Best Startup
At Best Startup UK we track over 130,000 UK startups and over 500,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top London based Director operating in the Professional Services space. If you think a Director is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.co.uk.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Companies House UK, Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Daniel Hurst
Principle Consultant & Practice Director, Enterprise DevOps Transformation of Contino
Daniel Hurst is a DevOps consultant specialising in defining and driving successful DevOps and Agile adoption within Financial Services organisations. He operates using a data-driven transformational approach: “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”.
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About Contino: Contino is a professional services consultancy providing a range of services for DevOps, Continuous Delivery, and Pragmatic Agile practices.
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Suchitra Nair
Director of Deloitte
Suchitra is a Director in the EMEA Centre for Regulatory Strategy, leading the work on Technological Innovation and Regulation. Her work focuses on assessing the strategic impact of technological innovation on regulation and the broader financial services ecosystem. Suchitra is a qualified Chartered Accountant and previously worked in Deloitte’s Audit, Corporate Finance and Regulatory Advisory teams.
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About Deloitte: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
David Harris
Creative Director of Deloitte
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About Deloitte: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Ian Burrows
Director, Brand and Engagement of Deloitte
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About Deloitte: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Mark Williment
Director of Deloitte
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About Deloitte, Keytree: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Will Powell
Director Of Innovation of Deloitte
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About Deloitte, Keytree: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Shilpa Shah
Director of Deloitte
Shilpa Shah is a Director in the Deloitte Consulting practice with over 22 years of technology and data driven transformation experience and expertise. Shilpa is an innovator and disruptor who challenges the status quo. While leading data driven transformation for our clients, she has built different businesses within Deloitte. These include the Delivery Models capability and a business wide sales support function. She has also been leading Deloitte Pixel to establish a crowdsourcing capability and business within the firm. Passionate about improving equality and broadening participation in the technology industry, she also leads the Deloitte Women in Technology Network driving long term sustainable cultural change. She builds relationships and has created many partnerships with organisations outside of Deloitte to help them make an impact that matters, on the diversity in STEM agenda. Shilpa is also an Industry Advisory board member of the government and industry funded Institute of Coding which is focused on addressing the shortfall in digital skills for the UK.
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About Deloitte: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Felix Lepetit
Director of Deloitte
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About Deloitte: Deloitte provides audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk management, tax, and other related services.
Guillaume Sampic
Strategy Director and Internet of Things of BT Global Services
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About BT Global Services: BT Global Services plc is a division of United Kingdom telecommunications operator BT Group.
Lola Fernandez-Redondo
Senior Associate Director of Jacobs
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About Jacobs: Jacobs leads the global professional services sector delivering solutions for a more connected, sustainable world.
Barry Borhani
Associate Director of Ernst & Young
A senior executive with over 30 years’ experience in Oil & gas and engineering; recent roles in Global super majors (BG-Group/Shell), Big 4 Consultancy (EY and PwC) and Management Contracting companies (KBR, Halliburton). Strong project management /Project controls , contract and procurement, analytical expertise obtained whilst working on major global programs ($100MM to $23 Billion) in Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
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About CPEC.ai, Ernst & Young, Harvey Milton: Ernst & Young is a provider of assurance, tax, transaction and advisory services.
David Pybus
Director of Ernst & Young
David Pybus is a Director in the EY Cybersecurity team and routinely helps clients with improving their cybersecurity programmes. David has twenty years experience in cybersecurity, much of it gleaned from previous roles in industry. He has first hand experience of managing the securing, scanning and patching of systems going from long since out of support operating systems all the way through to considering how to manage the patching levels of modern cloud and mobile environments
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About Ernst & Young: Ernst & Young is a provider of assurance, tax, transaction and advisory services.
Thomas Bull
Director of Ernst & Young
Tom Bull is a Director in the FinTech team at EY, based in London. He has led a range of research projects in the sector for the UK Government and the European Commission, including analysis of the FinTech ecosystem, P2P lending and crowdfunding sectors. He also leads major research work by EY including the EY FinTech Adoption Index, which identifies level of traction that FinTech is gaining with consumers. Tom’s background is in corporate finance and has worked on both cross boarder and domestic M&A processes. He has led acquisition and disposal processes for clients across various European countries as well as within Asia.
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About Ernst & Young, Ernst & Young: Ernst & Young is a provider of assurance, tax, transaction and advisory services.
