VOLUNTARY ACTION LEICESTER - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Executive Manager, Trading
Role
VAL Trustee
Adam has lived in Leicester with his family since 2012 and has a wide and varied employment history both in and out of the third/charity sector.
Adam started his career in Health and Social Care, specifically hospital ward work specialising in health care support for the elderly, dementia community outreach, special needs support worker and youth worker specialising in sexual health, housing and mental health. After almost a decade of working in this sector Adam then moved on to a banking career and has experience in both retail and commercial banking spread across Barclays, Natwest and Cambridge & Counties bank. He was one of the founding members of Cambridge & Counties bank where he spent 7 years fine-tuning his expertise in secured loans, specialising in property. Adam has since then moved on to become a self employed Commercial Finance Broker at 2XL Commercial Finance, supporting businesses and charities alike in finding the right funding to keep these entities prospering.
Adam spent most of his time building relationships with multiple introducer types and as part of this had to engage heavily in the charity sector to meet new contacts etc. After spending so much time mixing with multiple charities he has decided to make his home at VAL and concentrate his efforts in one place making a more specific impact to people's lives.
Job Titles:
- Trustee
- Audit Operations Director for Cooper Parry
Role
VAL Trustee
Gemma works as an Audit Operations Director for Cooper Parry, having previously led a number of teams through extensive change management and growth strategies.
Gemma is also part of the Audit Leadership team at Cooper Parry, assisting with formulating the strategic growth plans of the team as well as devising the operational strategy to achieve the objectives for growth.
As an experienced coach and mentor, Gemma takes pride in developing the people around her and building effective teams towards exceptional results.
Gemma has gained significant international experience in managing and leading on large Outsourcing projects where she has successfully migrated operational services and project teams offshore and led teams to ensure successful client delivery.
Her passion for automation and technological transformation has allowed Gemma to be at the forefront of process improvements and efficiency initiatives, using technology to best deliver client service.
Previously, Gemma has worked in the Real Estate and Property sector where she has worked with national property agents in managing the financials across their commercial property portfolios. This is where Gemma successfully implemented a national mentoring programme for finance professionals working within the property sector.
Married for 10 years and a devoted mother of two young daughters, Gemma is passionate about empowering young women and creating opportunities for the next generation of leaders.
Joanna is a passionate supporter of the voluntary sector. She joined the board in 2016 when she became the Business Manager for a Graphic Design company and was therefore was no longer able to contribute to the sector through paid employment. She chose to become a trustee at VAL because the work undertaken here has always been an inspiration to Joanna. Given her experience of delivering projects to help improve young people lives, this area of VAL's work is of particular interest to Joanna.
Kevan is a Biology graduate who's first job was manufacturing electrical parts for cars for Lucas in Birmingham. He held a series of production management posts in Unilever, Duracell Batteries before ending his manufacturing career with Avon Cosmetics in Corby. In 1985 he took up a temporary post as a Social Work assistant in the Belgrave Area of Leicester as he had become more interested in working directly with people.
Job Titles:
- Executive Manager, Public Sector Contracts and Projects
Since retiring in December 2009, Linda has been actively involved with the voluntary and community sector as a trustee and chair of a range of charities and other community organisations. She has chaired the Board of Trustees at Voluntary Action South Leicestershire (VASL) for the last 9 years. VASL is based in Market Harborough but provides services across Leicestershire. She is also a trustee of the Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust. Linda has also played an active part in the life of her village, wanting to use her skills and experience in giving back to her community.
Job Titles:
- Treasurer of the Board of Trustees
Job Titles:
- Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees
- Member of the Valuation Tribunal Services
Mr. Narendra Waghela has been living and working in Leicestershire for over 41 years.
The two things that make him feel truly fulfilled are when he is with his family, and when he is doing something to help make real a difference in his community and city.
Narendra has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge on social, political and economic issues through being a Trustee Board Member of several organisations, a key member of various organisations in Leicestershire and over 31 years as a Senior Project Manager, Business Co-ordinator and Scheduling Manager with an International Design and Production Company.
As well as his business skills, Narendra has also used his valuable personal attributes such as his natural empathy, ability to make a fair and sound judgement, and problem solving skills.
His unique role with BAPS, working with today's youth with the difficult objective of keeping them away from drugs, street crimes, smoking and alcohol, has been extremely rewarding.
As a member of the Valuation Tribunal Services, Narendra has been involved in dealing with sensitive issues through working with people of different backgrounds. With his ability to speak English, Gujarati, Hindi, Punjabi, and Swahili and Urdu he has on many occasions helped as interpreter and translator in some ‘sensitive' conditions.
Through the work that Narendra does in the community, he feels a real sense of satisfaction and that he is making his contribution towards the betterment of our society.
Job Titles:
- Director of Healthwatch Leicestershire
- Executive Manager ( YES Project and GREAT Project )
Role
VAL Trustee
Zahirul is a Senior Auditor, qualified with over 17 years of experience in financial services. His current role as a Senior Audit Manager at China Construction Bank, is to lead and manage internal audit reviews.
His experience in the financial world extends from, not only leading and managing business audit teams, but delivering external audits efficiently and effectively to Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) clients; financial sector clients included investment banks and other financial institutions.
Zahirul is passionate about the work of a wide range of non-profit organisations. He is a Treasurer for the BYCS, a Leicester based community organisation and also, a Secretary for Valerie Taylor Trust, supporting CRP in Bangladesh.