Our Shortlisting Judges

Leslie has worked in the media sector for over 12 years in an array of roles, including journalist, analyst, editor and executive director. He joined Vitesse in 1997 as a journalist on Growth Company Investor, ascending to the role of editorial director of Vitesse MediaPlc by 2000, with responsibility for the delivery of Vitesse¹s products across all platforms ­ online, events and print. Since mid 2006, Vitesse Media Plc has grown significantly, and Leslie has played a significant part in the integration of What Investment (purchased by the company in December 2006) and Information Age (purchased in December 2007). He was appointed to the role of Chief Executive Officer in July 2010.

Sherry Coutu is a former CEO and angel investor who now serves on the boards of companies, charities and universities. Sherry specialises in consumer internet, information services and education. She has made angel investments in more than 35 companies and holds investments in two venture capital firms.
Last year she was voted as the best CEO mentor / advisor in Europe by TechCrunch, and this May was named by Wired magazine as one the top 25 'most influential people in the wired world', and one of the top ten most influential investors and women.
As an entrepreneur, Sherry has founded two businesses in the financial services industry. The first (acquired by Euromoney) has operations in more than 70 countries. The second was responsible for the first e-commerce transaction in the financial services industry in 1995. When she floated the company in 2000 it was valued at more than $1 billion and was the most over-subscribed IPO in the history of the market at the time. Philanthropically, she helped found the Prince's Trust Technology Leadership Group, is a member of the venture board of Cancer Research UK and serves on the Harvard Business School European Advisory Council.

Why has Sherry decided to judge the National Business Awards?
"Holding up champions of business as examples of excellence is a good thing to do"

Stephen Dury joined Santander UKin September 2010 as Director of Market Development & Customer Propositions. He is responsible for strategic marketing, partnership development and new proposition development for Santander Business, Commercial and Corporate Banking. He is currently working on a new project launching later this year to support fast growth SMEs in the UK. Stephen joined Santander UK from the Royal Bank of Scotland where he was Commercial Director for RBS and NatWest’s Direct and Online SME businesses, a position he held since 2007. At the Royal Bank of Scotland Stephen was responsible for the development of new technology and innovations to support the SME market, the day to day commercial performance of the online channels, partnership development and the digital SME transformation programme for the commercial and corporate business. Prior to his role as Commercial Director at the Royal Bank of Scotland Stephen held a number of leadership roles from 2001 to 2007 in marketing, advertising, product and income management and technology development.

Gabriel Hopkins is the Head of eCommerce products at WorldPay, Europe’s leading e-Commerce payments provider. Gabriel joined WorldPay in 2005 and is currently responsible for the management and development of the company’s range of online payment services, which includes: payment processing, acquiring and risk management services. He is also in charge of marketing as well as the management of payment supplier and acquirer relationships. He chairs the eCommerce Change Board. Gabriel's previous experience includes a mixture of technical and commercial roles in eCommerce and payments. In 1995, he worked on the development of one of the first internet portals - The London Mall. Later, at earthport.com, he was the chief architect of an eWallet solution, which was adopted by the Egg bank in 2000.

Ardi Kolah is an accomplished author and speaker on sales & marketing and is ranked as one of the top 50 gurus in the world by the Chartered Institute of Marketing alongside Philip Kotler, Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell, Martin Lindstrom, Don Peppers and Sergio Zyman. In 2004, Ardi appeared in the 40th anniversary special edition of Admap as one of 40 marketing gurus to share their vision of the future of communications, with contributions from Sir Martin Sorrell and Clive Humby. Following a successful career as a BBC journalist, he spent the next 20 years building a career in sales & marketing within organisations such as Andersen Consulting, CMG plc, Imperial Cancer, WPP plc and the Defence Academy of the UK. He has also advised the Government on launching a promotional campaign to encourage mentoring on behalf of the National Mentoring Network and is a supporter of the National Marketing and Sales Standards Setting Board (MSSSB) that sets the benchmark for all sales & marketing vocational training in the UK. Ardi is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, the Institute of Sales & Marketing Management, the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Marketors and the Royal Society of Arts.

Julie Meyer is one of the leading champions for entrepreneurship in Europe. Julie founded Ariadne Capital in 2000 to create a new model for the financing of entrepreneurship in Europe and the UK - "Entrepreneurs Backing Entrepreneurs". She has completed transactions of over £300m in technology, media and telecoms firms out of Europe since 1988. She has been named one of INSEAD's Top 50 Alumni, Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year, World Economic Forum Global Leader of Tomorrow, TIME Magazine Digital 50, and one of the Top 30 Most Influential Women in Europe. Julie is one of the BBC's Online Dragons, and is on the Board of Directors of Vestergaard Frandsen & INSEAD. Julie is also a member of Vince Cable's Entrepreneur's Forum.
 