Andrew Michael
CEO, Director & Founder of Bark.com
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About Bark.com: A new better way to buy services online
Jill Collighan
Finance Director of MXC Capital
Jill is the finance director of the advisory subgroup. She qualified as a chartered certified accountant in 1994, initially joining Lathams, before leaving to set up her own accountancy consultancy business. Jill has worked with Broca since 2002 and has been a director since 2004. Jill has extensive experience of finance, human resources, investor relations and corporate finance. Jill is currently CFO of 365 Agile Group plc.
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About MXC Capital: MXC Capital is an investment and advisory group specializing in the technology, media and telecommunications sector.
Andrew Gore
Non Executive Director of Genmed
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About Genmed: Genmed is a provider of vendor-neutral, flexible, scalable managed services to the NHS, Health Boards, and private healthcare organizations.
James Cook
Associate Director of 150BOND
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About 150BOND: Global Advisory
Simon O’Meara
Director & Consultant Solicitor of Oakmere Law
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About Find a Lawyer UK, Oakmere Law: Oakmere Law provides legal consultancy services and specialists.
Volker Buscher
Director of Arup
Volker Buscher is a Director of Arup and the leader of their IT and Communications Systems practice. A project director for public and private sector clients in the UK, Europe, Middle East, Arfrica and SE Asia. Volker is part of the Future of Cities leadership team in Arup. A multi-disciplinary group developing strategies and solutions for cities striving to deliver a great place to live and work, decoupled from critical resource constrains. Volker is a member of the Smart London Board advising the Mayor of London regarding the role of technology in the economic, environmental and social development of our great city and a member of the national Smart City Forum chaired by UK Ministers Clarke and Willets.
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About Arup: Arup is an independent firm of designers, planners, engineers and technical specialists offering a broad range of professional services.
Paul Dollin
Executive Director of WSP Global
Paul Dollin is a Chief Operating Officer at WSP Global Inc. Paul, a Chartered Engineer joined WSP in 2010 as Managing Director of the UK business and Executive Director of WSP Group plc. Paul has since been appointed MD, UK/Middle East/Africa/India/Asia Pacific and made a member of WSP’s current Executive Team. Prior to joining WSP and following a period with British Energy, Paul Dollin joined Atkins, a leading engineering and design consultancy, in 1999. With Atkins he held a number of roles, including Managing Director of their Design and Engineering business and member of its Executive Committee. Paul holds a Ph.D. in material science from University of Leeds, UK.
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About WSP Global: WSP is one of the world’s leading professional services firm.
Tom Smith
Global Director – Property & Buildings of WSP Global
Tom Smith, BSc (Hons), MBA, CEng MIMechE, is the Global Director, Property and Buildings at WSP Global. Tom has been with WSP since 1994 and has held a number of senior business leadership positions with their UK, Middle East and India regions as well as being closely associated with many of WSP’s flagship projects and strategic clients. Since 2010 Tom has focused his efforts on their global agenda and has been instrumental in developing their global culture, connectivity and services. Tom has worked throughout the Group with regional management to develop global initiatives focused on market sectors, global clients and major project bids. In 2013 Tom Smith joined the Company’s Executive Team, and in January 2014 he was appointed Global Director, Property and Buildings, to focus on achieving WSP’s strategic goal of being recognised as the leading Property and Buildings consultancy by 2015.
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About WSP Global: WSP is one of the world’s leading professional services firm.
Kyle Hill
Global Director, Digital Sales and Service of Avanade
Kyle Hill a South African born Dynamics enthusiast, now based in London. He currently has the pleasure of being part of the presales team at Hitachi Solutions.His main focus is on Dynamics 365 with a slant to the more traditional CRM flavour of things. He also has a keen interest in IoT, Connected Field Service, the Bot Framework and the Adobe Experience cloud. He has a strong technical passion which he has coupled to a sound understanding of the Dynamics 365 platforms and this enables him to focus on creating innovative and value-generating solutions.
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About Avanade, Hitachi Europe: Avanade provides innovative digital and cloud services, business solutions and design-led experiences on the Microsoft ecosystem.
