UCISA22 Leadership Conference

Professor Simpson is Pro Vice-Chancellor (Learning & Teaching) at Teesside University. He graduated from Teesside University with a degree in Politics and a PhD in Criminology. He has written and researched in the fields of Youth Crime, Criminal Justice and Drug Use. Professor Simpson was previously Dean of the School of Social Sciences, Business & Law at Teesside University, and for a period of 9 years was a Director of the British Society of Criminology.

Professor Mark Simpson has a national reputation for teaching & learning and known for his work in educational digital transformation. He is a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (PFHEA) and a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts (FRSA).

Professor Robert Allison is a British academic who has held senior leadership roles in a number of top UK universities. Currently a Non-Executive Director and Trustee of several organisations, Bob was previously the Vice-Chancellor and President of Loughborough University.

Since stepping down from his role at Loughborough University, Bob is developing a portfolio of responsibilities. Recent appointments include becoming a Trustee of The Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust, Chair of the Board of Trustees of the St Philip’s Centre, Chair of the Board of Trustees of The Air Ambulance Service and Children’s Air Ambulance. He was appointed Deputy Lord Lieutenant for the County of Leicestershire in 2022. In his spare time Bob is a keen gardener, mountain biker and enjoys good conversation over a glass of wine.

My current role is the CEO of Jisc. Jisc is a not-for-profit membership organisation that provides the UK universities, colleges and skills sectors with a shared digital infrastructure. I studied psychology and management studies at the University of Glasgow, and started my career as a researcher studying how communication in the workplace supports innovation. I have since held a variety of Board level leadership roles in higher education, most recently as executive director of corporate services at the University of Sheffield. In Sheffield I had strategic responsibility for all the core corporate services including IT, HR, Communications and Estates and Facilities. Prior to Sheffield, I spent eight years at the University of York, where, I held a variety of roles including deputy registrar and director of corporate and information services. Over the years my work has covered high performance computing for research, library and archives, planning and strategic change, and leading the technology change team at the University of St Andrews. I was a member of UCAS council for 8 years, chair of Universities and College Information Systems Association (UCISA), and chair of the Russell Universities Group IT Directors (RUGIT). In 2017 I was delighted to be named as female CIO of the year by Computing Magazine. I have recently become a governor of York College my local FE provider.

Following a 12-year career in the Higher Education Sector, John retired from his role as the Director of Computing Services at the University of Liverpool in April 2021. John was responsible for the management, planning and implementation of all Computing and IT related services at the University. His department provided a focal point for all IT support services and promoted the innovation, development and use of new technology and systems to deliver the University’s strategic objectives in Research, Education and Professional Services. John joined the Higher Education sector in 2009 having held several senior management positions within Siemens, the global engineering and technology Services Company, operating across multiple industry sectors in the UK and abroad. Prior to his career with Siemens John worked in the UK Nuclear Industry for more than 10 years, during a period of significant sector growth in the 70’s and 80’s. Outside of his professional activities, John is still heavily involved in Rugby Union through his local club in Lymm Cheshire. Having played rugby for more than 40 years since his school days at Lymm Grammar School, John is now the Chairman of the club. Since retiring in April John has qualified as a vaccinator and supports his local Covid-19 vaccination program on a voluntary basis and is a Trustee on the board of a local Academy, “The Challenge Academy Trust (TCAT)”.

We are living in uncertain times with increasing pressures to perform. Out guest speaker is no stranger to uncertainty and adversity. He was brought up in poverty, on the at-risk register before spending time with foster families. At the age of 5 tragedy struck which sent him on a downward spiral. Growing up he experienced violence, substance abuse and domestic violence. He had thoughts of suicide as young as ten years old, left school with no qualification and ended up on a psychiatric ward aged 20. Soon after he was involved in criminality and the future looked bleak. But after a failed suicide pact he decided there had to be another way. He decided to turn his life around. He then wrote a No1 Bestselling book about his journey which sold close to 1/2 million copies. He’s now shared his story of transformation around the globe as far and wide as Iran, Germany, Canada, South Africa and few more in between. In this presentation he will share how we can all deal with challenges we get in life but also how instrumental certain leaders have been in that process. We guarantee you will remember this presentation for years to come.

Drew is Chair of the board of USL and former Director of ICT for the University of Lincoln. He joined both the University and the Education sector in January 2012 after spending over 25 years in a range of roles gaining experience in creating and implementing ICT strategy whilst working for global businesses including most recently as IT Director for Staples supporting the retail, e-commerce and logistics operations in the UK and the Staples European B2B operation. Drew has been an active member of UCISA since joining the sector and was been a trustee of UCISA from 2015 to 2021.

