Recruitment and Retention Conference 2019

Adrian Thomas is a recognised expert in Human Resources and Recruitment.  With experience spanning over 35 years Adrian has worked for some of the UK’s largest employers within the pharmaceutical, finance  and transportation sectors. Following submission of his review of change within the fire and rescue service, Adrian joined the Civil Service for almost five years to lead the recruitment of the most senior civil servants. He held this position until April 2018 when he returned to the private sector working with a portfolio of clients. Adrian is also chair of The Recruitment Society and the RL100 - the leading network of senior in-house resourcing and TA leaders.

Adam Gibson, Strategic Workforce Planning Leader, Capita

Adam Gibson is a global leader in Workforce Planning, and creator of the Agile Workforce Planning methodology, having successfully implemented and transformed workforce planning and people analytics in businesses across both the public and private sector advising company executives in creating a sustainable workforce that increases productivity and reduces cost.  He is the Group Director of Strategic Workforce Planning at Capita, a multinational company of 70,000 staff; he is at the forefront of efforts to simplify and strengthen their business.  In recent years he has held senior workforce planning roles at the Metropolitan Police and PwC.

Simon Fanshawe OBE, Co-founder and partner, Diversity by Design

Simon Fanshawe OBE is co-founder and partner of Diversity by Design and from 2007-2013 was the chairman of the University of Sussex governing council. He is currently on the boards of Brighton Dome and Festival, POWERful Women and the Museum of London and recently ended six years on the board of Housing and Care 21.

Simon was a co-founder of one of the most successful lobby and campaign groups in recent times, the lesbian and gay equality organisation Stonewall. He is now a co-founder of the Kaleidoscope Trust supporting LGBTI activists abroad.

He is also a broadcaster, writer and pundit. He was awarded the OBE in the New Years Honours list 2013 for services to Higher Education. And he was made an Honorary Doctor of the University of Sussex for services to diversity and human rights in 2013. 

Lizzie Crowley, Skills Adviser, CIPD

Lizzie leads the CIPD’s programme of research and policy development on the UK skills system. She is a policy and research professional with over 13 years’ experience in the employment and skills arena, having worked with both the public and private sector to develop high-quality research to inform organisational practice, public policy and shape the public debate.

Phil Pringle, Head of Insight and Engagement, Whitbread Group Plc

Phil has more than 12 years’ experience working in the field of employee engagement research and people insight. Phil is focused on enhancing Whitbread’s ability to understand employee attraction, engagement and retention through data integration and analytics.

Debra Corey, Author of the Rebel Playbook for World Class Employee Engagement

Debra Corey is a highly experienced and award-winning HR professional, two-time best-selling author and world-class speaker.  She’s had a varied and exciting career over the last 20+ years, working for global companies such as Gap Inc., Honeywell, Merlin Entertainments and Reward Gateway to name a few, where she’s developed and delivered HR strategies in a rebellious way, pushing the boundaries and challenging the status quo to truly drive employee engagement.

She's also an accomplished author, publishing two best-selling books, and in addition writes blogs for Forbes as well as other industry publications, getting her innovative and rebellious thoughts out in a variety of ways.

Debra's just moved into what she calls the 'pay it forward' part of her career, where she's using her experience to assist and influence others through her speaking, consulting and writing.

Jonathan Hull, Head of Resourcing Delivery, Nationwide

Jonathan has over 25 years experience in the Resourcing and HR world and has held senior positions across a range of industries and companies, where the focus has always been transforming service delivery, empowering teams to deliver to high standards and ensuring resourcing is always aligned to commercial goals and outcomes.

He has delivered transformation programmes in Assessment, Branding and Emerging Talent and always seen areas for improvement. Resourcing is now a strategic player for business and HR in order to deliver measurable results and value.

Samantha Hope, Graduate Recruitment Manager, Shoosmiths LLP

Samantha is Shoosmiths’ graduate recruitment manager based in Milton Keynes. She attracts, recruits and develops trainee solicitors, by co-ordinating the vacation placements and training contracts across the firm’s 11 office locations in the UK.

Samantha has a passion for the use of digital media in recruitment and marketing. She leads the social media pages for the careers teams at Shoosmiths, including a Facebook live video series called #ShoosmithsLIVE – designed as an opportunity to engage with a diverse range of potential candidates all over the world.

A law graduate herself, Samantha has been working in the graduate recruitment market since 2008, before joining Shoosmiths in 2010.

Scott Johnson, Head of Talent Discovery, Redington

Scott is Head of Talent Discovery and People Business Partner at Redington, an Investment advisory firm on a mission to make 100 million people financial secure. Scott joined Redington in March 2018 to establish an internal recruitment capability and was also tasked with establishing a new office for the company in Bristol.

In January 2019 he was invited to join the RL100 future leaders programme.

Prior to Redington he lead UK& Ireland Recruitment for Vertiv (a Critical infrastructure manufacturer) and before that led recruitment for Insurance and Investment Consulting at Willis Towers Watson.

Gillian Murphy, CEO, Pilotlight

Gillian is the CEO of Pilotlight, an award-winning social enterprise that matchmakes and manages relationships between charities in need of strategic transformation and carefully selected teams of senior professionals and entrepreneurs with skills to offer. Over 15 years, Pilotlight’s impact on over 1,000 professionals and 800 charities has been well-documented. Her work straddles a UK charity sector dealing with increasing deprivation and a business world that is being challenged to pair profit with purpose.

Gillian has worked in both the private and non profit sectors in Italy and South-East Asia.

Claire Battle, Head of Talent, Sagittarius Agency

Claire is Head of Talent at Sagittarius Agency having been at the organisation for nearly four years. In this time, the organisation has grown from 24 people in one office to 75 people based in Ashford, London, Leeds, Ukraine and Sri Lanka. 

She is accountable for Sagittarius' global HR and recruitment strategies, and implementation of processes.