Governance Structure

Candace has had an extensive career at the forefront of vocational education and training developments within the U.K. After several years working for a major awarding organisation, during which time she led a research programme exploring the requirements for effective workplace education across the major sectors of the U.K. economy, Candace set up and ran a successful workforce research and development consultancy. From the early 1990’s until she joined Skills for Health, Candace led, or participated in, a wide range of government driven and/or sector-based initiatives, all designed to drive up the effectiveness of U.K. workforce development, ensure strong employer leadership on skills and create learning pathways that are accessible to all.  From Skills for Health, Candace transitioned into becoming an Executive Director at the Workforce Development Trust, broadening her sector experience into the justice sector, before taking on the role of Managing Director of SFJ Awards in early 2020.

Keith Fraser is the Chair of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales (YJB), appointed by The Secretary of State on April 14, 2020, after becoming a member in January 2018. He is also an Advisor for the National Police Chiefs Council Digital Engagement Project for Young People, Chair of Employability UK, and a trustee on the Board of Sport Birmingham and the National Emergency Services memorial.

Prior to this, Keith was a Superintendent and Chief Inspector in the West Midlands Police, having joined the Metropolitan Police as a Constable, during which time he produced the 2016-19 Preventing Gang Involvement and Youth Violence strategy and was Head of Learning and Development for 13,000 staff.

Keith also produced the business plan for City of Wolverhampton council, where he was the Chair of the authority’s statutory Youth Offending Management Board. He led an innovative, preventative project, targeting over 7,000 young people, working with Sport England and was the Strategic Police Lead for the Princes Trust across the West Midlands.

Arvind Malhotra is the Co-Founder and CEO of FutureSense Group – a global social enterprise that works in partnership with leading universities in the UK & Australia to provide opportunities for students to gain new skills.

Prior to establishing FutureSense Group, Arvind held a number of leadership roles in global organisations across a diverse range of industries.

Beginning his professional career at Unilever, Arvind progressed to the role of Vice President at Bank of America before joining Zurich, where he became Marketing Director & Member of the Executive Board.

In addition to his role as CEO of FutureSense Group, Arvind chairs the FutureSense Foundation – an international charity that supports children and youth from disadvantaged communities worldwide.

A graduate of Delhi University, Arvind lives with his wife in Wiltshire and they have two children.

Daniel Langton is responsible for leading Microsoft Uk’s customer and partner experience (CX) and satisfaction efforts.

Niamh McKenna is the CIO for NHS Resolution and prior to that managed Accenture’s Health business in the UK. Niamh has worked across many different industry sectors leveraging a wide range of skills from management consulting to technology delivery. Her particular areas of interest include new technologies and how to best implement these in a practical way. She grew up in Belgium and has spent time living in Japan and now lives in London with her two sons.

Erika Bannerman is the Managing Director NHS Shared Business Services (SBS), July 2020, and a member of Sopra Steria UK’s Executive Committee.

Following a successful career in senior leadership roles with Capita and the Manpower Group, leveraging a wide range of skills from management consultancy to technology delivery, Erika’s role at NHS SBS is to harness the organisation’s great people and technology strengths to deliver its purpose: “helping the NHS to save money and enhance quality so that the NHS can improve health, innovate to save lives, and deliver better outcomes with care and compassion.”

An experienced CEO, Non-Executive Director, Chair and Advisor, serving on a mix of Public, Private and FTSE boards; Government Joint Ventures and Partnerships, Erika has a broad range of experience in business services, consultancy, digital and regulated organisations.

Erika is on the Partnership Board Committee for the Bookmark Reading Charity, an Education Charity committed to improving child literacy and is also a Consultant to the Social Mobility Commission, an advisory non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Department for Education.

Dr Rowena Hill is a psychologist who works at Nottingham Trent University. Acting as a conduit between the university and external sectors – mainly public sector organisations, she explores opportunities for mutually beneficial research, teaching and knowledge exchange. Rowena has worked extensively with the emergency services during her career and seeks to support them in evidence-based decision making and collaborative research with academia.

Her research portfolio focuses on emergency responders and emergency management, looking to provide insights on the impacts of spillover between work and home environments, and how family structures adapt to protect against this. She sits on many national boards within the blue light sectors and has previously held the role of Trustee for The Fire Fighters Charity. She now holds the position of National Honorary Research Lead for the organisation. Rowena has wide-ranging experience in quality assurance around learning, in both international and UK contexts, including Undergraduate, Postgraduate, Apprenticeships and Continuing Professional Development courses.

