About the IoD

• The IoD (Institute of Directors) was founded in 1903 and obtained a Royal Charter in 1906. The IoD is a non-party political organisation with upwards of 45,000 members in the United Kingdom and overseas. Membership includes directors from right across the business spectrum – from media to manufacturing, e-business to the public and voluntary sectors. Members include CEOs of large corporations as well as entrepreneurial directors of start-up companies.
• The IoD offers a wide range of business services including business centre facilities, conferences, networking events, virtual offices and hotdesking, issues-led guides and literature as well as information services and free access to a comprehensive business library and enquiry service. It places great emphasis on director development and has established a certified qualification for directors – Chartered Director – as well as running specific board-level and director-level training and individual career mentoring programmes.
• In addition, the IoD provides an effective voice to represent the interests of its members to government and key opinion-formers at the highest levels. These include ministers, constituency MPs, Select Committee members and senior civil servants. IoD policies and views are actively promoted to the national, regional and trade media.
• For further information, visit our website: www.iod.com

About Simon Walker, Director General

Simon Walker became Director General of the Institute of Directors in October 2011.

He was Chief Executive of the BVCA, the organisation that represents British private equity and venture capital, from October 2007 to March 2011.

Between 2003 and 2007 Simon worked at Reuters as Director of Corporate Communications and Marketing.  He was Communications Secretary to HM The Queen at Buckingham Palace from 2000 to 2003.  Earlier he served as Director of Corporate Affairs at British Airways and a non-executive director of Comair Ltd (South Africa).  From 1996-1997 Simon worked as a special adviser in the Prime Minister’s Policy Unit at 10 Downing Street.

Simon Walker was previously a partner at Brunswick, the public relations group, and Director of European Public Affairs for Hill & Knowlton in Brussels. He has been a member of the Better Regulation Commission, a Trustee of The Queen’s Golden Jubilee Trust, the New Zealand-UK Link Association, and the UK-US Jamestown Committee.  He is a governor for the environmental foundation, The Hillary Summit, a Council Member of the European Policy Forum and a member of the Parliamentary Speaker’s Advisory Committee on Public Engagement.

Simon was born in South Africa, and has worked as a journalist and consultant in New Zealand, Belgium and the UK.  He read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford, where he was President of the Oxford Union.  He was a Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University.  He is married with two children.

About Neville Bain, Chairman

Dr Neville Bain is chairman of the IoD. He was born in New Zealand and has worked in various senior finance and general management international roles. His main career was with Cadbury Schweppes plc where for 27 years he occupied roles of finance director, commercial director and managing director in different countries. His final roles in that company were Managing Director of worldwide confectionery and finally Group Deputy CEO and Finance Director. He then joined Coats Viyella, an international textile, clothing and fashion company as CEO, where he stayed for five and a half years.

Since 1990 Neville has had a portfolio of roles involving non-executive directorships and investments in businesses. Past posts have included directorships with The Royal Mail Group (chairman), Hogg Robinson Group (Chairman), and Scottish & Newcastle. Current roles are chairman of trustees Scottish & Newcastle Pension Fund, and Hogg Robinson’s Pension Fund, Non-executive director of Biocon (an Indian based company engaged in producing pharmaceutical products and drug discovery), and a small Aim listed company in UK, Provexis.

He is the author of four books covering general management, governance, and utilising people effectively. His latest publication ‘The Effective Director’ the IoD’s new book on best practice in the boardroom was launched in January 2008.