MARCHES LOCAL ENTERPRISE PARTNERSHIP - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Director of Reprezent
- Founder and Director of Radfield Home Care
Alex is also responsible for the strategic development, marketing strategy and digital care implementation and financial management of Radfield Home Care Franchising, which has a network of more than 25 Radfield Home Care offices which are delivering care across the country.
Before starting Radfield Home Care, Alex worked in community media, including running Ofcom pilot projects to bring licensed community radio broadcasting to the UK. He has also held roles in financial services and has worked as an advisor to technology brands focusing on blockchain technology.
As a passionate believer in the importance of community, Alex still works as a director of Reprezent, a London-based social enterprise providing broadcasting services, media training and education for young people.
Alex is a founder and director of Radfield Home Care, a company that provides care for people living in their own homes in Shrewsbury.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Chairman of the Metal Cladding
Fenton Partners has since delivered designs for more than 2,000 buildings. More recently, Clare, her husband and son set out on a research and development programme to investigate improvements to build and performance. The result of this work was Veritherm, an overnight 12-hour test that can give actual physical thermal performance data on built assets, which should help towards ambitious net-zero goals.
She has been involved with the Construction Innovation Hub's Platform Programme since its start, sits on the Platform's strategy board and is a key member of the envelope delivery team and the digital proof of concept team.
She was awarded the European Women in Construction and Engineering Lifetime in Construction Award in recognition of her efforts to improve standards, her innovations, collaborations along with years of mentoring, training and leadership.
A keen rower and cyclist, Clare is also a qualified sports therapist and a parish councillor.
Clare is the chair of the Metal Cladding and Roofing Manufacturers Association. She has been involved in the construction industry for more than 20 years, after starting out by creating CAD designs to support her husband's business.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Founder and Managing Director of Mosaic Spa
Dave is founder and managing director of Mosaic Spa and Health Clubs Ltd, and is small business champion on the Marches LEP Board.
Simone has over 25 years of experience working in a range of academic and leadership roles in a diverse range of universities in England and Wales. Simone taught undergraduates during her doctoral studies and worked as a post-doctoral research fellow on an interdisciplinary history and computing project before beginning her career in professional services. She joined Harper Adams in August 2020 having previously held similar senior leadership roles in other universities relating to her current role, and others relating to HE Governance, Research Management, Strategic and Academic Planning.
Simone has experience of leading successful change management programmes relating to educational course portfolio redesigns and restructuring of professional services. She also led an early proof-of-concept sector project on the use of AI and student services (funded by the Leadership Foundation, HEFCE and JISC) and was the project lead for a Strategic Investment Fund programme of organisational change funded by the former Higher Education Funding Council for England (worth £5.7M). Earlier in her career, Simone also ran a hospitality business.
In her current role, Simone is responsible for the learning and teaching, educational development and enhancement, and professional services supporting students: student Services, Accommodation Services, Learner and Disability Support, Admissions and Visa Compliance, Careers and Placements, Registry Services and the Assessment Office, Academic Quality and Standards, Library Services, Planning and Policy.
Simone has represented the sector and individual universities on a range of committees and working groups. In a former role, she was Vice Chair of a shared service relating to internal audit for a number of universities. She has extensive experience of working with higher education governing bodies and their sub-committees, as a member of the senior university leadership team and as a professional secretary directly accountable to the governing body, providing training, professional advice and support services to the Board.
Simone joined the LEP Board in June 2023 and is the Higher Education Champion and chairs the LEPs Higher Education Group.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Chairman of Herefordshire Business Board
Frank Myers MBE is the managing director of Ross-on-Wye based Myers Road Safety Ltd and a director of MCP Systems Consultants Ltd. He has been responsible for introducing a new high-tech concept of asset tracking into the health service and, in 2009, won the E Health Insider Award for Innovation.
In 1996, he was awarded the MBE "for services to road safety and to export".
He joined The Marches LEP Board following his appointment as chair of the Herefordshire Business Board with a broad responsibility to assist in promoting economic growth opportunities for Herefordshire, and representing Herefordshire focused projects with the wider Marches LEP area.
Frank graduated in Engineering from Loughborough University as part of a successful student apprenticeship. He also has a Graduate Diploma in Management and Administration from the University of Bradford Management Centre.
He was a director and trustee of Queen Elizabeth's Foundation for Disabled People for nine years and is also a non-executive director of The Wye Valley NHS Trust. A former chair of its Quality Committee he now chairs the Charitable Funds Committee. He is also chair of the Herefordshire Community Foundation. Frank was also chairman of Walford Parish Council until 2019.
Serving on The Marches LEP board since November 2014, Frank is also chairman of Herefordshire Business Board and a member of the LEP Performance, Risk and Monitoring Committee.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Director of Pomona Solar Co - Operative
- Member of the Institute of Physics
Gordon Coppock joined the Marches LEP board as the partnership's energy and net zero champion.
