Connexus

Executive director reporting directly into the CEO, leading a team of +200 colleagues in the delivery of housing, support, and customer services, with group-wide ownership of our evolving customer strategy. I work closely with Executive colleagues to drive our ambition to provide safe, affordable, and high-quality homes where people can build their lives. The role is critical to Connexus' commitment to being a leading voice in rural affordable housing and delivering top quartile sector performance.

My responsibilities and accountabilities include: 
- Setting our future strategic direction, ensuring compliance with consumer regulation and service delivery requirements.
- Oversight of our resident engagement and tenant satisfaction measurement program.
- Development and delivery of our customer-centric service approach, aligning our housing strategy to improve services and modernise processes.
- Overall contribution to year-on-year efficiencies, modernising the business and reinvesting in improved customer services.

Connexus is a rural housing association, proudly providing over 10,500 affordable rented homes and support services across the counties of Shropshire and Herefordshire. Nestled in the Shropshire Hills AONB, our Head Office in Craven Arms is surrounded by unspoiled countryside. We are driven by our Rural Ambition:
- Commitment to more rural affordable housing.
- Support for skills, opportunities, and jobs.
- Investing in communities.
- Improving infrastructure and connectivity.

More information is available at https://connexus-group.co.uk/.

Communities & Customer Services Director

Pobl Group

Reporting into the Executive Director of Customers & Communities, I provided leadership to the customer experience and repairs teams, along with Group-wide accountability for critical strategic priorities. Following Pobl’s merger with Linc Cymru in April 2024, my role transitioned away from primarily operational delivery to leading on some of the Group’s most impactful programmes of work. 

My key responsibilities included:
- The transformation of our repairs service, a pivotal interaction with our customers that can really make or break their trust and satisfaction with our organisation, along with the financial performance of the Group. 
- Crafting and implementing a new customer first framework, based on an ‘always listening’ multi-channel customer service experience, that is constantly improving and delivering against our customers' expectations. 

My direct team of nearly 200 colleagues provided key services to customers, whilst my areas of strategic responsibility impacted all areas of the Group. The repairs service and customer first framework benefitted not only customers living in the +23,000 social homes we provide, but all customers across care, support, and the various other services delivered.

With regular Executive and Board level engagement, the relationships and influence I had with senior colleagues was a key contributor to our overarching objectives. This included external engagement with a broad and diverse mix of stakeholders. 

All of the above was driven by a passion for improving the experience for customers and colleagues alike, utilising technology and the scale of the Group to help us deliver a large and local service across the communities in which we operate.

Our work was underpinned by our values of being Positive, Connected and Considerate: 
https://www.poblgroup.co.uk.

Director of Customer Experience (Group)

Reporting into the Executive Director of Customers & Communities, I provided strategic leadership to the customer experience team, developing a multi-channel customer service experience that was constantly improving and meeting customers' expectations and outcomes. 

My team of +300 Pobl 'difference makers' worked hard to deliver the end-to-end customer journey, including: 

- Applying for a home and all ongoing Housing management for +13,000 tenancies
- Income and account management for +£100m in annual revenue
- Advice, support and wellbeing services, connecting customers with +£1m in additional income
- Delivery of +42,000 repairs to our customers’ homes every year
- Our customer services teams, covering multi-channel inbound queries, outbound engagement activity and customer complaints.

As a member of our Senior Leadership Team, I also had Group wide responsibilities to shape and influence customer experience and our wider Pobl ambitions, such as leading on our 'Customer Connectors' strategy. 

All of this was underpinned by our Pobl values of being Positive, Connected and Considerate.

https://www.poblgroup.co.uk/

Director of Customer Experience

Sage

Reporting into the Global Customer Experience Director, I led a cross-functional program transforming the end2end customer experience and pivoting colleagues to ‘Start with the Customer’ – a key 2021 strategic pillar.

- Focused on the attraction, conversion and expansion of SME customer relationships. 
- Critical stakeholders to manage included leaders across all product verticals, business functions and global operational teams. 
- Implemented customer feedback and communication tools, with a defined annual plan impacting key measures of ARR, NPS and Employee NPS.

Moved on due to career progression.

Experience Architect

EQUANS

Reporting into the Customer & Business Transformation Director, my role at ENGIE (now EQUANS) was a driving force behind the continuous improvement of the services provided. Leading a team of CX and Customer Insight professionals to put the customers’ voice at the heart of our business, driving tender ‘wins’ and customer renewals.

