Lucy Carter (Production Advisor)
Lucy is a double BAFTA award-winning Producer. Currently working as Director of Programmes for Indus Films, she has executive produced much of its output including Wild Shepherdess with Kate Humble, Ben & James vs The Arabian Desert, The Mekong River with Sue Perkins and World’s Greatest Markets. Prior to that she was Exec Producer at Wall to Wall Television, on the twice BAFTA-nominated series Who Do You Think You Are? for BBC One and NBC in America, the BBC Two Arts series My Life in Verse, and Ian Hislop’s First World War series of films for Channel Four, Not Forgotten. Lucy was Series Producer and Director of award-winning documentaries including the Grierson and BAFTA Award-winning series Britain At War in Colour for ITV and Auschwitz The Forgotten Evidence for Channel Four.
Sarah Mills (Live Broadcast Advisor)
Sarah Mills has been a TV, radio and online producer and reporter for more than 10 years. She currently runs the LIVE desk at Thomson Reuters co-ordinating and booking LIVE coverage from news, sport and entertainment events around the world for TV and online. Before Reuters, she worked for ITN, BBC Radio Five Live and MTV. She also spent 6 months in Sierra Leone and Ghana shooting news stories for Reuters and produced a short film out of Sierra Leone for the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Sarah is passionate about telling stories featuring the people and places we don’t always hear about in the news, yet deserved to be recognised for the work they carry out.
Andy Middleton (Start-up Strategy Advisor)
Andy Middleton is a maverick thinker and social entrepreneur with a passion for disruptive change and radical innovation. He is Founder Director of the TYF Group and a non exec board member of Natural Resources Wales, helping organisations correlate their ambition, goals and actions to the speed and scale of response that’s needed for a shift to resilience. Andy works with business, schools, parents, adults and kids, redesigning play, work and learning to fit with a changing future. The Do Lectures is the UK’s answer to Ted Talks (only better, in our opinion). A hugely inspiring non-for-profit business which offers talks from passionate, creative people that Do. Hosting an ‘ideas festival’ each year, first in Wales, then in San Francisco and now Australia, the DO experience has been known to change people’s lives, including ours…
Michael Peel (Technical Advisor)
Associate Lecturer and TV Production Technician at Regent’s University London, Michael runs the TV studio and works closely with the RSDFM (Regents School of Drama, Film & Media) students and lecturers, supporting a wide variety of digital video projects including all live stream events. He also works as an Associate Lecturer teaching digital media courses in camerawork, lighting, editing, sound recording, and both studio & outside broadcast production. Michael has a Masters Degree in Media & Film, a BA in Television & Film Production.
Michael Taggart (Digital Media Strategy Advisor)
Michael is an accomplished communicator with 15 years’ experience in journalism, PR and digital marketing in both the private and public sectors. Currently, he heads up the digital division of successful London-based financial services agency MRM. Michael’s background is in journalism and he became a national newspaper correspondent before taking several senior public sector communications roles, including head of media at Brighton & Hove City Council. He is regularly quoted in the media on a wide range of subjects, including social customer relationship management, public sector communications and financial services communications. He has trained many senior executives in digital communications, including ministers from the Namibian Government and FTSE 250 chief executives. Outside work, Michael is a guest blogger at Brand Republic and speaks at industry conferences on digital and social media. He is consistently ranked in the top five of PeerIndex’s ‘Top 150 social media influencers in UK financial services’.
Preethi Nair (Innovation Advisor)
Preethi Nair, author of 3 novels published by Harper Collins, is a writer and entrepreneur whose incredible story motivates audiences all over the world. Preethi left her job as a management consultant to set up her own publishing and PR company after her manuscript, Gypsy Masala, was rejected by most publishers. With no resources to rent an office and publish her book, she established a multinational company in her bedroom and appointed feisty director, Pru Menon (an alter ego) to energetically hype her work. Preethi won the Asian Woman of Achievement award for her endeavours. ‘Pru’ Menon’ was short-listed for PPC Publicist of the Year. Preethi has shared a platform with Sir Bob Geldof, Kevin Spacey, the head of Green & Blacks & Prêt a Manger and spoken on “talking less & doing more.” Preethi has completed her third novel and writes for BBC Radio 4 and a number of broadsheets. She is an ambassador for the Prince’s Trust, promoting creativity and has set up Kiss the Frog, a company that takes creativity and innovation back to the workplace.