The members of the judging panel are selected from a broad spectrum of industries and have a wealth of experience across the full range of business disciplines. The judges all give their time, professional abilities and enthusiasm to the Awards. They consider each entry independently and impartially.
Chief Judge
Stephen Woolfe – Harvey Ingram LLPStephen has headed the panel of Judges for four years having previously been a judge in the Innovation category. He also acts as a link between the judging panel and the Awards' Board. He has acted as a judge in the Business in the Community National Collaborative Action Awards, the Midlands Business Awards and in the Chamber Regional Business Awards. Stephen is a partner at Harvey Ingram LLP, Chairman of the East Midlands Chambers of Commerce and the immediate past-President of the Leicestershire Chamber of Commerce.
Substitute Judge
Roger has 4 years experience as a judge on the Leicester Business Awards. He is a business services partner at PKF, specialising in helping owner managed businesses with their growth plans. He is also a due diligence specialist, assisting on the financial aspects of acquisitions. His work with fast growth companies makes him ideally placed to act as a judge on these Awards.
Sales & Marketing Category
Mary-Ann has held Senior Sales and Marketing roles within the Food Manufacturing sector for over 10 years and has a broad range of experience within the chilled food market. Her experience covers dealing with all sizes of customers.
Mary-Ann is currently Sales Director for Saladworks, part of the Samworths Group, based at Leicester Forest East. Saladworks is a major supplier of Ready Meals to Tesco's and Waitrose. A major part of her role is developing a strong consumer led strategy to drive sales forward and increase their market share. She is heavily involved in new product development and consumer research all targeted towards developing innovative and tasty convenient meals
Vijay Asi - ASRA Midlands Housing Association
Vijay has extensive experience of the development, management and marketing of a broad range of housing products and services, and in the regeneration of inner city housing estates. Vijay is currently Chief Executive of a midlands based regional Housing Association, ASRA Midlands. He has also held the position of Chief Executive of Central Walsall Housing Trust, a stock transfer association.
Vijay is an independent Board Member of the Keynote Housing Group and a former board member of Leicester University Council and Court, Leicestershire Learning and Skills Council and Central Television’s Regional Advisory Council.
Investing in Leicestershire Category
William Presland is the Operations Manager for Invest Leicestershire, the Inward investment arm of Leicester Shire Promotions (LPL). Invest Leicestershire works with businesses of any size, in every sector except retail, with the ultimate aim of creating new jobs or safeguarding existing ones.
William started his career in Kent, performing a similar role and gaining many years of valuable experience with Locate in Kent. Since coming to Leicestershire in November 2004, he has worked hard to fuse his knowledge of issues facing business looking to expand, with regional knowledge of Leicester and Leicestershire. William is looking forward to judging the Investing in Leicestershire award, as he feels his experience and knowledge will be an asset to this category.
Stewart Collier – Mark J Rees
This is Stewart’s first year on the judging panel. He is a partner at Chartered Accountants and Business and Tax advisers Mark J Rees in Leicester, a position he has held for over 20 years. With a lifetime of working and living in Leicestershire he is well aware of the issues facing local businesses whose ambition it is to grow successfully. The subject of investment crops up almost on a daily basis with his client base which is derived from a variety of industries and sizes of business. The many years he has of knowing Leicestershire intimately, together with his accounting expertise, provide a solid foundation of experience to add value to the process of judging the Investing in Leicestershire category.
Success Through People Category
Erica Bonner – AstraZeneca R&D Charnwood
This will be Erica's third year as a judge for the Success Through People category. Erica is a Global HR Business Partner based at AstraZeneca R&D Charnwood in Loughborough where she has worked for the last 4 years. Prior to that Erica worked in a number of HR senior management roles in both the public and private sectors and has significant experience of both operational and strategic HR issues including major organisational change and is looking forward to using her knowledge and experience of achieving business success through people in judging this category.
Paul Blake - Crescent Search & Selection
A Chartered Management Accountant by professional qualification, Paul's early career included Board Appointments within both public and privately owned companies. A "second" career within senior management recruitment consultancy commenced 20 years ago when he became a founding partner of Crescent. During this time he has led people and management resourcing initiatives across a wide range of businesses and industry sectors. Paul's experience therefore includes an interesting mix of achieving business success both through people and sound financial management.
Enterprise Through Innovation Category
Stephen Bainbridge, Ashfield In2Focus Limited
Stephen is the Finance Director of Ashfield In2Focus and has been with the company almost since its inception some 10 years ago. He has been an integral part of the senior management team which has successfully turned the company into the number 1 player in the UK CSO arena and currently trades in 3 countries. In that time Ashfield In2Focus has picked up the Leicestershire Business Awards for Success through people, investing in Leicestershire, Business Personality of the Year and the most coveted Leicestershire Business of the Year award so understands fully what is required to win. He qualified as a Management Accountant in 1994 and has worked for a variety of Blue Chip companies in a variety of roles and industries within the Leicester and Nottingham area.
