business, the “absolutely fabulous” Lynne Franks PR.  Starting as a trainee, Graham rose through the ranks to become Managing Director several years after Lynne herself had stepped down to pursue other interests.  Graham oversaw the transition of the company from one specialising in fashion PR to an all round consumer PR agency.  In early 1998, Lynne Franks PR was sold and merged into US-based Omnicom owned Ketchum, who were keen to expand their offer in the UK.

Outside of work, Graham’s passions are his wife Lisa and eleven year old twins Dexter and Summer, Arsenal and golf.  He is also a board member of Camden Town Unlimited, a business improvement district that works with a number of partners including Camden Council, TfL, GLA, Central Government and key private sector stakeholders, to initiate and deliver projects that improve the viability, visibility and commercial performance of Camden Town as a business location.  A little known fact about Graham is that he has appeared on Baywatch alongside Pamela Anderson and David Hasselhoff.

As corporate partnership manager, Susy is responsible for managing a portfolio of UK and International business partnerships for the charity, including the Charity of the Year partnership with the PRCA.  Previous to her role at Leonard Cheshire Disability, Susy has over 8 years experience managing business partnerships for leading organisations in the cultural sector, including the British Film Institute, the National Maritime Museum and more recently as Senior Corporate Membership Manager at the Royal Academy of Arts.

Based at the firm’s West End office, Ian focuses exclusively on advising creative, communications and consulting businesses ranging in size from AIM and PLUS-listed companies to start-ups and sole traders. As well as audit, tax and accounts, Ian advises on other ad hoc business issues, such as financial due diligence, valuations and employee incentives.

He writes the ‘UK quoted eting groups’ section of the firm’s flagship ‘Financial Performance of eting Services Companies Annual Survey’ and contributes regularly to the bi-annual newsletter ‘eting Monitor’.

Ian joined Kingston Smith LLP in September 2002 as a trainee. He qualified as a chartered accountant in 2005,  was promoted to manager in 2007 and made a partner in 2010.

David is the head of the Action for Children's Public Relations and Engagement Team, coordinating the charity's communications with key audiences across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. He is also responsible for communicating with more than twelve thousand staff, volunteers and supporters in more than 500 locations around the UK.

He has won several national awards for his work, including the coveted PRWeek Young PR Professional of the Year award, CorpComms Magazine's Young Achiever award and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations’ Outstanding Young Communicator award at the Local Public Services Group conference in 2008.
 

For over six years, David managed communications at Fenland Council in Cambridgeshire, recognised as one of Britain's best councils. He played a significant role in the council's transformation programme that saw Fenland go from one of Britain's poorest performers to one the highest rated authorities in the country. His work included a culture change campaign that which contributed to a record level of staff satisfaction – a staggering 92%.

Caroline Harris has 25 years’ PR and eting experience, both in house and with consultancies. She worked in London for five years before moving to Bristol. She set up Spirit Public Relations four years ago after working in a large independent PR consultancy for six years as an Account Director and acting as an independent consultant for several years.
 

Spirit has grown consistency since it was founded and in 2009, it was named as one of the top five ‘Creative Agencies to Watch’ in a regional list compiled by Bristol Media.
 

Caroline has led and managed a wide range of PR campaigns for a range of national and regional clients over the years from blue-chip companies such as Wessex Water, EDF Energy, FirstGroup and British Gas Properties, to public sector bodies including the South West Regional Development Agency, Universities and numerous local authorities, and a range of regional private sector clients and charities. Her work has won several industry awards including Chartered Institute of Public Relation’s Sword of Excellence and a Public Relations Consultants’ Association’s ‘Regional Campaign of the Year’ Award.

Jim co-founded Threepipe in 2004 and has over fifteen years experience on both sides of the client/ agency fence.
Having worked at a number of leading agencies and in-house roles, Jim’s experience spans the business and consumer landscape, including major campaigns for Tiscali, O2, Nintendo and UK Online.

At Threepipe, Jim takes overall responsibility for all client campaigns, with a hands-on approach to overseeing the strategy, creativity and implementation for every campaign.

David Holdstock is head of corporate communications at the London Borough of Hillingdon.  He has wide experience of crisis communications, working on high profile events such as the Docklands bomb, Paddington rail disaster and Funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales.
 

David is the current national Chair of LGcommunications, the professional body for council communicators and in that role, speaks at events and conferences across the UK.
 

He worked with the Bulgarian police in Bulgaria and the UK, helping to develop police and Government communications following the changes in Eastern Europe.
 

He was last year’s PRCA in-house professional of the year.

Rebecca Hopkins is Managing Director of ENS Ltd, a London-based PR agency offering global sports brand promotion and protection.

