The team
Richard Astle
A communications professional with wide experience of corporate affairs at director level, Richard’s career combines senior roles in the financial services sector with an earlier career in the Foreign Office.
His strengths include strategic advice and consultancy at board level and for management teams, helping them to understand and tackle their communications challenges. Richard has worked recently on projects involving public consultations, a change programme launch for a large public sector organisation, and communication strategy for the creation of a new public sector body. He also has considerable experience of developing communications strategies for major projects in the private sector, both in the context of investment in growth and redundancy programmes.
Richard won the Institute of Public Relations Sword of Honour for public affairs in 2000.
Jon Cook
Jon is a versatile programme manager and change agent. He works with board directors, contributing to project conception and definition, going on to manage – or coach others in – project set-up, governance and delivery.
He has wide experience of achieving business benefits through changes in organisation, systems, processes and culture, with an emphasis in Marketing, Sales, HR and IT arenas. He has led a wide variety of projects and is accustomed to leading effective multi-discipline – and sometimes ‘virtual’ – teams comprising a mix of in-house line managers and staff, external suppliers and consultants.
James Toms
James has substantial experience as a senior Human Resources executive in the UK and internationally. As an HR Director he has played an influential role in helping organisations understand the root causes of why they are changing, where they are going and what they must do to achieve operational excellence.
He works with senior management helping them work out how to enable their business to change gear – shaping corporate transformation initiatives, and advising on HR strategy. He is also a certified executive business coach with psychometric testing and Myers Briggs accreditations, with a focus on helping managers get to grips with the specific demands of leading in a change environment.
Elizabeth New
Elizabeth is an employment law and human resources expert with extensive business experience. She has worked in private practice and as a senior HR executive and lawyer in an international company. She is also a qualified business coach.
Elizabeth has wide-ranging experience of change management, organisational development and employee relations, and has used this rare blend of expertise on several major change initiatives. These have involved planning radical re-structures, union negotiation and consultation, setting up employee representative bodies, and designing HR policies and practices.
She operates through a Law Society registered practice, providing HR consulting and definitive legal advice and hands-on input to directors responsible for major change initiatives such as mergers, outsourcing, and strategic business reorganisations.