Martin Jones – Harvey Ingram LLP
Judging the entries for the 2007 Business Awards will be Martin's second year as a Judge for the Enterprise through Innovation Category.
Martin is a Partner at Harvey Ingram and is primarily based in Leicester and is now in his 19th year with the firm. Martin's specialist practice areas are construction and engineering allied to project finance and security with a specialist approach to regeneration within the Midlands and beyond in particular those sites within the National Coalfields programme. Martin looks forward to applying the expertise he has developed in the often innovative and pioneering approach taken for reclaiming and regenerating derelict areas and applying these skills and his experience generally in judging this category
Contribution to the Community Category
Lisa Hallam – Alliance & Leicester plc
Lisa is responsible for the co-ordination of Corporate Social Responsibility at Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank. She is actively involved in planning and initiating many charity, volunteering and environmental projects across the Group and publicising them both within the company and the local area.
Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank supports a wide range of community and educational initiatives in Leicestershire which has been recognised with a number of awards, including the ‘Contribution to the Community Award’ in 2004. Lisa therefore has first-hand experience of the qualities a company needs to make a positive impact on the local community.
Lisa is a member of Leicestershire Cares’ Champion Team and works with various local organisations and charities, including – Business in the Community, Leicester Learning Zone, Leicestershire Education Business Company and One-Stop Shop School Governors. She also liaises closely with Rainbows Children’s Hospice, which is the bank’s nominated Charity of the Year (South) 2005.
Kevin Feltham – Leicestershire County Council
This will be Kevin's first year as a judge for the Contribution to the Community category. Kevin has been an elected County Councillor representing the Gartree Division in south east Leicestershire since 2001. He is a senior member of the County Council Cabinet with responsibility for Resources, Property, ICT and Finance. He has run his own healthcare IT management consultancy business since 1991 dealing primarily with NHS hospitals. Prior to that he held the executive board position of Sales Director for 5 years of a leading UK healthcare software company. Kevin has worked in both the public and private sectors in senior management positions, and is looking forward to using his personal experience of business success with competitive IT and scientific enterprises, in judging this year's entries.
New Business Category
John Bowler – Grant Thornton
John is an audit partner at Grant Thornton, the Chartered Accountants and business advisers, where he acts as auditor and/or adviser to a wide range of companies from the SME sector, both privately owned and publicly quoted. He has a long history of internal management experience, having been office managing partner of both Leicester, and until recently, the Milton Keynes offices of Grant Thornton, covering a period of almost ten years. He has also chaired the firm's National Partner Selection and Promotion Interviewing Panel for a similar period. In both roles he has pursued his strong interest in the development of people for the mutual benefit of the organisation and their own personal careers.
Alexandra Charles – De Montfort University
Alexandra Charles is a Principal Lecturer and Postgraduate Programmes Director in the Faculty of Business and Law. Alexandra joined the University in 1994 after completing her first degree in Accounting and Finance. Since then, she has completed a Masters in Accounting, is an affiliate member of the Chartered Association of Certified Accountants, and holds membership with the British Accounting Association and the Higher Education Academy.
Alexandra specialises in the areas of ‘Management Accounting’ and ‘Finance for Managers’, both at Postgraduate level. She is responsible for the financial training of a variety of local, national and international corporate clients, ranging from Leicestershire Constabulary to the Cuban Ministry of Finance. Having been brought up and educated in Leicestershire, and worked within one of the region’s leading Business Schools, Alexandra is committed to promoting and enhancing the business environment within the local community.
Entrepreneur of the Year Category
John Burton – KPMG
2007 will be John's first year as a judge of the Entrepreneur Category of the Leicestershire Business Awards. John joined KPMG in 1991, qualifying as a Chartered Accountant in 1994. John has gained a wide range of experience working with a wide range of businesses from large plc's to smaller owner managed businesses across both audit and taxation functions and corporate evaluations. In 2006, he relocated from Birmingham to Leicester taking a portfolio of clients to deliver audit services while also having a business development remit to broaden the client base serviced from Leicester.
Stephen Peak – New Business
Stephen Peak is Head of the Department of Corporate Development in the Faculty of Business & Law at De Montfort University. Stephen joined the University from a successful career in industry having been Group Managing Director of a small set of property and retail related businesses. Having started businesses from scratch and purchased small going concerns Stephen is ideally suited to be judging the New Business Category.
Stephen has taught Marketing, Strategic Management, Business Ethics and Business Excellence at undergraduate and post-graduate levels. He has researched the barriers to growth in both service and manufacturing organisations and created practical programmes of intervention to help businesses overcome them. Stephen’s fourth book is due to be published in early 2005 "Good Business Isn't Rocket Science" (Peak, Bailey).