Having started her career at News International Rebecca spent the following seven years for agencies and brands including AMV, BBC Magazines, Hayet and The Telegraph Group before joining BT’s sponsorship team working on 1999 Rugby World Cup.

Eighteen months later, having completed project work for BT on the WRU, Wimbledon and the British Open, Rebecca became a partner in Bench Sport where she devised and delivered the first Sport Industry Awards. Rebecca launched ENS on the success of the awards in 2002

ENS enjoys a client base spanning sports stars, charities, sponsors, governing bodies and rights holders including BT, EDF Energy, The Scout Association and the LTA. In the nine years since ENS launched Rebecca and her team have worked on two Olympics, two Rugby World Cups and numerous domestic and international events and competitions.
A specific specialism of ENS is its leading approach to reputation and crisis media handling. Having worked on some of the biggest scandals to hit the sector, including the FIFA ‘cash for votes’ issue and ‘Bloodgate’, Rebecca’s team advocates preparation as the strongest course of action and has created one of the world’s most robust services to ensure ENS clients are always ‘media crisis ready’.

In addition to her work at ENS, Rebecca is Chair of the PRCA’s Sports Group, a Director of Starponyz.com and an NED of social enterprise, Social Health Ltd, which focuses on delivering projects that meet health agenda issues. Rebecca also owns and runs The Rugby Business Awards and co-owns The Marine Industry Awards.

Warren Johnson is managing director of W Communications, the agency he founded in September 2009.  Prior to W Communications Warren spent five years as a board director at Freud Communications  where he managed the reputation of brands including Nestlé, Unilever, Coca-Cola, Nike, PepsiCo, Mercedes-Benz, VW and Eurostar.  He has more than 13 years' PR experience across consumer, corporate and international. Since its launch in 2009, W Communications has picked up leading brands including Toyota, Hendrick's Gin, Gallo Wines, The Independent and i. 

Jonathan Jordan is the founder of Sermelo – derived from the Latin for conversation – a specialist consultancy focused on helping organisations communicate their competitive advantages and optimise dialogue with internal and external stakeholders. He has over fifteen years’ experience helping companies anticipate and respond to changing dynamics; be they driven by technology, a change in consumers’ attitudes or behaviour, new regulation, changing legal frameworks or environmental responsibility.

Jonathan is based in London and has worked extensively with clients based in the Americas, Europe, the Middle-East and Asia-Pac and has led a number of award winning campaigns. He has particular specialism in the digital economy and in communications technology. He has advised all the major players on issues ranging from the adoption of disruptive technologies to the agreement and rationalisation of global standards. He has also worked with clients in the automotive, professional services, health, defence and aerospace, financial services, natural resources, energy and FMCG sectors.

Prior to founding Sermelo in March 2010, Jonathan was the Chief Executive of Burson-Marsteller’s UK operations, which included the consumer agency Communiqué PR and Marsteller, a specialist in digital and integrated eting. Under Jonathan’s leadership, the firm enjoyed sustained growth, pioneered a number of award-winning integrated campaigns and was recognised by PR Week as the International Consultancy of the Year in 2008.

Jonathan joined Burson-Marsteller in April 2003 from Fleishman-Hillard, where as a Senior Vice President, he spent nearly five years as head of the technology, media and telecommunications practice. Before working in public relations, Jonathan spent over three years as a journalist and served for over four years as a weapons engineering officer in the Royal Navy. He has a 2.1 bachelor of science Honours degree in Electronic Engineering with Business Management from King's College, University of London.

Jonathan sits on the Executive Committee of British American Business, he is a Fellow of the Public Relations Consultants Association, co chair of its Qualifications Board and a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations. Jonathan's hobbies include rugby, football and sailing and he is married with three young children.

Tanya has been in communications all her professional life. Having started her career as a journalist, she went on to become press secretary to the Lord Chancellor and then served as a senior press aide to Prime Minister Tony Blair for over four years. She joined the world of consultancy in 2003 when she joined Grayling where she went on to run its UK public affairs division. She has recently took the plunge and started her own consultancy called Tanya Joseph Consulting and Associate Hillingdon Cresswell where she is the director.

Howard is Chairman of broadcast specialist Markettiers4dc. Having started the agency in 1994, the company has since pioneered Broadcast PR services to embrace the convergent media era in which we now operate and is still hands on in the running of the business and overseeing the development of new initiatives. Howard is well versed in both how the broadcast media operate today and their plans for the future, and in ensuring the PR industry is geared towards meeting these new demands.

As Managing Director of Ruder Finn UK, Nick is responsible for the growth and development of the UK business as well as providing strategic counsel for the agency’s clients.

