Mark is Chair of the Financial Services Skills Commission, following his role as Chair of the Financial Services Skills Taskforce.

He is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Flood Re, a post he has held since 2015. He provides strategic direction and ensures the delivery of strategic objectives and risk management. He also serves on the Board of the London Stock Exchange Plc and is senior advisor to Markit, a leading international financial information provider.

Mark was previously Member of Parliament for Fareham, first elected in 2001. During his time in Parliament he served as Minister for Employment 2012-13 and as Financial Secretary to the Treasury, 2010-2012 where he was responsible for the coalition government’s financial services policy. Prior to his election, Mark worked for PwC and its predecessor firms between 1985-2001. He studied Economics at the London School of Economics and is a Chartered Accountant.

Claire Tunley is the Chief Executive of the Financial Services Skills Commission, appointed in May 2020.

Prior to this role, Claire was Head of Skills Policy at City of London Corporation leading on skills and talent policy. In this role, Claire was seconded to the Financial Services Skills Taskforce as subject matter expert on skills; led the creation of a sector deal on apprenticeships between the Professional Business Services Council and government; worked with the Government Equalities Office to create an action-based guide on supporting women’s progression in the work place; and created an innovative partnership with local schools to support students from disadvantaged backgrounds to gain a professional financial services qualification.

Claire has worked in skills and economic development in both local and central government roles for over 20 years. Claire is a member of the Institute of Leadership and Management and is a governor of a secondary academy located in an area of deprivation and is the nominated lead governor for careers.

Miles Celic is Chief Executive Officer of TheCityUK and has held this position since September 2016. He is also a member of the Department for International Trade Advisory Groups on Financial Services and Professional Advisory Services, a board member of UK Finance and a board member of the Financial Services Skills Commission.

Miles began his career in broadcasting, making and presenting radio and television programmes for the BBC and others. He moved on to work in the UK Parliament, where he focused on foreign affairs and defence issues. Miles subsequently worked in a number of leading reputation management and public policy consultancies, including a period at an arm of Omnicom – one of the world’s largest communications agency groups – where he advised clients including the BBC, the International Committee of the Red Cross and a number of international financial firms.

In 2007, Miles joined HSBC’s policy function to lead political engagement. He was part of the team that led the bank’s response to the global banking crisis. Miles moved to Prudential in 2009 as Director of Group Public Affairs & Policy and became Director of Group Strategic Communications in 2013. He was a member of Prudential’s Group Leadership Team.

Catherine McGuinness is Chair of the City of London Corporation’s Policy and Resources Committee.  She has been an elected Member since 1997 representing the ward of Castle Baynard, which takes in St Paul’s and Fleet Street. Catherine is also a member of the Community and Children’s Services Committee and the Finance Committee.

As Chair of the Policy Committee, Catherine is Deputy Chair of TheCityUK, the promotional body for the UK financial services industry, and the International Regulatory Strategy Group and also Chairs a number of Committee’s such as the Courts Sub Committee, the Culture Mile Working Party, the Resource Allocation Sub Committee and the Public Relations & Economic Development Committee

She was previously a commissioner on the IPPR Commission on Economic Justice and is now a commissioner on the IPPR Commission on Environmental Justice, and on the council of St Paul’s Cathedral.

A solicitor by training, Catherine practised in financial services law for several years, qualifying as a solicitor at Waterhouse & Co (now Fieldfisher), where she became a partner, and leading the London legal departments at Sanpaolo Bank and Banca Commerciale Italiana (now combined as Intesa Sanpaolo).  More recently she has worked as a consultant in the alternative investment management sector.

Christopher is the Global Leadership Partner for one of the UK’s largest banks and, by background, is an organisation design and HR consulting Partner.

He has worked predominately in financial services, across banking & capital markets, insurance and asset management.  He also has significant experience in oil & gas and consumer goods.

Over the last decade Christopher has led on the people aspects of some of the most complex bank restructures, and more broadly has led programmes ranging from cost reduction, business realignment, functional transformation and acquisitions and divestitures.  In addition to his role as a Global Relationship Partner, he is currently leading work to set up the end to end design for two new entrants to the UK Banking Sector.

Christopher has worked closely with regulators and other industry bodies to deliver to organisations major mindset shift and broader cultural and behavioural change programmes.  He works across the c-suite on people strategy programmes.

Christopher has a proven track record of leading teams in various roles including PwC’s London Tax Team; as the Global Relationship Partner for a Japan headquarted global bank; PwC’s UK Financial Services P&O Practice; PwC’s Middle East P&O Practice and PwC’s Tax Transformation team.

Having completed an MA in Psychology at Aberdeen University Susan’s career started in retail during which she held a variety of HR roles, starting off as a generalist then following her passion for learning into leadership and management development. In 2000 she started her own business providing consultancy initially on leadership and management development and latterly, business transformation.  She worked with a variety of organisations across a wide range of sectors around the UK until 2015 when she joined the HR team at Baillie Gifford.