Following a career with Siemens, culminating as a director for the Asia Pacific region with responsibilities for 32 countries, Gordon decided to focus his work on climate change issues and in particular those related to energy use.
Gordon has a significant experience of working in the renewable energy sector both in the Marches and across the UK. His personal journey with using solar panels started in the 1980s and he has worked for one of the UK's pioneering renewable energy companies, Wind and Sun based in Leominster.
Gordon is a director of Pomona Solar Co-operative, Herefordshire's largest community-owned solar generation system supplying low cost electricity to local businesses and is actively seeking more sites.
He is vice chair of Herefordshire Green Networks and in 2019 created the Zero Carbon Herefordshire project. He has been chair until recently of his local town's award-nominated environmental group KLEEN, and has worked with Marches Energy Agency to support the Keep Herefordshire Warm project.
Gordon is an elected member of the Institute of Physics (IOP), and has been a STEM ambassador to support the IOP Lab in a Lorry project for schools across the Marches and in Wales. He has developed (with support from the IOP) educational energy bikes for all ages and taken these to events across the Marches.
With any rare spare time, he enjoys astronomy, long distance walking with his family and friends and cycling using only his own energy!
Graham Guest is the Marches LEP's Skills Champion and was appointed to the Board in November 2021...
Jonathan Lester joins the LEP Board as the Leader of Herefordshire Council. Jonathan was first elected to the council in 2011 and became Council Leader in May 2023. Cllr Lester's alternate on the Marches LEP Board is Cllr Graham Biggs.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Board Member of the Microfinance Centre
Paul is also a board member of the Microfinance Centre, a European Microfinance Network based in Poland. Prior to his career in the "not for profit" small business lending sector he was the secretary general of the British Junior Chamber of Commerce.
Paul lives in Wellington, Shropshire, and founded Shropshire Canicross in 2015, which now has over 400 members involved in trail running with dogs. He has represented England in the Annual Tri Nations Canicross championship races and competed in the Great Britain Team at the European Championships.
Paul has been a part of The Marches LEP board since May 2018 and is the Access to Finance Champion. Paul Kalinauckas founded a Community Development Finance Institution based in the West Midlands in 2002 supporting local SMEs and recently retired as the chief executive after 17 years of service.
Having been raised in Shropshire, Sara's professional life began in the heart of the county at Ironbridge Gorge Museums Trust. There she was influential in the establishment of Enginuity, one of the most popular educational attractions in the area and a key economic foundation for the Trust itself. Following this, and with a taste for project management, she has gone on to perform influential roles at some of the region's most notable employers.
After a number of years in event management, it became clear that marketing and public relations were natural callings for Sara. As her journey progressed into the B2B circuit, her agile skillset has adapted according to the specific requirements of the industries she's served. First with Lyreco, a Europe-wide office supplier based in Donnington Wood; and more recently an international role with Protolabs, a global digital manufacturer based in Halesfield.
Education is a passion for Sara, and through her role at Protolabs she supports the local educational community's focus on STEM subjects. As a certified STEM ambassador, she is tasked with providing practical and vocational support to secondary schools. The primary objectives here are to instil in schoolchildren a fascination of STEM subjects and to ensure the associated skills remain in the region; the Marches' future generation of scientists, technologists, engineers and mathematicians.
Sara was appointed to The Marches LEP board in July 2019. With a career forged in the Marches cluster, Sara brings a wealth of experience gained in both the private and non-profit sectors.
Job Titles:
- Chairman
- Member of the Board
- Director With Laura Ashley
After a successful commercial career as director with Laura Ashley, Sonia moved to the charitable sector in 2003 as CEO of Landau, one of the UKs most prestigious supported training and employment organisation. She has led the charity from a £200k to a £4.5m turnover business and increased in service delivery across the UK.
Sonia became Chair in November 2022. She is the champion for both diversity and the community & voluntary sector and chairs the LEP's Performance, Risk and Monitoring Committee.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Founder and Managing Director of Priority Managed Services Ltd
Will, founder and managing director of Priority Managed Services Ltd, is a strategic leader and executive mentor who specialises in business performance improvement as well as operational excellence and is a proven turnaround specialist.
With over 30 years' board-level leadership experience across the telecoms, technology, business support services and manufacturing environments, he is an accomplished strategist focused on delivering profit optimisation and sustainable stakeholder value.
Currently providing 1-2-1 executive mentoring to businesses across Telford and Wrekin through UKMentor, Will provides empathy and expert communications and influencing skills to support his clients who reap the rewards of service excellence and accelerated growth. Will sits as chair of Telford Business Board CIC and is deputy chair of the Marches LEP.
Will Westley joined The Marches LEP board in July 2021 after being appointed chair of Telford Business Board Community Interest Company (CIC). In January 2023 he was appointed Marches LEP deputy chair.