Nick joined Ruder Finn from OCTANE PR, where as MD he worked with the agency’s major clients including major household names and fast-growing challenger brands. During this time he consulted on both internal and external communications campaigns across EMEA, and led strategic and co-ordination activity across a number of ets.

Prior to this he held the role of VP Strategy (Europe) for LEWIS PR, an international PR agency spanning 27 international ets across five continents.

Lara Leventhal is managing director at Eulogy! and Onlinefire – an award winning integrated communications agency.

Lara graduated from the University of Middlesex with a BA Hons. in business management and began her working life in marketing at leading global research company Ipsos MORI. Following rapid promotion, Lara became marketing manager at research consultancy Pegram Walters, where her role encompassed all elements of the marketing mix.

After four years in the research industry Lara decided she needed a new challenge; combining her research and business experience she chose to follow her passion for PR and communications, joining Eulogy! in 2000.

Over the last 10 years, Lara has been instrumental in developing The Eulogy! Group’s brand proposition to reflect the award winning agency it is today. In 2007 Lara was responsible for acquiring Onlinefire, bringing it into the Eulogy! family when social media was not on the radar of most agencies.

Today, Lara directs a growing team of over 40 PR and digital professionals and is responsible for the day to day management of the company, reflected by the agency’s success and reputation within the industry, and the continual milestones achieved in client and staff retention and satisfaction levels.

Lara’s hands-on approach, determination and inspirational vision took Eulogy! into PR Weeks top 20 independent agency league tables for the first time this year, which is a reflection of her tenacity and commitment to the Eulogy! Group.

Lara’s work has been recognised by a number of prestigious industry awards and honours including the Stevies – best executive in EMEA and the 2010 CorpComms Digi Award for Best Integrated Agency with Digital Expertise and the PRCA best technology campaign. Eulogy! was previously crowned PRCA Agency of the Year and PRCA Specialist Agency of the Year, and also ranked in PR Week’s Best Places to Work.

Chris is CEO and Founder of LEWIS PR as well as an author, journalist and businessman. He has written for a variety of international business publications. He is best known for founding LEWIS PR – a global agency that has gone from start-up to thirty offices worldwide in 15 years. He is also the author of The Unemployables, a profile of forty inspirational leaders.

Mark MacGregor founded Marketforce Communications, a B2B PR agency, in 1998. The firm built a fee income of £1m+ with clients such as KPMG, Cap Gemini and Hay Group. He sold his shares in the business after being appointed as Chief Executive of the Conservative Party in 2001.  He then worked as Campaign Director for Steve Norris' London Mayoral bid until 2004. now runs Connect, an IT and cloud computing firm, based in Canary Wharf
 

Robyn Massey is responsible for corporate communications at Ketchum Pleon London. Over her 17 yearlong career, she has literally produced and pitched more than a thousand campaigns, stories and press events covering everything from CEO transitions, PR ROI tools and M&A to an international cocktail shake off with the world’s most celebrated mixologists when she was the PR director for a renowned restaurant group. Her greatest passion is striking creative and strategic partnerships with agenda-setting organisations, brands and personalities. Robyn has worked in Japan and New York and currently resides in Brook Green, London, with her husband and two daughters, Yasmine, 5, and Reem, 3.
She is delighted to serve as a PRCA judge and looks forward to identifying and advocating for the industry’s outstanding work.

Simon is Director and co-founder of Linstock Communications. Set up in June 2005, Linstock’s clients include Grant Thornton, Census 2011 (ONS), British Gas and TheCityUK. Linstock’s work combines strategy, research, content development and delivery – often via the media. Simon has 15 years PR experience, including stints at an international PR agency and an issues management consultancy.
 

Mike is the Managing Director/CEO of Napier Partnership Limited which one of the UK’s top 40 Technology PR consultancies. The consultancy offers a full range of eting services in addition to PR and focuses exclusively on B2B technology clients.
Mike began his career as an electronics design engineer, working for companies ranging from GEC-Marconi to DDA, a company that designs and manufactures audio mixing desks. Mike later joined IDT Inc, an American semiconductor company, where he held a variety of technical and eting roles including European Applications Manager and European eting Manager.
In 2001 Mike acquired Napier with Suzy Kenyon. Since that time he has directed major PR and eting programmes for a wide range of technology clients. Mike offers a unique blend of technical and eting expertise, and was awarded a Masters Degree in Electronic and Electrical Engineering from the University of Surrey and an MBA from Kingston University.

Chris McCafferty is owner and founder of Kaper. He has 13 years experience across the communications industry, from senior in-house roles at blue chip companies to leading teams at top agencies.
 