William Montgomery is a performance consultant with first class credentials. The former navigating officer of HMS Ark Royal and Head of Strategic Change at Lloyds TSB, he now heads up TEN where he has earned an enviable reputation as a powerful catalyst for performance. He has earned an enviable reputation as a powerful catalyst for performance, helping release potential to maximise profit through the creation of a success culture for start-up entrepreneurs to FTSE 100 companies. He is retained by some of the world’s most respected organisations in the areas of business, media and sport, where he uses his 10 actions of effective leaders to turn the ordinary into the extraordinary. He has chaired and addressed conferences across the UK in the private and public sectors. William’s messages are practical, and presented with electrifying effect. He shakes up and inspires his audiences, showing them what lies within their grasp.

One of three Executive Directors and reporting direct to the CEO, Simon is responsible for leading the development of a reformed and refocused Commission, following the Arm’s Length Review of all Non Departmental Public Bodies by the new Coalition Government. In addition to his corporate role as part of the senior leadership team, he is directly responsible for the delivery of the largest of the Commission’s four priority areas of work, to “Galvanise Employer Investment in Skills”. This market driven approach includes three specific strands of work; developing and creating a compelling vision for sector leadership of skills, managing £60m /annum investment funds to stimulate employer skills investment, sector by sector and repositioning and promoting Investors in People as a key business improvement tool. He is responsible, as the lead Director for Scotland, for managing the strategic relationship with the Scottish Government at the time the Scottish National Party takes overall control. He is also responsible for developing the International strategy of the Commission following successful work to build the Commission’s relationship with India and the recent co-operation agreement which has been signed with their National Skills Development Corporation.

After 10 years in publishing at IPC Magazines, working on magazines such as NME, Shoot, 90 Minutes, Golf Monthly and Rugby World becoming Sports Group Publisher in 1995, David ‘transferred’ to the Football Association as Commercial Manager in 1997 where he developed the FA’s licensing and merchandising programme. Whilst at The FA, he was part of the development team for The FA’s web site and launched the FA’s online store England-Direct. He left The FA after the Euro 2000 tournament joining Sports e-Tail working on the development and launch of various football/sport related online stores including those of Manchester United, Blackburn Rovers, UEFA, and The ECB. In June 2007 David joined the online retail membership organisation IMRG as Director of Operations, responsible for the development of the organisation as the voice of online retail, before becoming its Managing Director.

Dr Richard Spencer is Head of Sustainability at ICAEW. He joined ICAEW in 2005 and set up the sustainability practice within the Technical Strategy department, ICAEW’s think-tank. Richard leads on the Institute’s thought leadership programme Sustainable Business. This has included designing a conference in Beijing on Environmental Corporate Responsibility with Peking University and the Chinese State Environmental Protection Administration, acting as content lead on the Institute’s Business Sustainability Programme and running a session on sustainability for Cass Business School executive MBAs, producing technical guidance on environmental reporting written in conjunction with the Environment Agency. Richard is also one of the co-conveners of The Finance Innovation Lab, an initiative designed to co-create a new model of capitalism, one that serves society and the environment. This is a project that ICAEW has undertaken with WWF-UK. Before joining the ICAEW Richard worked as a strategy consultant in the Natural Resources division of Accenture. Prior to that he worked at N M Rothschild & Sons Ltd for eight years in the bank’s treasury and project finance teams with a year at Rothschild Australia. He began his career at the Bank of England in the banking supervision arm which regulates banks in the UK.

Charles is responsible for sales, marketing, communications and relationship management of Intellect’s 750 members. Charles' role involves day-to-day involvement with member companies of all types and he regularly contributes to executive level seminars on a variety of topics including sales strategy, performance benchmarking as well as software pricing and licensing. He regularly speaks on the state of the UK ICT sector and market entry strategies for overseas companies. Involved in a number of national award schemes, Charles is chairman of the judging panel for Intellect’s ‘IT Excellence in Local Government’ and a member of the BCS/Computing panel. Charles was on the judging panel for the 2007 Digital Challenge competition and has spoken on Digital Inclusion at various forums. Charles joined Intellect from Compaq (previously Digital) where he was EMEA Head of Marketing for Customer Services Division. Prior to joining Digital in 1989 Charles held a variety of marketing and sales roles in De La Rue Payment Systems, Johnson & Johnson and 3M United Kingdom.