Based in Edinburgh, Susan now leads the Talent & Development team whose role it is to ensure that there is a strong pipeline of talented individuals to ensure the firm’s continued success. She has responsibility for Talent Attraction and Acquisition, Talent Development, Performance Management and Learning.

Steve Collinson is the Head of the UK People Team, leading the People function across Zurich in the UK.

Steve has been with Zurich for over 30 years, in a career which has seen him drive and deliver major initiatives within HR, communications, finance and operations. In his current role, Steve and his team are at the heart of major advancements in employee engagement, benefits and wellbeing, and are focused on diversity, inclusivity and building sustainable careers for Zurich’s talented workforce.

Before taking up the role of Head of the UK People Team, Steve was Head of Change and Internal Communications, where he embedded a refreshed focus on engaging employees in strategy, brand, business performance and change.

Steve works alongside the UK Executive team, shaping the employee value proposition to deliver Zurich’s goal of being a great place to work for the widest range of people. He brings leadership, passion and deep business experience to his role.

Caroline is an experienced HR Director with over 25  years’ experience within the fields of Financial Services, FMCG, Travel and Retail sectors. Currently she is HR Director for Danske Bank UK where she leads the People Strategy as part of the Banks Executive Committee. She has spent the majority of her career in London and returned to NI in 2015. Prior to taking up her current role she worked for a number of FTSE 100 companies including Reckitt Benckiser where she held a Global HR Director role, Executive HR Director at Coutts and had 11 years with RBS in a variety of HR roles.

Melanie Halsey brings more than 20 years’ experience in senior human resources (HR) roles, most recently as Executive Vice President, HR at Colt Technology Services Limited, where she led a global team of 150 HR professionals across 15 countries.

Prior to that, Ms Halsey was Global Head of HR for Eight Roads, a global venture capital firm. Ms Halsey joined that business after working for Eight Roads’ major shareholder Fidelity, where she was the Head of HR for UK Financial Services.

Jane joined Nationwide Building Society in January 2018 and in September 2019 was appointed as Chief People Officer, leading the people, culture and inclusion experience for all colleagues.

Prior to Nationwide, Jane was Chief People Officer for Yorkshire Building Society with responsibility for people experience along with internal and external communications. Jane also spent 13 years at HSBC Group, where she was HR Director for First Direct and spent time in business leadership roles such as Customer Experience and Branch Network leadership.

Emma Hardaker-Jones joined Legal & General as Group HR Director in 2017. Emma’s previous role was as Global HR Director and Board Director at PA Consulting, co-leading the successful sale of 51% of PA Consulting to The Carlyle Group in 2015.

Prior to PA Consulting, Emma spent a number of years as Group Head of Talent and Resourcing at BP, driving change across the 100 countries in which BP operates. Emma has also held roles at Prudential and the Bank of England and was the co-founder of a dot com start-up, Skillvest.com. Emma has significant international experience having worked in Europe, North America, Asia and Africa.

Tanuj joined Standard Chartered in March 2017 as Group Head, Talent, Learning and Culture and took on additional responsibility as Global Head HR, Corporate, Commercial and Institutional Banking in May 2018. In November 2018 she joined the Management Team as Chief Human Resources Officer.

Prior to joining the Bank, Tanuj built her career at HSBC, where she worked for 17 years across multiple HR disciplines in many of their footprint markets- Hongkong, Singapore, India, Dubai and London. In her last role she was a Group General Manager and Head of HR for EMEA, Global IT & Operations and the International Management programme.

Tanuj is a Non-Executive Director at Sainsbury’s PLC and a member of their Nomination and Remuneration Committees. She also a board member of Asia House, which is a London-based centre of expertise on trade, investment and public policy whose mission is to drive engagement between Asia and Europe.

Katy is the Head of Human Resources at Capital One UK, leading all aspects of talent acquisition and development, people operations, and strategic business partnering. Katy has been with Capital One for over 10 years and spent the majority of her career working for their parent organisation in the United States in various senior HR positions. She is passionate about ensuring that organisations provide opportunities for personal and professional development and the impact ongoing skill development has on enabling people to better serve the needs of their customers.

Esmond has been at HSBC UK as Chief of Staff and Head of Strategy & Planning for 3 years, having previously been Head of Strategy at RBS for Personal and Business Banking.He has helped to deliver a strong performance for HSBC UK, across customer experience, people engagement and value-growth. He led the creation of HSBC UK’s refreshed 2030 vision, as well as 5-year strategic ambition and transformation plan; he is driving its overall execution.

He has worked in early-stage venture capital and also strategy consulting. He is a Chartered Accountant, and has an MBA with distinction from INSEAD.

Stephen is Chief Digital & Transformation Officer at Lloyds Banking Group. Stephen joined Group Transformation in April 2018, to lead the Retail Transformation team and took up additional responsibilities leading the Retail Bank Chief Digital Office in January 2020.