Chris launched MySpace across Europe from 2006-2008; before that he was Head of PR and Corporate Affairs at MSN. Most recently, as a Director at Shine Communications, Chris led teams for lastminute.com and eBay, building brand campaigns, establishing and managing their social media platforms, and running both brands’ external press offices. Other clients included Evian, Hotpoint and Volvic.
 

Chris has a long track record of delivering for big household names like Microsoft, McDonald’s, Gillette, Sony and Ikea. He has strong experience of promoting content across the likes of PlayStation, EA Games and Sports, and Paramount Films.

Matt has over 10 years PR experience working across science, technology and engineering based companies. As Head of Public Relations and Events for online publisher BioMed Central, he currently leads two teams encompassing the full gamut of communications practice.

He speaks regularly about online and social media strategies, campaigns and measurement, is a CIPR Chartered Practitioner and is also Chair of the Institute’s Marketing Communications Committee.
 

Graham has more than 25 years’ broad experience in the travel industry, with a career built on developing and driving new businesses. He was educated at the London School of Economics’ where he graduated with a degree in Economics.
Upon graduation Graham moved almost immediately into the rapidly developing world of technology and soon came through the ranks of programmer to systems analyst and finally to project and accounts manager. In 1984 he along with three colleagues joined Sandhurst eting plc and formed the Business systems division of which he was appointed Managing Director. Over the next 3 years the company developed a wide spectrum of clients and package software. In 1987 he and his colleagues obtained finance from Midland Bank plc. and performed an MBO and changed the name to Integra Systems.
As founder of Integra Systems UK – a developer of destination management systems – he led the company through major international and domestic growth.  At one point Integra software was deployed throughout Scotland and all of the major UK leisure and business destinations such as London, Manchester, Bournemouth, Brighton, Harrogate, Great Yarmouth and many others.  Overseas Integra clients included Cape Town, Mpumalanga, Amsterdam and Durban.  During this time he was involved in a number of EC funded projects that involved multinational participants. In 1997 he was instrumental in making a trade sale of the company and moved to the USA where he led the growth and development of Bond International Software Inc. for over four years. Graham was a full board member of Bond who during his tenure were floated on the UK London stock Exchange through the Alternative Investments et.
In 2002 he subsequently returned to the United Kingdom where he founded the Omni Tourism group, owners of leading online travel news service Travelmole.com. The company is the world’s largest business to business travel trade news resource, sending out over 500,000 email newswires every day.
In addition to his duties at TravelMole Graham is a non-executive director of Responsibletravel.com, Siren PR and an adviser to First Source-Interactive. More recently Graham has completed work for Farm Stay UK, Estonian Enterprise, IFITT, Visit Britain (on social media) and Isle of Wight Tourism. He is a fellow of the Tourism Society and immediate past chair of the ENTER conference on Tourism and Technology.

Ware Anthony Rust is the East of England's leading communications agency based in Cambridge which uniquely includes PR, today representing over 40% of the business.  Alison led a management buyout in 2005 and remains involved in the business of all WAR’s clients calling upon 25 years plus working agency side at a senior level.  Alison’s experience encompasses advertising, design, pr and as head of digital prior to becoming MD, Alison continues to be passionate about the opportunities digital presents. 

Richard is CEO, Hill and Knowlton UK and has led the agency since 2009.

In that time, he has remodelled the agency around nine key industries, driven a commitment to industry expertise, broadened the agency’s service offer and championed a company-wide commitment to training and development.

Richard is a brand eting specialist with extensive experience both agency and client side.

He rejoined the agency having spent eight years at Habitat in a variety of eting, trading and retail management roles. Most latterly, Richard was Managing Director, Habitat UK with responsibility for 40 stores and turnover of £130m.

Richard’s client management responsibilities are primarily focussed in the retail sector. He also leads the adidas account with whom the London office has more than eighteen years experience.

He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and a graduate of the University of Manchester with a degree in Politics and Modern History.

Helen joined Porter Novelli in March 2011 after more than a decade delivering award-winning campaigns for digital brands including MSN, Expedia and McAfee. Previously she was a board director at The Red Consultancy where she helped the agency become a social media pioneer by founding its digital team Shiny Red in 2006. Helen’s experience spans consumer, b2b and corporate work in the finance, pharma, FMCG, retail and consumer tech sectors, and she collected an inaugural Reputation Online award for best use of digital within a wider campaign for Molson Coors’ Cobra Beer. Helen was named as one of PR Week’s power players in social media and is a member of the CIPR’s social media panel. She is a regular speaker at social media conferences and contributes to industry publications and the Porter Novelli blog, as well as tweeting @Helennow. Prior to PR Helen was a journalist covering news and features for papers including The Times, Guardian and Independent.  