Janis Thomas
Marketing Director of deltatre
Janis joined Deltatre, a global leader in the sport business, at the beginning of 2019. She is an expert in using digital marketing to deliver sales and revenue growth in subscription and ecommerce businesses. She has grown diverse brands from Birchbox to Playboy. She has held senior consumer marketing roles at digital media and entertainment businesses across film, TV and publishing. Janis will be responsible for leading Deltatre’s B2C marketing. This function will help Deltatre’s sport and entertainment clients grow their direct-to-consumer streaming subscription services.
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About deltatre: deltatre is a sports media services company that provides consulting services for videos, webs, graphics, and sports businesses.
Alastair Bloore
Group Risk and Compliance Director of Currie & Brown (Australia)
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About Currie & Brown (Australia): Currie & Brown is a project services consultancy firm.
Oliver Godfrey
Finance Director of Makers
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About Makers: Our mission is to transform lives: accelerating the careers of tech professionals by integrating education and employment.
Joel O’Connor
Creative Director of AB Communications
Joel is a multi-award winning, multi-disciplinary designer who leads and inspires AB’s design team to challenge and push boundaries. He has launched magazines, campaigns, digital platforms, and brands – internally and externally – for some of the UK’s biggest companies. Before joining AB in 2011, Joel spent the best part of a decade working as art director for various publishing houses, design and content agencies. During that time, Joel was awarded the prestigious IPAC’s designer of the year award. He puts the audience at the heart of everything he does and strives to create meaningful work that cuts through the noise and tells our clients’ stories. Joel believes that while certain design rules can’t be broken, the rest is up for grabs.
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About AB Communications: AB Communications helps organizations reach their full potential by engaging, informing, and inspiring their audiences.
Rachel Stock
Group HR Director of Camelot Group
Rachel Stock is a Group HR Director at Trinity Mirror.
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About Camelot Group, Reach plc: Camelot Group Plc is a company that provides national lottery games.
David Philipps
Managing Director of Construct
David Philipps is the CEO of Construct, a global digital learning company, where he manages the company’s fast-growing business and leads a growing team across the U.S., U.K, Middle East and South Africa. He is responsible for leading the day to day operational delivery, the commercial engagements, investor relations and for driving the culture of high performance across the company in addition to agreeing the strategic direction of the company with the board.
David was previously CFO of Bank of America EMEA Emerging Markets (CEEMEA) which he developed in to a world class finance team. A seasoned executive with a background in both consulting and finance, David excelled at organising and driving large scale strategic programmes across Bank of Americas international finance space, creating commercial insights, efficiencies, control enhancements and improved people engagement. David was well respected by both his team and the Bank of America finance leadership for his high energy levels, natural enthusiasm and his results orientated pragmatic approach to bringing clarity and organisation to complex situations. He was promoted to CFO of the CEEMEA group after demonstrating a strong track record of performance leading the EMEA Finance Control Group through the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash.
Before joining Bank of America, David spent 5 years consulting within the Finance and Performance Management Global Service Line at Accenture, running multiple successful projects in the UK, Europe and Asia. David qualified as an accountant and corporate treasurer at telecoms company Global Marine Systems Ltd in 2003 before joining Accenture.
David is a passionate endurance athlete having completed swims across the English channel and straits of Gibraltar. He is currently working towards the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc and enjoying supporting his daughters with their own swimming and running endeavours.
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About Construct: Construct helps organizations with learners, like schools and employers, create beautiful, cutting edge digital learning experiences.
Harshdeep Singh
Director of Operations- EMEA of Cloudwick
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About Cloudwick: Leading Provider of Big Data Services and Solutions to the Global 1000
Nigel Dias
Managing Director of 3n Strategy
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About 3n Strategy: 3n Strategy is a global consultancy business that helps clients in decision-making for large organizations.
Howard Pyman
Technical Director of Liss Systems
A founder member and director of LISS Systems, Howard has been involved both in the management of IT and Operations of end-user companies, and of software development and installation for a variety of national and international insurance based companies. This has included both General and Life, from broking and underwriting perspectives. Howard and Derek have together provided the vision and insight for the LISSIA system, which embodies their combined experience of the life industry. Most life administration platforms claim to be flexible, open and easy to change, but the design of LISSIA has proven outstanding in its inherent flexibility to support sophisticated products and newer, web-based business models. Howard remains at the forefront of design and specification of new function, seeing this through into development and delivery. He also manages and oversees the technical direction of all client versions of LISSIA. Howard has successfully delivered many large development and implementation projects, including those for Ageas in the UK, and Aviva Insurance in India.
