Our staff
Damian Allen
Senior Associate
We benefit from Damian's extensive experience in local government, where he occupied the position of Executive Director of Children and Family Services for Knowsley Metropolitan Borough Council from 2005-2012.
Paul Corrigan
Senior Associate
Paul has a proven track record of delivering large scale change in the NHS and central government as well as managing change in a range of other public services.
Tony Mackay
Chair
Tony chairs our Board of Directors. His work specialises in the areas of school and system leadership, improvement and innovation and he is currently working on a number of ‘Next Practice Projects' on School Leadership and School Improvement and Reform around the world.
David Jackson
Partner
David is one of our partners. He is one of our experts on education and leadership, and is involved in our projects on the Global Education Leadership Program (GELP), Transforming Early Years, Learning Futures, and i-zone New York.
Matthew Horne
Managing Partner
There isn’t much about using innovation to improve public services that Matthew doesn’t know. He is currently our resident expert on co-operatives and mutuals, localism and the big society agenda, as well as being a key player in our work on Radical Efficiency and Innovation Labs.
Sarah Gillinson
Partner and Head of Radical Efficiency
Sarah leads the Innovation Unit's research and practical work on Radical Efficiency, building our understanding of innovation that delivers different, better and lower cost public services and supporting leaders to develop it in practice.
Aviv Katz
Senior Service Designer
Aviv leads our team of designers, specialising in service design, research and creative production. He is our resident expert in service design and is a trained designer and social researcher.
Julie Temperley
Programme Manager for Global Education Leaders Program
Julie is an experienced researcher working close to policy and practice in education. She is currently managing the exciting work we are doing transforming education systems at a global level.
John Craig
Managing Partner
John leads on business development as well as supporting projects in social care and health. John developed and now leads our Innovation Exchange work, which connects people and ideas around shared social challenges.
Paul Roberts
Director
Paul Roberts is a Director on our board. He lends his extensive experience and understanding of local government to our work with local authorities.
Valerie Hannon
Director
Valerie Hannon was a founding director of the Innovation Unit when it was initially established within government, and subsequently became its first Managing Partner when IU became an independent not-for-profit. She serves now as a Board Director and consultant.
David Albury
Director
David is a Director on our Board. He is working on the Global Educational Leadership Program (GELP) which is supporting system change in education globally to help empower learners to thrive in the 21st Century.
Raj Cheema
Project Manager
Raj is one of our Project Managers. She is currently managing our South London Nursing Networks project and the Global Education Leaders Program (GELP), an international programme led by Innovation Unit in partnership with Cisco, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Promethean and the Ellen Koshland Family Fund.
Alec Patton
Researcher & Project Coordinator
Alec has worked across a range of projects in education, health and children’s social care. His work encompasses research, writing and editing publications and toolkits, and workshop facilitation.
Peter Baeck
Researcher & Project Coordinator
Peter is a researcher and project coordinator at the Innovation Unit working on a number of public service innovation programmes. This has included service areas from health and social care to criminal justice and education.
Martha Hampson
Researcher & Project Coordinator
Martha is a researcher and project coordinator, focusing on our education projects and the Global Education Leaders Program. She is also working on a project on improving care for those with COPD.
Leonie Shanks
Researcher & Project Coordinator
Leonie currently focuses on our health projects but is also enthusiastic about our work in education. Leonie also manages our social media accounts and regularly tweets and blogs.
Adam Preis
Senior Project Manager
Adam is responsible for supporting the high quality delivery of our projects and programmes, working closely with our staff and external partners on bespoke project management framework and associated tool-kits.
Fan Sissoko
Designer
Fan's graphic skills support the Innovation Unit's service design team and head of communications in visualising new services, and in making new ideas engaging.
Kathryn Tyler
Head of Communications
Kathryn leads on all our communications, including designing and producing materials, managing our website and social media spaces and handling our public relations and events.