Kitty Parry, is one of the most well-respected communications profesionals. Having founded Templars PR in April 2009, she has since been shortlisted as one of the top three PR consultants of the year by the trade body the PRCA. Kitty’s experience has enabled Templars to be known for providing communications and public affairs advice to a number of well known brands and highly regarded individuals such as the broadcaster and journalist Lynn Faulds Wood. In the last few months she has attracted a team from the highest levels of the media and the City to enable Templars to offer the energy, agility and client focus of an independent consultuncy with the capacity and intelligence to deliver. The agency’s dream is to be revered as a consultancy that creates sustainable profitable growth for its clients. People on her Advisory Board include Charles Prior of BP and Tim Campbell, the first winner of The Apprentice. She herself sits on the Advisory Board of a charity called Global Angels, which she frequently position in the national press as well as acting as a strategic advisor to its founder Molly Beddingfield.

Kitty also has a passion for encouraging business: along with Clare Logie (former chair of the Global Banking Alliance for Women) and Heropreneurs founder Richard Morris, she is co-hosting an event in the House of Commons focused around supporting woman in business. Kitty has also been responsible for growing a wedding business, Templars Barn in Berkshire.

Ginny started her career up North working at Communique in Manchester.  Moving down to London she joined Jackie Cooper PR where she ran the food and drink division leading campaigns for big brands including Mars, Coca Cola and Diageo.  Promoted to the board, she took on a pan-agency role as client services director, overseeing the majority of accounts in the agency.  After 7 years at JCPR, she moved to Henry's House as deputy MD where she ran the brands division working on consumer brands such as Absolut Vodka, FHM, Channel 4, Honda Formula 1 Racing Team and Virgin brands.  18 months ago, Ginny took over ownership of Henry's House, now re-branded House PR with partner Sam Oxley.  The agency now represents a broad range of consumer brands and entertainment properties from aol, to Peugeot, to Thorpe Park, to MOBO.

Debby is a director of EML Wildfire, recently formed to become one of the largest independent tech PR specialists in the UK.  Debby chairs the PRCA regional group for South East & East Anglia as well as holding the vice-chair position for the PRCA technology group.

Johnny founded Launch in 2001 and is the CEO.  A finalist in Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year Awards and winner of ‘best agency leadership’ (eting magazine), Johnny obsesses about ideas and people.  Now a fully integrated agency (media relations, digital and experiential), Launch won the PRCA’s Campaign of the Year 2010 for its Walt Disney World ‘Twinned Town’ campaign.

Stephen is the founder and chief executive of the Reable Group. He is totally focused on driving its growth and success and providing clients with tangible commercial results. For 20 years, Stephen has provided strategic communications consultancy for campaigns at national, regional and international levels.  

In November 2009, Nick was appointed CEO, Emanate. In his role Nick is focusing on the establishment, growth and success of the London office and developing the Emanate brand into Europe.
With responsibility for business development, general management and client stewardship, he will also remain fully integrated in Emanate client work and won’t be found hiding in his office, because he doesn’t have one.
Nick was appointed Deputy CEO of Ketchum London in June 2007 following three years service as a Practice Director, initially with responsibility for a large portfolio within the consumer brand eting practice. During this time Nick led on a series of major international PR programmes for Carlsberg, Pepsi, Whirlpool, Lenovo, Heineken and Bayer Animal Health, plus domestic et work for clients including LG, Mars, Mercedes Benz, Geek Squad and KFC.

Since first appearing in the paper in 1977 Clive has been hooked on the thrill of being involved in the news. Now with 25 years experience, he specialises in generating real news content for clients and combines technology with good old fashioned people-first values to generate coverage in print, online and on air.

John Doe, founded by Rana in April 2009 specialises in marrying brands with popular and contemporary culture. John Doe’s clients include Sony PlayStation, Vauxhall Motors, W Hotel’s and Vice

Last year John Doe won PRCA 2010 Small Agency of the Year


 

Eleri has over 10 years experience in the PR industry covering consumer, B2B and technology but most recently in Local Government working as Campaigns Manager and deputy to the Head of Communication at Essex County Council.
During her time at the Council Eleri has been involved in a number of high profile and award winning campaigns including the Essex Post Office scheme. She also manages the communications for Brentwood Borough Council as part if the Council’s unique partnership arrangement.
Managing a team of 15 she is responsible for all the external communications for one of the largest councils in England tackling difficult issues such as budget reductions and child protection issues.
Before working at Essex County Council Eleri worked as Account Manager at London based PR Agency Kinross + Render dealing with clients such as Xerox, UPS, Saga and Pace Microtechnology.

