Chris Dawson

Chris has worked with start-up and early stage businesses for 10 years with organisations such as Newcastle Council, Entrust and SES, providing assistance in all aspects of business and specialising in social media, online marketing and the social enterprise sector. Chris will be the first point of contact for businesses in West Northumberland and his expertise is available to all businesses in Northumberland.

Paul Scott

Paul has a background in sales and marketing, having helped businesses identify and execute growth opportunities in a variety of industrial sectors including Automotive, Oil & Gas and Construction. Paul will be the first point of contact for businesses in the North Northumberland area and his expertise is available to all businesses in Northumberland.

Rachel Harrison

Rachel has a background in business development and talent attraction, having worked with businesses of all sizes in the North East and Yorkshire regions for several years offering business support including designing and managing STE(A)M activity, youth engagement and recruitment. Rachel will be the first point of contact for businesses in the South East Northumberland area and her expertise is available to all businesses in Northumberland.

Lucy Cansfield

Lucy is the ERDF Programme Manager responsible for the successful management and delivery of Business Northumberland. Lucy is an experienced Programme Manager and has previously managed the successful delivery of the iNorthumberland business support programme. The programme supported over 300 businesses and created jobs in the local area. Lucy has been with Advance Northumberland for 4 years and prior to this managed a range diverse localization projects from receipt to delivery, for a wide range of high profile international and UK-based clients.

Lois Brentnall

Lois is responsible for the successful management and delivery of Business Northumberland during Lucy's maternity leave. Lois has a background in Business Development and Project Management and previously worked for Carillion and British Gas, developing energy efficiency programmes and managing the customer journey from lead receipt through to claim.

Heather Newton

Heather is responsible for planning and organising Business Northumberland events. As well as development of the website, social media presence and developing programme related marketing material.
Heather has a background in events management and previously worked for an accountancy firm.

Ian Swain

IS Business and Finance

Finance for Business

Ian is one of our expert trainers on Business Finance. He also runs his own successful business that works with individuals looking to successfully start new businesses, and with existing businesses looking to improve performance and profitability. Ian is a qualified accountant who brings his invaluable experience of working at senior level in financial, general, and operational management across several business sectors. This includes in corporate, SME, high growth entrepreneurial, manufacturing, and customer service led operations. For the last ten years he has worked with hundreds of businesses across the North East helping them to start-up, to grow, and to find access to the finance they need. Ian has written all of our Finance for Business content and will be your trainer at the associated workshops. His workshops include practical and insightful help for business owners and managers.

Pat Beaumont

Beaumont Associates

Employment and Skills
Leadership and Management

Pat Beaumont is the director and owner of Beaumont Associates (Northumberland) Ltd. She has over 20 years’ experience at director level of Strategic HR management and Organisation Development, with a proven track record of designing and implementing programmes to modernise and improve performance. Pat brings this experience to the Business Northumberland Programme through our Employment and Skills and Leadership and Management programmes. Through the content that Pat has provided as well as the corresponding workshops, Pat will help you look at you and your business strategically to give you the skills to grow your workforce and avoid any potential legal pitfalls.

Ross Golightly

Sphera Consulting

Developing your Growth Plans and driving Business Growth
Growing Existing and Entering New Markets

Ross Golightly is an experienced Growth Strategist, Consultant, Coach, Mentor and Non-Executive Director. His firm (Sphera Consulting Ltd) typically works with ambitious, growth-led CEO's, Entrepreneurs and Owner-Managers to build, grow, scale and exit their businesses. Ross has over 19 years industry experience, having held Senior Commercial roles in two Fortune 300 multinationals and has spent the last 12 years working with over 700 businesses, ranging from VC-funded start-ups to global PLC’s accross manufacturing, services and digital/technology. He regularly works closely with a range of Boards to drive aggressive revenue and profit growth and is an experienced Non-Executive Director with 3 x current NXD roles on the Boards of other high-growth companies.

Katherine Briggs

Finchale Group

Marketing and Communications including Digital Marketing
Social Media

Katherine Briggs is an experienced Enterprise Consultant from Finchale Group. Specialising in digital and social media marketing, she is passionate about the personal and business success of her clients. Katherine began her career in enterprise in 2012 fulfilling a marketing manager role, going on to set up and run her own business as a marketing and social media coach. Now as an employee of Finchale Group, she plays a key role in the delivery of several large contracts including social media and enterprise consultancy for Durham Sparks, a programme designed to support community enterprise to grow in County Durham as well as being the lead consultant for Combined Arms, a programme that supports ex-armed forces personnel into self-employment.

John Allan

Altius SEO

Search Engine Optimisation

John is a founding partner and a hands-on member of the Altius team. Originally training as computer programmer at the University of Sunderland, John has worked for several international software development and marketing companies and boasted personal client’s such as British American Tobacco, BMW and General Motors to name but a few. John is Head of Search for Altius due to his depth of knowledge built from 15 years of experience of the search engines and their ever-changing algorithms. He also has an extensive knowledge of tools such as Google Analytics, providing clients with a clear interpretation of the use of their website, traffic flow, etc. and ways in which to improve conversion of visitors to clients. Due to his programming background, John is fully conversant in several web-building platforms and languages, including WordPress and HTML.

Damian Baetens, Rachael Humphrey, Richard Myers