With over 15 years operating at C-level in Global organisations, Bev prides bringing energy, dynamism and a sharp focus to all she does. Bev’s background is in Human Resources with a particular emphasis on Strategic Workforce Planning, Talent Development and Employee Engagement. Her experience spans multiple sectors including IT Services, Technology, FMCG and Manufacturing. Her achievements are based on her having a clear vision; that creating the right culture and leadership style enables people to grow and develop as their organisation transforms, helping to ensure they remain relevant, engaged and successful.

With a passion to enact change, Mel drives strategic and transformative skills development
solutions, utilising experience spanning global corporations and agile startups. Having led one of the
UK’s largest Learning & Development functions, provided innovation-led development solutions for
some of the most globally recognised brands and acted as a change practitioner through results; her
expertise in navigating both commercially driven and in-house development environments are
value-add. Mel has been at the forefront of the prevalent ‘Skills Transformation’ debate, experiencing firsthand what is takes for an organisation to consider, implement, and challenge, in supporting both the modernisation of an organisation and its people in parallel. Her approach to organisational and
capability development not only addresses current workforce skills gaps, but also anticipates
evolving industry and technological demands, positioning the organisation for proactive growth and
adaptability within a competitive skills market.
For the past 18 months, Mel’s principal focus as Director of People Capability has been to reposition
VMO2 from a traditional role-based organisation, to one which operates with agility, self-sufficiency,
and skills centred configuration in an evolving and complex industry. She has pioneered the use of
EdTech AI to craft an ecosystem which provides responsive skills, mobility, and workforce practices;
designed to enhance employee experience and promote a ‘leaner and simplified’ culture of learning
for the business to nurture.

Andy MacLean joined Standard Chartered in November 2019 as Global Head, Organisation and People Capability. His portfolio includes learning and development, leadership, culture, employee listening, organisation design, and people analytics. In an expansion to his portfolio, he has also been Head of HR for all Global Support Functions since September 2022. Prior to joining Standard Chartered, Andy spent six years as a management consultant with McKinsey & Company, and 25 years in the British Army. At McKinsey he focused on post-merger integration. As a soldier he spent most of his career with UK Special Forces. Andy is also a member of the Board of Trustees for RE:ACT Disaster Response, a disaster relief charity that leverages the unique skills of military veterans and former emergency service personnel.

Amanda is recognised as a global expert in skills and learning strategy and technology. Through her boutique consultancy NilesNolen she helps companies like Google, HSBC and Novartis deliver business results by shifting to skills-based organisations, while advising startups and scale-ups on their own strategy, go-to-market, positioning and more. She is venture partner and LP at Emerge Education, faculty at IE University, a regular speaker at events such as WebSummit and Learning Technologies, and the author of a popular LinkedIn course on the Future of Workplace Learning.

Born in the United States but based in Spain for over two decades, Amanda is also 100% fluent in English and Spanish.

Gillian has worked as a senior HR practitioner and OD specialist for several organisations including Swiss Re, Vodafone and BAA. Prior to her HR career, she was a management consultant with Deloitte Consulting and is also a qualified solicitor. Gillian has written various CRF reports on subjects including HR strategy, organisation design and development, leadership development, coaching and diversity.

Matt Sigelman is President of the Burning Glass Institute and a Visiting Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School. Named by Forbes to its Future of Work 50, Matt has dedicated his career to unlocking new avenues for mobility, opportunity, and equity through skills. The Burning Glass Institute advances data-driven research and practice on the future of work and the future of learning. Previously, as CEO of KKR-backed Lightcast, Matt and his team invented the field of real-time labour market data, a breakthrough innovation that transformed the way employers, education institutions, policy makers, and workers understand, plan for, and connect with the world of work. By mining billions of job openings and career histories, Matt led the company to become the global authority on the market for talent. Prior to Lightcast, Matt worked at McKinsey & Company and at Capital One. He writes widely on the job market, has testified before Congress, and is consulted frequently by public officials and global media. Matt holds an AB from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard and is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.