Dan is Head of PR for Azzurri Communications, a leading B2B telecoms firm. His hybrid role sees him take responsibility for corporate and internal communications, analyst relations and social media strategy. Prior to joining Azzurri, he worked agency-side, leading EMEA and UK-focused campaigns for global technology players Microsoft and BMC Software.

Dan won three CIPR Pride Awards in 2010 and was a finalist at the 2010 PRCA Awards for In-House Professional of the Year and for the Technology Award.

Alec founded Splendid in 2004 to build a global boutique agency creating innovative brand communications. Previous roles included head of global consumer practice at strategic research consultancy Datamonitor and Head of Brands Division at Slice, a music and entertainment PR shop. Alec is a family man and former DJ who still maintains a severe vinyl addiction.

Jo started her career in banking but quickly realized the error of her ways and moved to Milan where she worked as an international business trainer. She worked with the heads of leading Italian businesses and after working in-house with the head of PR at publishing firm Rizzoli, she decided to embark on a career in PR, starting with Leedex, a medium-sized agency. She worked there on a range of B2B and B2C clients including Allied Bakeries, Forte and Pickfords before moving to Tokyo and working for the Rowland Company as international project manager working on the European’s Commission’s prestigious export promotion programme, Gateway to Japan. After returning to the UK Jo worked as an account director at Republic and three years later set up Velvet PR.
Velvet specializes in running PR programmes for clients in the creative, eting and digital industries. It also has in depth knowledge of the retail industry, and works with the country’s largest delivered wholesaler, Palmer and Harvey. The agency also works with entrepreneurs and SMEs across a broad range of sectors.

Karolina has eleven years’ experience planning and executing media, analyst, influencer and social media relations campaigns for a variety of organizations from IBM to Coca Cola. She has worked both in-house and agency-side. At 1E, she is responsible for driving business and trade media, analyst and influencer relations in five ets. She also leads the company’s partnership with UK PR agency Hotwire.

Prior to joining 1E in 2009, Karolina held a variety of roles in agency. Having spent four years at Text 100, she led campaigns for PC manufacturer Lenovo in the UK and EMEA and supported all areas of the IBM business, spanning hardware, software, services, the company’s Second Life activity and its sponsorship of the Wimbledon Grand Slam tennis tournament.

Prior to joining Text 100, Karolina was an account manager at IPG’s Weber Shandwick and GolinHarris where she represented Oracle, EMC, Coca-Cola Great Britain and Nestlé and also managed Weber Shandwick’s internal pro-bono PR programme with the Media Trust.

Karolina has a BA (hons) degree in English & Italian from the University of Manchester and a Chapterhouse proofreading qualification. She speaks fluent Italian and Polish as well as conversational French and Spanish.

As Precise’s New Business Director, Darryl has been responsible for successfully leading the business into new ets where Precise’s growing product range have delivered a competitive edge to PR and communications teams. Darryl was previously Managing Director of TMT analysis provider Media Report, which was acquired by Precise in 2004, and from which he developed the UK’s dominant media analysis business.

Richard’s career is studded with achievements both political and professional. From Citigate Dewe Rogerson’s youngest Associate Director and youngest-ever elected President of the Conservative Party National Convention and Chairman of the 2004 Party Conference, to Board Director at Smithfield Consultants and then Group Director of PR at Royal Mail Group, where he developed public and media relations and public affairs for Royal Mail and Post Office. Richard is considered by his peers to be a talented and dedicated professional, one of the industry’s best. 

Arun Sudhaman is partner and managing editor of the Holmes Report, the industry-leading media title that is dedicated to proving and improving the value of public relations, by providing insight, knowledge and recognition to public relations professionals. In this role Arun oversees the Holmes Report's global content offering, including its analysis and insight into public relations and communications trends and issues. He brings to the position more than eight years experience of covering the global PR industry. Prior to joining the Holmes Report in May 2010, Arun spent more than seven years with Haymarket Media in Hong Kong, Singapore and London. He joined Haymarket title PRWeek UK in January 2009, after covering Asia’s media and marketing landscape at sister Haymarket title Media Asia (now Campaign Asia-Pacific) in Hong Kong and Singapore. Before joining Haymarket, Arun spent one year at Weber Shandwick during its tumultuous mergers with Weber and BSMG. During his career as a journalist he has also contributed to The Guardian and the South China Morning Post, where he began his career as a business reporter.

Charles took ownership of Citypress from his family in 1998. Under his leadership the agency has had 13 years of unbroken growth and is the 9th largest PR agency headquartered outside of London with over 40 consultants working across three offices – Manchester, Birmingham and London.

Andrew Thomas is publisher of Communicate magazine, the UK’s principal magazine for corporate communications, and producer of #CommsChat, Europe’s leading PR and media conversation.

