Meet The Team

Meet our highly experienced team who can help you drive change and your business forward.

James Aherne

James is an experienced leader and consultant with over 25 years of practical experience of leading, managing, and delivering business excellence programmes and projects within operational and transactional environments. James thrives on demystifying the jargon and buzzwords that are too often associated with business transformation by delivering meaningful and accessible actions that will help teams develop and exceed their current potential and, ultimately, achieve their strategic intent.

Over the years James has delivered significant improvements to delivery, productivity and quality as a Chief Operating Officer, and managed hundreds of operational excellence consulting programmes during 10 years as Director within the Renault-Nissan Alliance. James spent the first 10 years of his career as an Operations Manager and, latterly a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt within the Cummins Engine Company and holds a BEng (Hons) degree in Mechanical Engineering.

Phil Ward

Phil is a Leader in Operational Excellence, Business Change and Transformation. With 20+ years of experience, establishing and directing programmes across multiple international businesses in the Construction, Finance, Utilities, Rail, Nuclear, Transport and Regional Government.

Over the years Phil has delivered benefits valued in excess of £200M, and coached and trained more than 1500 people in Lean Six Sigma, Behavioural Science and Leadership. Phil’s previous career in the Water Industry as a Director of Commissioning, gave him a solid foundation in fast moving projects, from concept to commissioning of multiple major schemes, each over £300M.

Overall, Phil is a results-oriented leader with an acute awareness of Customer’s needs, and sharp focus on value for money. He knows that performance turnaround is needed in days and weeks, not months and years, and that driving the right behaviours is key for sustainable, lasting results, and an environment people enjoy working in.

Ross Garrett

Ross is highly skilled and experienced at leading organisations through the various challenges when creating and deploying their business strategy, and brings gravitas and a wealth of experience to every project.

With over 40 years business experience in roles right up to executive leadership level in sectors including manufacturing, infrastructure, banking and local authorities, Ross has likely dealt with challenges very similar to yours first-hand and is well equipped to support you and your team through them.

Complementing his practical experience, Ross is a certified Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and a qualified Executive Coach and Mentor. Perhaps it’s best to let an industry leader summarise their thoughts; this testimonial is from a Regional Director in what was known at the time as Highways England:

“Ross has been absolutely the right person for the job and without him the programme would not have been successful. Ross has put a massive amount of energy into the various projects and he has driven very hard, on many occasions making people in both our internal and contractors’ teams feel uncomfortable – which was entirely right and in fact absolutely necessary in order to see real improvements in the joint business. Ross was very quick to get to grips with the real issues, be realistic about what was needed to overcome them, set in place plans and drive progress on both sides.”

Kate Gardner

It is often said that it will be the people, not the processes, that make or break a transformation programme which is why Kate is such a valued member of the extended team. Kate is a psychologist and a trainer who helps organisations put their goals into action rather than just on paper!

With over twenty years’ experience delivering training and conducting consultancy assignments for over 40 different organisations as the owner of Gardner Training & Consultancy (GTC), Kate has helped hundreds of leaders, managers and operational teams deeply understand how to achieve their goals.

Backing up this hands-on experience, Kate has a degree in psychology, a postgraduate management qualification and a training qualification from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), and has been an approved trainer and assessor for the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM).

Kate’s specialisms include performance management, change management, aligning staff with strategy, communication and team dynamics. Kate’s use of positive psychology alongside tried and tested theory and practice, means she creates lasting and meaningful relationships with clients across organisations facilitating buy-in to the programme, at all levels.

John Celino

John is a Chartered Engineer (IMechE) who spent the first 13 years of his career deep in Operational Excellence at Nissan’s world class Sunderland plant. Since then, John has spent 22 years leading and coaching teams in developing and delivering improvement strategies in sectors including industrial manufacturing, MRO, oil and gas, aerospace, and food production.

At heart John remains an engineer, but that’s far from the full story. John’s passions extend to using data-based logic combined with a coaching leadership style to support individuals and teams to define, challenge and ultimately overcome the hurdles that face any transformation programme. His unique combination of engineering logic and personal empathy brings value to any programme of work.

John has the first-hand experiences and posses the natural ability to engage with all levels of seniority and co-develop solutions that hit the mark first time.

Jonathan Clarke

Jonathan is an experienced and challenge-orientated Director with considerable operational and project management experience. This is combined with an excellent track record of delivering business results on time and to cost through the effective leadership and management of multi-disciplined teams.

As co-founder and former Managing Director of Morgan Jones Recruitment Consultants Ltd, Jonathan has a deep understanding of what is required to overcome challenges that face organisations at the sharp-end including relocation, sustainable recruitment and succession planning, procurement and management of external services as well as the practicalities of sustaining ISO 9001 and 14001 management systems.

After nearly 25 years of success with Morgan Jones, Jonathan now enjoys a slower pace of life, serving on the board of EKC Schools Trust whilst remaining on hand to support some of our smaller clients with practical guidance and solutions.