Stephen has been part of the Group since December 2007, leading first the mortgage business, then as MD Retail Customer Products, became accountable for a portfolio including savings, mortgages, personal current accounts, retail business banking and payments.

Prior to joining Group Transformation, Stephen was Group Customer Services Director, and Group Ambassador for the South West in 2016-2019. In this role he represented the bank and built relationships with MPs, community leaders and local businesses.

Ged is Barclays Global Head of Talent and Development. He joined the Bank in April 2019 and has spent the last 6 years in Financial Services Talent and Development roles.  A former Brigadier in the Royal Marines he was the commanding officer of several major units including 42 Commando Group and the Commando Training Centre.  Before leaving the Service Ged led the Individual Training and Recruiting organisation for the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, which included all the New Entry training establishments, the Leadership Academy, and 1 Assault Group Royal Marines.

Ged is a Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute and remains actively involved in supporting veterans charities and cadet organisations.

David is a Partner in EY People Advisory Services (PAS) focusing on future workforce themes in the Financial Services sector.

David is an experienced entrepreneur and advisor with a 25-year track record in helping clients with strategy, organisational effectiveness and people challenges. He joined EY 9 years ago and led the South African People Advisory practice before relocating to the London office in 2016 where he has had several leadership roles, most recently as EY EMEIA Workforce Advisory leader. He has led large assignments in banking and insurance clients in the areas of hybrid work strategies, strategic workforce planning and capability development, organisational change and culture, leadership and learning, and talent.

David joined EY as part the acquisition of Resolve Group, a collection of strategic human resources consulting companies that he co-founded and led for 14 years in South Africa. He also co-founded and launched SnappCab, an App based taxi aggregator. Prior to starting Resolve he had several formative early career experiences in the areas of political violence mediation, electoral administration and policing reform during the South African transition to democracy, and spent several years in student and community based anti-Apartheid activism.

Jen was appointed as the Chief Transformation Officer in August 2020, as a member of the Group Executive Committee. In addition to her existing responsibilities for driving strategic transformation, managing the investment portfolio, customer journeys and build of group-wide capabilities and efficiency, Jen has recently taken accountability for the Group’s People agenda and strategy, Property Services and Procurement as the Group Chief People & Transformation Officer. Jen is also the Executive Sponsor for ‘Rainbow’, the Group’s LGBTQ+ employee led network.

Prior to joining NatWest Group, Jen spent 15 years at Lloyds Banking Group. Appointed to the Group Executive Committee in 2017, she was Group Director, People and Productivity responsible for HR, efficiency, sourcing, supply chain management and property. Prior to that, she was the Group Organisation Design and Cost Management Director, Group Customer Services Director and MD, Business Banking serving over a million small business customers. Before working in financial services, Jen worked in both the engineering and airlines sectors.

Jen is a non-executive director on the board of Morgan Sindall Plc, a FTSE250 construction, housing, infrastructure and regeneration business. She joined the Council of City University, University of London, in July 2020 where she also chairs their RemCo. She has also sat on the boards of Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets and Kent Community NHS Foundation Trust.

Jen graduated from Oxford University and is mother to three children residing in Sevenoaks and London.

Sara’s career has been spent entirely in HR, starting as a graduate and working for various large multinationals as well as running her own consultancy. Her early career was in IT and telecoms companies but since then she has gained considerable Financial Services experience including roles in Royal Sun Alliance, Barclays and more recently, Aviva, the UK’s largest insurer. Between 2005 and 2009 Sara lived and worked in South Africa where she led the people aspects of the integration of Absa Bank in to Barclays. Although the UK is now her base Sara has worked in Europe, Asia and the Middle East, Latin America and the US. Sara is a working mum with a daughter and son in their early twenties.

Vicky Wallis joined Direct Line Group as Chief People Officer in April 2020 and is a member of the Group’s Executive Committee. Vicky is responsible for developing and driving the people agenda enabling a dynamic, inclusive place to work, where people can collaborate, grow and thrive.

Vicky has a wealth of experience in building HR functions, developing cultural frameworks and enhancing people capabilities having worked previously at Santander where she was the HR Director for five years and at RBS, where she partnered the business through unprecedented levels of change in their Capital Resolution and Non-Core Divisions. Having operated in international organisations with global roles and projects in India, Romania, EMEA and the US, Vicky also gained a wealth of experience running her own HR consultancy company working with a range of companies, notably EDF Trading, Lloyds Pharmacy, Abbey National and Vodafone.

Vicky is passionate about ensuring that organisations provide interesting and stretching work opportunities for people from all backgrounds and creating cultures that enable everyone to thrive and grow to their potential.  She sees the continuous evolution of organisational skills as a critical part of the HR agenda in order to ensure colleagues are always ready for the rapidly changing market.

Vicky is CIPD qualified and has a Master’s degree in Organisational Leadership.  Vicky is married and has two children (26 & 24) and ensures she maintains a good work:life balance in order to spend quality time with them. She is also a keen film-goer and also enjoys running, cycling & the gym; when she can get there!