Grant Thoms has worked for Scottish Renewables for the past six years in a communications role and currently as Public Affairs Manager. Grant leads Scotland’s green energy trade association’s political monitoring, lobbying and parliamentary relations, including briefing parliamentarians and councillors, and providing the secretariat for the cross party group in the Scottish Parliament on renewable energy and energy efficiency.
Grant’s role also includes managing relations with the industry’s strategic stakeholders including academics, industry bodies, environmental NGOs and community organisations. Grant is board director of Friends of the Earth Scotland, currently a Glasgow City Councillor and a former head of campaigns, now local government convener, for the Scottish National Party.
Grant holds a degree in hotel management from Edinburgh Napier University, PgCert in Public Relations from Queen Margaret University, has recently completed the new CIPR Public Affairs Diploma, and about to commence the MSc in Corporate Communication and  Public Affairs and distance learning at Robert Gordon University.

Sarah is co-managing director of McKenna Townsend PR. Sarah is known for her tenacity and prides herself on providing strategic advice that really makes a difference to the bottom line. Sarah very much sees herself as an extension of her clients’ teams. She is most proud of setting up a truly outstanding agency. Aside from delivering brilliant results for her clients, Sarah likes to explore the underwater world with her love of scuba diving and in the winter hitting the slopes to hone her skiing skills.

Andrew has worked in marcomms for 21 years, in both client and agency side roles across a vast array of sectors from the music industry through to FMCG. He set up Lucid in 2002 as a response to the need for a specialist design consultancy for the PR arena. Lucid works for over 25 PR consultancies and in-house teams and is the official design partner of the PRCA.

Deborah Walter joined Kreab Gavin Anderson in April 1988 and is Deputy Managing Partner of the London office. She has extensive experience of advising companies on their financial PR programmes, investor and government relations, M&A and IPO activities. Deborah is a specialist in the energy and consumer sectors.

Kreab Gavin Anderson is a global financial and corporate communications agency. KGA’s consultants are experts in financial PR, corporate positioning, public affairs and government relations.

Stephen was appointed Communications Director of the Law Society in June 2007 and has been the Society's Diversity Champion since mid-2008.  He is responsible for all communications work including public affairs, branding, eting and PR with the aim of developing a closer relationship between the Society and its members and raising its profile in public debate and thought leadership.  In the last three years, the Law Society has moved into the Top 100 Superbrands, leading in its sector.

Stephen drives the Society's work on equality and diversity as an employer and as a representative body.  He has transformed the Society’s approach to diversity, launching the Diversity and Inclusion Charter in 2009 and associated toolkit in 2010.  He was recently described by Stonewall as a role model for diversity in the legal sector. 

Stephen has a background in policy and communications in the civil service (Cabinet Office, European Commission) and political campaigning.

Rikki has over 22 years fmcg PR experience and joined Cirkle three years ago from Huntsworth-owned EHPR where she is now board director.   She has worked with blue chip clients including P&G Beauty, as well as Wella, Sassoon, Remington, Russell Hobbs and Energizer.  Rikki founded Cirkle’s highly successful body+soul and life+leisure divisions, attracting beauty and lifestyle clients from a standing start.   The divisions have already won over 15 clients, 2 campaign awards and a 90% pitch success rate, and currently account for 35% of the agency's income.

Carl is Managing Director of Communications Consultancy CWC. A specialist in local government communications, he edits the Communications Journal – a free to use online resource for public sector communications professionals and is currently delivering strategic communications management for the Olympic host borough of Hackney.

Simon Whale is managing director of Luther Pendragon, having led a management buy-out of the business five years ago.  He has 20 years’ experience in communications consultancy, advising clients across the business world and in the public and voluntary sectors.  His work has a strong issues focus and he has particular expertise in drawing together a range of communications disciplines – media relations, public affairs, stakeholder relations – to manage those issues and deliver effective results for clients.

Clare has been working in PR for over ten years, having started her career at IKEA as a management trainee in the b2b eting team. As a PR graduate, Clare swiftly moved into the IKEA press office and has never really escaped the world of retail PR since. Stints at Staniforth\ and Cow PR saw Clare work agency side for M&S and Tesco as well as the Mall  shopping centres, and Luton Airport’s newly launched shopping arcade. Other agency experience spans a vast array of clients with everything from telecoms with the launch of a new directory enquiries service and an infamous mobile phone aimed at children; to food and drink for Arla Foods.

For the last five years, Clare has been at the forefront of financial and corporate PR at M&S, working on many of the company’s high profile PR campaigns, including the much celebrated launch of Plan A and the award winning 125th Anniversary campaign. During this time she has also managed the extensive store opening and remodel programme and led the comms strategy behind the introduction of carrier bag charging in the UK.

