Founder and Principal Associate/Technical Advisor

Nutshell

Helping companies to prioritise their sustainability issues and understand their impacts on the environment – especially on biodiversity - is what drives me. Companies can often get lost in process, and miss the impacts and the outcomes of their activities. Getting this right and demonstrating an understanding of impacts and outcomes endows a sense of good moral stewardship and an index of credibility. Getting down to basics at an operational level and successfully guiding a company through the tangle of sustainable development is challenging and promises to make a difference.

Expertise

Ability to look at things in the round using an operational, governmental and practical ecologist’s perspective. Identifying key issues and taking these through the whole business process - from board strategy presentation to dealing with them in the field. Putting sound science in place to support process and assertion - and restructuring options using rigorous analysis and assessment.

Previous experience

17 years in the UK Government Conservation sector - including heading ornithology and site management sections - provided a firm basis in process, systems, policy, science-based outcomes and pragmatism, in delivering objectives in the UK and Europe - directly for Government and also in its partnerships with the private sector. This included basic analyses underpinning the design of the UK Biodiversity Action Plan, as well as data systems assessments for the EU’s Habitat Directive monitoring.

In the last 10 years, I have worked globally to enhance the biodiversity management performance of a range of national and multinational companies from the agricultural, energy and mining sectors.

Experience in practical work was incorporated into the outputs of the ground-breaking Energy and Biodiversity Initiative (EBI) and work on biodiversity guidance for the International Finance Corporation’s (IFC) own staff and clients, as well as the recent International Council for Mining & Metals (ICMM) offset publication.

Peer-review science is an important part of my work, and I continue to publish with leaders in the field of biogeography such as Jared Diamond and Stuart Pimm.

Education

BA (Hons) Geography, University of Cambridge, 1977
MA University of Cambridge, 1980
D Phil Zoology, University of Oxford, 1981

Professional Qualifications

MIBiol and CIBiol.