Andy Smith Joined UCL in May 2020 as CIO and before that he was the Global CIO for Arm from 2014 to 2019. Arm is one the world’s leading technology companies with its processor designs in more than 150 billion chips including almost every phone in the world. Prior to this Andy spent 5 years as a Government CIO working for one of the agencies in the defence sector. Before that he worked for 20 years with BP in a variety of roles and locations around the world including 6 years in Alaska. Andy lives in Cambridge with his wife and two daughters. He is a keen sportsman who has recently discovered the game of Real Tennis.

Joe Wolski, CTO at ANS, oversees ANS’ technical vision and strategic direction. With 10 years’ experience in the industry, he has progressed through multiple technical roles and has played a pivotal role in transitioning ANS into an end-to-end digital transformation provider.

Tony Pauley, Chief Information and Digital Officer at the University of Warwick, has many years of experience delivering large scale digital transformation in complex environments. As CIDO, Tony is leading and developing Warwick’s digital and information strategy, accelerating the digital transformation, and revolutionising the future of its technological environment.

Henrik has gathered his experience of leading people through change and digital technologies from many sectors including Publishing, Tour Operating, Housing and, lately, Higher Education. Having worked in a variety of leadership roles encompassing operational management and strategic delivery, he is an experienced communicator at many levels. Henrik has spent the last decade in two leading universities creating successful Service Delivery and Operations departments with a focus on strategic goals and business outcomes, underlined by a culture of empowerment and achievement. He is the vice-chair of the UCISA Sustainability Group, member of the UCISA Support Services Group, an eager contributor to UCISA projects, and enjoys voluntary work, latest for tuition charity The Access Project. Continuous learning is a core principle to Henrik, he completed a Master’s degree with distinction in Management not long ago, and he perpetually embraces opportunities to learn through a variety of platforms. He is a keen architecture buff (having recently built a house to his own design) and loves a good cup of tea!

James Eaglesfield has over a decade’s experience of leading information governance and is responsible for cybersecurity at the University of Derby. James’ portfolio also includes the Security Operations Centre, project management, communications and digital adoption, IT procurement and for the last year the delivery of corporate and academic systems. James is an active member of the UCISA community through his work on a number of groups including the Cybersecurity committee.

Nana-Ampofo is a seasoned IT, networking and InfoSec professional with a passion for using technology to transform the way we live, work and play. Nana's experience ranges from developing technology solutions > safeguarding endangered rhinos > to assisting clients on global security transformation projects. Today, Nana works with some of the largest organizations in the world to provide his bespoke expert advice on their complex Security Operations challenges which are often impeding the SOC's ability to succeed as a business.

Paul has been the Director of the converged IT & Library service at the University of Greenwich since 2013. Previously he held Assistant Director roles in IT and Corporate Systems, consultancy roles within higher education, housing and financial services and has held several visiting lecturer positions.

In 2013 he developed the university’s first IT Strategy and over the following five years transformed the IT organisation and every aspect of the services it provides. He led on the opening of a new £80 million library and the consolidation of the central IT service into the newly refurbished student hub at the heart of the Greenwich campus. More recently Paul led on the development of a Digital Strategy for Greenwich which aims to further embed technology into every aspect of university life.

In addition to his roles at the University of Greenwich, Paul is a member of the Ellucian Global Executive Advisory Council, Co-Chair of the Ellucian European Ellucian Advisory Council and a Trustee and Director of the Greenwich Students’ Union.

Professor Karen Stanton joined Solent at the start of February 2020, from her role as Vice-Chancellor at York St John University. Prior to that, Professor Stanton was Deputy Vice-Chancellor at Glasgow Caledonian University and has also held positions at King’s College London and at the Universities of Nottingham, Birmingham and Sheffield Hallam.

Her previous areas of responsibility have included Director of the Centre for e-Research, a 4* rated research team based at King’s College London, responsibility for GCU’s overseas campuses in New York, Oman and Bangladesh and as a member of the United Nations Alliance-UK. She was Chair of the Cathedral’s Group and Vice Chair of GuildHE until December 2019. Prior to her academic career Professor Stanton worked as a researcher for the BBC and the Home Office.

Professor Stanton has over 20 years of academic leadership experience having dedicated her career to enhancing and advancing life and career opportunities through education, with a particular commitment to widening access and support for all. She is Chair of Southampton Connect.