At M&S Clare’s team of six handle around 3,200 press calls each month. Amongst other things the team is responsible for: promoting and protecting the M&S brand across a wide range of media outlets around the world through proactive campaigns and reactive issue and crisis management; all financial calendar events; the Annual Report; the AGM; Plan A PR; International PR and Board and senior management liaison and coaching.

Fiona is senior vice president of Visa Europe’s corporate communications function and has spent more than twenty five years in the card payment industry.  Much of Fiona’s work focuses on creating a positive business climate in the electronic payments arena for the Visa Europe membership association and its 4,000 members.   
Fiona joined Visa in 1982 and has held a variety of pan-European eting, communication and sales roles.  These include periods as head of Visa EU’s acceptance team and General Manager of Visa UK.  She was project manager for Visa’s Olympic sponsorships in Albertville and Barcelona in 1992, and is actively involved in the company’s sponsorship of London 2012, including the launch of Team 2012, a partnership which will support 1,200 British athletes between now and the games in 2012.
She has a degree in Economics and Law from Cardiff University and is a trustee of Eaves for Women and has been a member of the CBI’s Regional Council for the past year.

With nearly 30 years in consultancy PR, Amanda has a wealth of experience across the consumer, corporate, business to business and crisis management sectors and has worked with both multi-national companies and start up business, and everything in between.

As a founding partner of Storm Communications, Amanda is still an active account handler working to devise and implement creative campaigns for consumer clients, and advising on reputation management and issue handling for more corporate focused businesses. Amanda is also actively involved in the PRCA, heading up the Food and Drink Committee and sitting on the PR Council.

Since joining Cake in 2005, Chris has orchestrated successful campaigns, via the COI, for Visit London (Only in London, Waterways, Outdoor Spaces), The Royal Marines (recruitment), The Royal Navy (sponsorship support) and The Big Lottery (Peoples Millions). He provides strategic guidance and senior counsel to all Cake’s PR clients, including bodies such as WEMA and blue-chip brands such as Sainsbury’s, Unilever, Sky, British Airways and confused.com. Increasingly, he ensures a seamless strategy that incorporates traditional print and broadcast media as well as new digital communications platforms and social media.

Chris joined Cake as Head of PR in August 2005 and was promoted to the role of Managing Director in 2010. Before joining Cake, Chris was a director of Communique PR, the UK consumer arm of global giants Burson Marsteller. He previously held main board positions in the UK with Porter Novelli and Ketchum.

Alison has recently joined CCC Europe, in a newly created role supporting the European and global leadership team in strategic counsel and overall practice development. Alison offers an extremely broad experience in ethical and consumer healthcare PR, including: global brand communications launches, brand strategy development, issues management support for product withdrawals and strategic counsel on competitor blunting and public issues.

In total, Alison brings eighteen years of industry healthcare industry experience where she has worked in communications and eting in both in-house and consultancy roles within the UK, Europe and globally. Alison has worked on mainly ethical PR programmes, across a number of disease areas including oncology, diabetes, respiratory, gastrointestinal and HIV. 

Specifically, her relevant experience in oncology includes strategic counsel and delivery of global programmes for the Roche Oncology Franchise, including managing portfolio media outreach activities and affiliate engagement at ASCO. Alison primarily has a real passion for breast cancer, having worked in-house at AstraZeneca for a number of years as the Global PR Director for both the breast and prostate cancer franchises. In this capacity, Alison delivered international media programmes supporting data milestones for Arimidex, Faslodex, Casodex and Zoladex. She also worked closely with breast cancer patient advocacy groups on disease awareness raising initiatives for breast cancer awareness month, which included patient education and raising funds for third parties.

Previously Alison was a Board Director at Cohn & Wolfe, where she led on a number of international programmes, whilst also supporting the leadership of the practice. Prior to this Alison worked at Novartis as Head of Oncology External Affairs and Communications for Europe, Alison was responsible for driving regional programmes for all brands within the Novartis Oncology portfolio in both public relations and public policy.  Within this role she was responsible for providing strategic counsel to the European Regional Leadership Team and in building the communications capability across the entire region.

Alison has extensive issues management experience having worked on behalf of MSD in handling the impact of the recent foot and mouth outbreak on their animal research facility, Merial and the product withdrawal Roche’s HIV drug Viracept, due to contamination with EMS.

Having worked in PR for over 15 years (10 with Publicasity), Emma has created brand campaigns for many blue chip brands such as Disney, Microsoft and Royal Mail. Emma became an owner and managing director of Publicasity four years ago and currently leads the Kia, Britvic, United Biscuits and Guthy Renker teams.