Former Chief Executive of BBC Ventures Group

An accomplished businessman and public speaker whose experience is unique having worked at a Director/CEO level in five global companies across multiple industries at times of rapid change. He has run businesses with turnovers between £400m and £2bn, with millions of customers and thousands of staff.

He can bring a fascinating insight and perspective to the challenges of developing and running global businesses and his talks can be focused on topics such as Transformation, Turnaround, Strategy in Action, Leading Culture Change, Delighting the Customer and Innovation.

Very comfortable talking to audiences from 25 to 2,500+, likes it to be entertaining as well as insightful and can compare and contrast between the companies he has worked for. His talks are always tailored to the client and brought to life through stories and practical experiences. He is also a member of The Magic Circle.

Roger worked at Virgin Group directly for Sir Richard Branson on business development and for the Group Finance Director on deal-making after the highly leveraged buy-out of Virgin Group Plc in 1989. He worked on deals including the sale of a stake in Virgin Atlantic, a hotel joint venture, an Airship business and 3 TV Franchise bids. He then became Commercial Director of Virgin’s Media Group and drove projects such as the launch of Virgin Radio and the equity investment by Apax Partners, the explosive growth of Virgin Games and the subsequent process to float on Nasdaq and the international expansion of Virgin Digital Studios.

Roger then joined British Airways PLC in 1995 as General Manager World Sales & Distribution with a brief to radically change the way distribution worked in the Airline Industry. Responsible for sales strategy, sales effectiveness and all distribution functions with 500 staff. Chairman of Speedwing Training Ltd and Director of Galileo UK Ltd. He developed and implemented a sales and distribution strategy to tackle the £1.2 bn cost of distribution representing 20% of the £6bn sales target.

He began the move away from standard commission to travel agents as well as launching electronic ticketing and the internet site www.britishairways.com, resulting in a distribution cost reduction to 6% of revenue and a dramatic take up in internet sales and electronic ticketing usage.

Roger then joined Prudential PLC immediately after the £2bn pension’s miss-selling debacle to be Managing Director of the UK Retail business (“The man from the Pru”) that was the cause of the miss-selling problem. The UK Retail business had sales of £2bn, 6 million customers and 7,000 staff. He drove a major business transformation by introducing a multi-channel distribution model as well as a transformation in the economics, culture and infrastructure of the business.

Roger then joined the BBC as Chief Executive of BBC Ventures Group, reporting to Greg Dyke, Director General, and was a member of the Executive Committee. His role was to create profits and equity value by taking 4,500 staff from internal service functions of the BBC and transforming them into Commercial and Customer Driven businesses. He delivered 3 successful businesses creating over £750m of value to the BBC. He was also instrumental in the overall BBC wide change programme.

After the BBC Roger became Chief Executive of SpringBoard Group Ltd which is a private investment vehicle. Through this vehicle Roger has invested in a number of businesses ranging from a Bioenergy Media business to a Financial Services software business to a Strategic Consultancy business.

In addition Roger has worked closely with Private Equity on a number of deals. He drove a Retail public to private transaction with an enterprise value of £1bn in partnership with Merrill Lynch and secured backing for a bid from Permira.

He worked with Warburg Pinkus on the management buyout of SDI Media Group, a global company providing media services to the major players in the Film and Television Industry. He became President International and a Main Board Director of SDI responsible for all businesses in Europe and Asia and drove a series of European acquisitions as well playing a key role in the Secondary sale of the business from Warburg Pincus to Elevation Partners.

Roger was also a Non Executive Director of Maxjet Airways Inc., a transatlantic all-business class airline for its flotation on AIM.

Roger is married with two teenage daughters and lives in London.

Testimonials

Roger has been speaking on the topics of Developing and delivering growth strategies, Transformational Change, Leadership, Culture Change, Distribution, Innovation and Customer Service for the last 5 years. He has spoken all over the world and his talks are inspiring, practical and thought provoking:

"Roger's presentation perfectly complemented the theme of our Senior Leaders' Risk conference. He related his relevant business experience in a way that resonated with the audience, particularly the challenges of managing change." - David Godfrey, Managing Director, Risk, Lloyds Banking Group

''Thank you so much for all your efforts to make the conference such a resounding success. The 850 delegates were really impressed with both the substance and significance of your presentation and achievements. Thank you for a terrific job'' - Bill Manson, Chief Executive, The Management & Leadership Network

"Everyone thoroughly enjoyed your talk and the discussions during the remainder of the two days suggested that many of your comments had struck a note with the delegates" - Jane Pakalski, VP Learning and Development, TK Maxx

"Many of the delegates commented on how inspiring and thought provoking they found your speech" - James Taylor, Learning & Development Manager, Royal Borough Kingston

"The participants said afterwards that although theirs was a totally different business they could certainly apply some of the learning from his stories to Rexam's business" - Alice Heezen Group Management Development Manager, Rexam PLC

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