Steve served 23 years in the RAF as a telecommunications engineer, he specialised in electronic warfare and cryptography and has an extensive Cyber and Information security background. Steve is a highly accomplished senior executive, with over 20 years’ extensive operational experience operating at C level in a variety of senior roles with extensive experience of shaping and delivering large scale organisational change including complex cultural and technical strategies. Steve is the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) for Jisc. As such Steve provides a clear vision and direction for information and Cyber Security operations. He promotes continuous improvement, innovation, and agility in service delivery, whilst working in consultation and collaboration with colleagues across Jisc and the Academic Sector.

As the CISO, Steve is responsible for overseeing a range of technical and process security controls and leading a programme of continuous improvement in response to changing security threats and risk. Steve has a thorough understanding of technology, as well as a broad, up-to-date knowledge of information security frameworks, pertinent regulation and legislation, vulnerability management, incident management and response, secure development techniques and approaches, Cyber Security engineering and operations, and management and governance of Cyber risk and Cyber Security. making a real and sustained difference to research and education in the UK. He also manages top-level relationships with Regulatory and Law enforcement and major security organisations including government security services to provide increased benefit to our members.

A CIO for over 30 years in education, public and charitable sectors, Laura Dawson's focus is building high performing teams and helping organisations make the best use of their data and technology. Laura was CIO of LSE till 2023 and now is a Governor and Charity Trustee and Founder for Leaderly Consulting.

Nick has been the CIO at King’s College London since 2012. Before that he had spent 25 years working in the media and technology consulting sectors. Under his leadership KCL IT has been transformed into a high performing professional services function. Part of this transformation has been enabled by the King’s Service Centre in Newquay, Cornwall which is now a c200 staff organisation providing IT and other professional service support to the University and other organisations.

Tony Sheehan is a senior director and analyst within Gartner’s Higher Education team. He provides advice to global clients on higher education trends, innovations and best practices, with particular focus on Optimization, evolution and transformation of learning systems; Student learning experience and engagement; Evaluation of emerging technologies; Digital transformation strategy and implementation; and Higher Education’s ongoing response to COVID-19.

Tony started his career as an engineer, then developed his interests in people, process and technology as global knowledge manager for an engineering consultancy prior to moving into higher education in 2007. Tony has since held positions as Associate Dean at London Business School, Director of Learning Services at Ashridge Business School. Tony has a degree in Metallurgy from the University of Oxford, an MBA from Loughborough University and is also a Fellow of the Centre for Distance Education at the University of London.

Chris Dixon is Head of Digital Change and Innovation at Lancaster University where he works on projects to embed digital transformation and create new innovative services. Chris works with developer teams, business owners, key stakeholders across the university and external providers to solve business challenges and produce new in-house solutions.

Steven is the Oracle Cloud Programme Director at Durham University, a position he has held for over 2 years as well as being a Senior lecturer at Northumbria University specialising in ERP with a research focus on Technology Adoption. Throughout his career, Steven has held a number of senior IT positions across both the private and public sector and is a Non-Executive Director at the NEAT Academy Trust.

With more than 20 years' experience, he has progressed through multiple technical roles. He is now leading a converged Library and IT service and is driving the development of a digital, data and technology strategy.

Andy Cook is Ravensbourne University London's Vice Chancellor, holding responsibility for overseeing the strategic direction of the University. In this capacity, Andy has focused on the key priorities of delivering an exceptional learning experience and ensuring a compelling offer for student recruitment. Andy has also been leading the institution towards identifying opportunities for diversification and collaboration at the intersection of creativity and technology.

Caitroina McCusker is the PwC UK Education Consulting Lead, working at a global and local level to help higher education institutions (HEIs) to reimagine their student and staff experience. From aligning costs using our bespoke and tested PwC methodology, to running and delivering large scale student experience focused transformation programmes. Cat works with HEIs to identify and implement the right technology, people strategy and student experience

Joined Higher Education in May 2020 – so a newbie!
Rupa brings change delivery experience from management consulting, retail and travel industry.
Rupa will admit that she has not managed to solve the capacity management needs and is looking forward to the HE collaboration on this topic.

Adrian Ellison is Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor and CIO at the University West London, where he is a member of the Vice-Chancellor’s Executive and responsible for Academic Administration, Academic Registry, Academic Quality and Standards, Library and IT services and the Institute for Policing Studies. He has been in UK higher education for 24 years at four universities. Adrian has written about and spoken widely on the use of technology and analytics in the HE sector.

Aman Chandhok leads Cyber Resilience in the UK at Dell Technologies. Aman across the UK, to create and deliver transformative IT strategies designed to create business advantage. As a cyber resiliency expert, Aman builds resilience into the agreed strategy and systems to protect infrastructure, people and company reputation.