GUHG - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Group Chief Executive
- Member of the Executive Team
Aileen has had a career spanning over 30 years in housing and in her role as Group Chief Executive oversees everything at Grand Union Housing Group. She believes passionately that building properly affordable social rented homes is fundamental to solving the housing crisis.
Aileen was voted President of the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) in November 2019 and completed her tenure in June 2021. As part of her presidency, she started a campaign to shine a light on mental health in housing and through various fundraising activities raised over £42,000, with the total still rising.
She writes an occasional column for Inside Housing and other housing publications, is regularly called upon to present at various industry events and her views are often sought in response to government consultation and policy.
Prior to joining Grand Union, Aileen was Housing Services Director at South Yorkshire Housing Association and before that worked for Leicester Housing Association, North East Derbyshire District Council and Nottingham City Council.
She, has a coaching mastery, is a neuro linguistic programming master practitioner, has a strong interest in understanding healthy organisational cultures and the impact on performance, is a member of the Association of Coaching, holds an MBA, is a member of the CIH, and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society for Arts.
Job Titles:
- Director of Corporate Services
- Member of the Management Team
Anne-Marie is Director of Corporate Services and is responsible for HR, communications and external affairs, overseeing a team of 16 who provide payroll, recruitment, learning and development and staff management support as well as PR, communications and policy and external affairs expertise.
With over 30 years' experience in HR, Anne-Marie has worked across the private, public, not for profit and charity sectors. She began her HR training at PwC in London where she stayed for 12 years before moving on to Bedfordshire County Council as Head of HR. Following this, Anne-Marie spent four years working for The Prince's Trust and then a nine-month stint at Aragon Housing Association in 2004/05.
Anne-Marie has been in her current role for over 12 years and is MCIPD (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development) qualified, a trained coach and currently working towards being a Brain Work Recursive Therapy therapist.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Director of His Own Company, O'Halloran Consultants Ltd
Brent is the director of his own company, O'Halloran Consultants Ltd, specialising in social housing consultancy.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Chris Is Director of Finance & Treasury and Is Accountable for Financial Operations, Taxation, Treasury Management and Long - Term Financial Planning
- Director of Finance & Treasury
Chris also heads up the financial planning function which ensures that accurate long-term financial plans are prepared on a timely basis to enable effective strategic decision making.
From 2012 Chris served as Director of Resources at Rockingham Forest Housing Association before they joined Grand Union in November 2016.
Prior to this, Chris spent 10 years at Grant Thornton working in a variety of roles such as auditing, accounts preparation and systems development. During his time at Grant Thornton Chris became a fully qualified accountant, completing both Association of Accounting Technicians and Association of Chartered Certified Accountants qualifications.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Director of Development & Commercial
Dave is our Director of Development & Commercial. He delivers our ambitious new homes strategy and leads a team that identifies and delivers new business opportunities, forges successful new partnerships, builds over 300 new affordable homes a year, manages capital expenditure of over £35m pa, oversees the quality control on our sites, and manages our Homes England (HE) Affordable Homes Programme 2021-26 delivery. Dave also leads our development consortium and manages the sale of over 120 new shared ownership homes each year alongside our market sales activity and the market rent homes in our portfolio.
Having worked in social housing for over 29 years, Dave has gained significant experience within various sized housing associations, delivering new homes and services across a range of tenures, client groups and geographical locations.
He has been with Grand Union since August 2005, has a post graduate Diploma in Housing, is a member of the CIH and is a Board member at Soha, a community, mutual housing association, based in Oxfordshire.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Director of Wellbeing & Safeguarding
Deborah's role as Director of Wellbeing & Safeguarding gives her responsibility for retirement living, extra care, day services, telecare, Life24 alarm and wellbeing visiting service, learning disability and mental health services, dementia care, domestic abuse refuges, financial wellbeing, community investment and safeguarding.
Deborah began her career in supported housing working for Age Concern as a Resettlement Officer for older people with a learning disability. She then moved to Hightown Housing Association as Deputy Team Leader managing a 24-hour independent living service for people with a learning disability and from there to Aldwyck Housing Association where she held a variety of roles within the supported housing service.
After more than nine years working for Aldwyck she moved to Macintyre Housing Association as Supported Housing Manager. In 2006 Deborah took on the role of Assistant Director of Housing and Support Services before taking on responsibility for supported housing in 2014. She also has a Degree in Housing and a Diploma in Coaching.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Director of Property Services
- Member of the Chartered Institute of Building
In his role as Director of Property Services, Doug is responsible for asset and facilities management across the Group. He oversees the annual programme of major projects, cyclical maintenance, tenant safety, corporate health & safety as well as the Occupational Therapy and Accessibility services.
Doug started his career at British Gas before moving into the private sector with a Mechanical Services Provider. In the late 1980s he made the move to social housing, joining what is now Milton Keynes Council. In 1997 Doug moved on to South Northamptonshire Council to take up the position of Building Services Manager, where he stayed for 11 years before joining Grand Union Housing Group.
Doug is an incorporated member of the Chartered Institute of Building and has a First Class Honours Degree in Building Surveying.
Job Titles:
- Association - Board Member
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board
- Interim Board Chair
- Vice Chair of the Group Board
Emma is Vice Chair of the Group Board and Chairs of the Customer Experience Committee.
Job Titles:
- Chartered Accountant
- Member of the Board
Kevin is a chartered accountant with 25 years' experience in financial services and consulting, focussing on governance, risk, and audit. He is now an independent consultant focussing on risk and assurance around climate, sustainability and ESG.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Team
- Executive Director of Finance and Business Services
Mona began her career in the media sector after qualifying as an accountant. She has over 15 years' experience working in housing and loves working for organisations that make a difference.
Mona joined Grand Union in February 2019 from Sovereign Housing Association where she held a senior position for three years. Prior to that, she was at Catalyst Housing Limited.
Mona has also worked in the media, insurance sector and has run her own travel business.
In her role as Executive Director of Finance & Business Services, Mona oversees the Finance, IT, Corporate Services and Governance teams.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Director of Customer Experience
- Formerly Head of Insight and Performance at Alliance Homes
Naomi is our Director of Customer Experience. She has over 20 years' experience delivering and improving customer service in a variety of sectors, with a particular expertise across all areas of customer experience, customer insight, strategy and data.
Formerly Head of Insight and Performance at Alliance Homes, Naomi transformed their customer involvement and performance teams into a single insight function - delivering a psychographic customer segmentation, a fully optimised digital customer engagement platform, instant feedback functionality and a new customer experience strategy.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Team
- Executive Director of Operations
Phil has worked in housing for over 25 years and firmly believes that high quality affordable housing is a fundamental cornerstone for current and future generations achieving their aspirations. As Executive Director of Operations he is responsible for all customer facing services, such as customer experience and independent living as well as property and development. Phil has also led our ambitious transformation programme.
He is the former Chair of Connection Support, a charity providing specialist support to people with complex life challenges and before joining Grand Union, he held senior positions at Sovereign Housing Association and Oxford Citizens Housing Association after starting his housing career at Ashfield District Council.
All Board and Committee members are required to declare any outside interests they have that may conflict with their role within Grand Union. A register of these declarations is publicly available on request.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Management Team
- Director of Governance & Risk
Job Titles:
- Independent Specialist Committee Member
- Member of Committee