Dr. Sara Munro is the CEO at Leeds and York Partnership NHS Trust; a role she has undertaken since September 2016. Here, she leads the team of executive directors, along with the chair and non-executive directors from the Trust Board. The Board is responsible for setting the strategic direction for the organisation.

Sara started her career in the NHS as a student nurse and agency nursing assistant. She is a registered mental health nurse and her clinical work was spent in inpatient mental health settings. Sara also holds additional system leadership roles, being the workforce lead for the ‘one Leeds workforce’ on behalf of health and care partners, which has established a pioneering health and care academy. In the West Yorkshire Integrated Care System, Sara is the senior responsible officer for mental health, learning disability and autism collaborative.

Sara has worked across a range of NHS mental health and community services providers in the North West of England, and has also completed a PhD looking at attitudes of acute mental health nurses and their impact on service users’ experience of care.

As chief executive of MiP, Jon Restell takes responsibility for the strategy and performance of this specialist union for health and care services managers and senior staff. Managing a team of national officers, he acts as lead media spokesperson, negotiates with employers at national level, and works to influence ministers, civil servants, and other policy makers.

Jon became MiP’s first member of staff when the organisation was founded in 2005 and now also acts as secretary of the MiP national committee. He is accountable to members of UNISON and FDA executive committees, and attends UNISON’s health service group executive on behalf of MiP. He represents MiP members on a number of national NHS forums and working groups, including: the national Social Partnership Forum, Strategic Group of the Social Partnership Forum, Workforce Issue Group, a sub-group of the Social Partnership Forum (as co-chair), NHS Pensions – Scheme Advisory Board, and the Workforce Race Equality Standard – Strategic Advisory Group

Taking a special interest in leadership development, Jon focuses particularly on the value of good line management and has tutored leadership programmes for middle managers. Throughout his career, he has developed particular expertise in pensions, working to improve workplace culture and diversity, especially in building resilience among union members. Jon is trained in using Future Search events to bring diverse groups together to co-operate and plan for the future, and is interested in exploring approaches to strategic development for engaging everyone.

John is a well-known figure across workforce development in the UK and is a member of a range of national boards.

John Rogers is Chief Executive of the Workforce Development Trust (incorporating SFJ Awards, Skills for Health, Skills for Justice and People 1^st). He has spent most of his career in workforce development leadership roles. Much of his career has focused on the health sector, including roles as Chief Executive of Skills for Health, Chief Executive of Healthwork UK, as a Director at the NHS Training Authority, and other senior roles in the Department of Health and within the NHS. John has also worked significantly across sectors including contributions as the Chair of the UK-wide Alliance of Sector Skills Councils and as a non-executive of the South West Learning and Skills Council.

Lisa started her career in policing at North Yorkshire Police in 1993 as a Special Constable in York, before joining Humberside Police as a regular officer in 1994.

She has undertaken a number of roles from Constable through to Chief Inspector in response policing, neighbourhood teams, detective roles and professional standards. Having joined the High Potential Development Scheme, she has also worked in strategic planning and business change roles and authored the policing plan on behalf of the Police Authority and the Force.

In 2008, she returned to North Yorkshire Police and worked within the York and Selby Command as part of the senior management team as Chief Inspector Operations.

She remained at York on promotion to Superintendent Operations and went on to be the Commander for the City between 2009 and 2013. During this time she also attended the FBI National Academy leadership course in Quantico.

In May 2016 Lisa took up Chief Officer responsibility for local policing, and in February 2017 she became Deputy Chief Constable at North Yorkshire Police, before becoming the Chief Constable the following year.

Lisa Winward received the Queen’s Police Medal for Distinguished Service in the 2022 Queen’s Birthday Honours list.

Jacob Abboud joined the board of The Workforce Development Trust in 2022, following a successful career encompassing c-level positions at Legal & General, Allianz Insurance and AXA UK & Ireland.

A Chartered Member of the British Computer Society, Jacob holds a PhD in Computer-Aided Engineering from the University of Bath and has a long track record of leading digital transformation in complex organisations.

Jacob has previously held non-Executive roles at Allianz Business Services Limited (Premierline) and the Motor Insurers’ Bureau. He currently serves as a Non-Executive Director at the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) and the Financial Ombudsman Service where he chairs the Transformation Committee.

In 2019 Jacob was named in the Global BT150 (top 150 Global Business Transformation Leaders) and voted amongst the top 20 digital transformation leaders to follow on Twitter the following year.