- Winning, mobilising and growing contracts: authoring and presenting work-winning material across Corporate, Transport and Manufacturing sectors. Implementing CX plans for seamless mobilisation through to ongoing measurement and improvement. A key member of Strategic ‘wins’ including HMRC, Grant Thornton and Wembley Stadium.  
- Team leadership and development: growth of team through additional responsibilities and recruitment, with budget secured because of work winning and retention impact.
- CX strategy leadership: leading senior UK and Global colleagues in the definition and delivery of initiatives driving consistency, familiarity and improvement in our CX management. Outputs included a CX maturity model, customer journey mapping and enhanced CX measurement programme.
- UK insight activity ownership: optimising our insight activities, both relational and transactional, including pivoting our approach to capture customer sentiment. 

All of this was underpinned by the core behaviours - we are Bold, Open, Demanding and Caring - fuelling a commitment to lead the sectors in which they operate.

Moved on due to Covid-related business cuts.

Head of Customer Transformation

Moneysupermarket Group

The MoneySupermarket mobile experience was a key part of our Group's Re:invent strategy and we significantly developed both its standalone features and wider integration with the website. 

As the Head of Change for Mobile, I was responsible for the development and delivery of a range of initiatives to support the Mobile teams through a continued expansion.

Key responsibilities include:
- Delivering change through the application of ‘best in class’ change management
- Creating and presenting business cases in conjunction with the Product Director
- Supporting and coordinating the definition and realisation of business benefits
- Effectively identifying and managing senior stakeholders in the interests of business change delivery, communicating progress with clarity and impact
- Proactively monitoring the overall progress of change plans, resolving issues as required
- Identifying and managing the required resources to deliver change
- Facilitating team meetings to maintain progress of all change activities
- Working closely with third parties (internal and external) to deliver objectives.

In conjunction with this, I retained responsibility for the customer service and support for the mobile Apps, ensuring feedback and insight informed product development.

Moved on due to career progression.

Head of Change - Mobile

MoneySupermarket's app was a new way to make switching easier, keeping customers informed and engaged in saving money. As Head of CX, I worked to ensure that all the features, teams and functions of the app were optimised to bring customers back. I was closely aligned with product, marketing and strategy to deliver an experience that continually listens to - and acts on - customer feedback. 

The app was a key part of MoneySupermarket Group's strategy, so effective stakeholder engagement across the business was key to creating a product that supports the vision of helping households make the most of their money.

Key responsibilities and objectives include:

- Develop and own effective customer feedback and insight strategies, driving volume and value that triggers action through the Product roadmaps
- Support delivery of commercial goals by creating an engaging experience that keeps customers coming back and advocating what we do.

Head of Customer Experience - Mobile

Leading a team of analysts and executives that support the business in making it easy for customers to positively interact with Moneysupermarket.com. In summary, the team:

- Identify, investigate and evaluate barriers to customers achieving desired outcomes
- Recommend how to overcome these barriers, applying customer and market insight and understanding
- Make it easy for customers to achieve successful outcomes by helping to provide the best online experience, not just best in class.

Using customer feedback, internal requests and their own knowledge, the team was able to bring the voice of the customer into the business. This enabled us to balance development resource between achieving 'happy-path' journeys for customers, whilst ensuring we were open, aware and courageous in overcoming the issues we found.

Effectively, we were looking to tackle 'failure-demand' head-on.

Key personal responsibilities and objectives include:

- Stakeholder analysis and management
- Customer journey mapping and improvements
- Change management 
- Customer feedback analysis
- People development

Customer Outcome Manager

Financial Ombudsman Service

Leading teams of adjudicators to resolve customer disputes, before leading projects and teams to enhance both operational and CX performance.

- Cross-skilling and operational efficiency: delivery of parallel initiatives to upskill over 200 staff, driving case allocation times down 50% and resolutions ‘under 1 month’ up 35%.
- Team leadership and development: developed 40% of team to promotion, along with various recruitment and coaching responsibilities.

Moved on due to relocation.

Team and Project Manager

Nationwide Building Society

Leading various teams, ranging from 5-18 staff, to deliver across a balanced scorecard of KPIs - sales, service and risk.

Moved on due to career progression.

Branch Manager

A senior customer experience (CX) and change leader, with a deep background in CX leadership, people development and operational improvement. I thrive on steering teams through periods of change, collaborating to be consistently brilliant at the basics, earning the right to drive innovations that enhance experiences and deliver business value. 

The key skills I bring include: 

-> Leading, influencing and collaborating 
-> Full end-to-end CX enhancement
-> High impact communication
-> Effective people development 
-> Complex stakeholder management
-> Confident, decisive decision maker

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