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About Liss Systems: Liss Systems provides policy administration solutions.
Peter Barron
Associate Director of Liss Systems
Peter joined LISS in 2002, after leaving university where he achieved a first class honours degree in Computer Science. He was instrumental in the technical design of the LISSIA group version of the system and the implementation in 2003/2004 to Generali. Offering key technical input into the development of the LISSIA product suite over a number of years, Pete progressed to LISS Technical Architect in 2007 at the initiation of a project for Munich Re. In 2008 Pete was given the additional responsibility of heading up the onsite LISS project and team at Munich Re. On his return to LISS in 2009 he led the design, development and implementation of the eLISSIA product suite. Pete continues to drive the strategic technical design and development of the eLISSIA system.
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About Liss Systems: Liss Systems provides policy administration solutions.
David Hanley
Managing Director of Liss Systems
David has been with LISS Systems since 2000, a director of the company from 2001 and Managing Director since 2007. He started out in the late 1970s at Guardian Royal Exchange plc (then a top three UK composite insurer) in their Asset Management subsidiary after completing a Masters degree in Economics. He moved into a Group business management role later on where he gained extensive experience of both Life and General insurance business worldwide. After AXA Insurance acquired Guardian he worked as a director on a number of programme management and change management assignments before moving to LISS systems. David has responsibility for the day-to-day management of LISS Systems and is actively involved across all LISSIA projects and clients. He works closely with the other directors in areas of business development, resourcing and relationships with clients and strategic partners.
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About Liss Systems: Liss Systems provides policy administration solutions.
Rebecca Kalra
National Communications Manager, Associate Director of Avison Young
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About Avison Young: Avison Young is a retail company that specializes in making full use of our agency, investment and lease advisory skills.
Michael Sheehan
Managing Director – UK and Ireland of Systems@work
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About Systems@work: Systems@work is a leading provider of expense management, time recording and professional services automation solutions.
Luke Rehbein
Director, Patent and Trade Mark Recruitment Specialist of Dawn Ellmore Employment
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About Dawn Ellmore Employment: Dawn Ellmore Employment is a market leading legal and intellectual property recruitment agency.
Dawn Ellmore
Director, Patent and Trade Mark Recruitment Specialist of Dawn Ellmore Employment
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About Dawn Ellmore Employment: Dawn Ellmore Employment is a market leading legal and intellectual property recruitment agency.
Kirsty Heath
Sales Director of DeHavilland
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About DeHavilland: DeHavilland is a definitive provider of political insight and intelligence in the UK and EU.
Niels Footman
Managing Director, UK and Europe of Copylab Inc
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About Copylab Inc: Copylab is an investment writing and copywriting agency.
Joel Gill
Director of The Human Centered Design Society
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About The Human Centered Design Society: The Human Centered Design Society a not-for-profit organisation created to promote Human Centered Design (HCD) as a community of practice.
Karen Smith
Education & Training Committee Director of The Human Centered Design Society
Specialising in education management, widening participation, positive student experience including public events, work related learning, quality enhancement, management, and student achievement, CPD, curriculum development and validation, research, consultancy and enterprise strategies, promotion and recruitment including events and social media, digital teaching and learning, equal opportunities, health and safety, DDS, teaching Foundation, UG and PG in Media and Arts. Teaching and research specialities: World cinema, contemporary European and British cinema, film marketing, heritage, epic, cult and exploitation film and television, media exhibition and distribution, film festivals and media audiences. Audience research and marketing. Participant observation and oral histories.
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About : The Human Centered Design Society a not-for-profit organisation created to promote Human Centered Design (HCD) as a community of practice.
Damien Field
Managing Director of MM-Eye
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About MM-Eye: MM-Eye is a market research agency, specialising in quant, qual and online research for the automotive and mobility industries.
Karen Levesley
Research Director of MM-Eye
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About MM-Eye: MM-Eye is a market research agency, specialising in quant, qual and online research for the automotive and mobility industries.
Meg Rudman-Walsh
Associate Director of MM-Eye
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About MM-Eye: MM-Eye is a market research agency, specialising in quant, qual and online research for the automotive and mobility industries.
Alison Saunders
Director of Public Prosecutions of Crown Prosecution Service
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About Crown Prosecution Service: The Crown Prosecution Service is responsible for criminal prosecutions in England & Wales.
