Simon Tse

Chief Executive of the Crown Commercial Service

He first joined CCS in May 2016 and led the Procurement Operations directorate. He served as interim CEO from July 2018 until his permanent appointment, which followed an external competition, in December that year.

Simon is an experienced Chief Executive Officer and has extensive experience of strategic planning, customer service, driving performance improvement and achieving results. He first joined the Civil Service in 2008, taking up the position of Chief Executive Officer for the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, where he remained in post until 2013.

Simon was Health Director at the Department for Work and Pensions, one of the UK’s largest public service departments, from 2013 - 2016. In this role he was responsible for the provision of all health and disability assessments services within the UK.

This role followed a successful career in the private sector spanning more than 25 years, most recently at Virgin Media, firstly as Managing Director for Wales and West, and subsequently as the UK SME Business Director.

Chris Ball

Research Associate NUBS, Honorary Expert Associate for the National Innovation Centre on Ageing and Director of the Centre for Research into the Older Workforce

Expert on all aspects of policy and practice regarding the ageing workforce. Passionate about the value of older workers, management of an age diverse workforce, development of the "silver economy" and demographic change, including international dimensions on all these. Speaker, commentator and writer.

Publications include "Managing the Ageing Workforce: An Introductory Guide for HR Professionals", (TAEN, 2007), research reports for Newcastle University and CROW, as well as academic book chapters and many blogs and articles.

Specialties: Learning, health and well-being, age management, labour market, demographic changes, employee relations.

Gillian Askew

Director at All Things Procurement

Gillian is an experienced procurement professional with a career spanning over 25 years in both private and public sector. Gillian currently runs All Things Procurement, a social enterprise focussing on increasing public sector business to SME's and optimising the delivery of social value through procurement.

Gillian is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply and a member of the Institute of Leadership and Management, as well as a member of FSB and Social Value UK. She is also an active committee member of the CIPS South Yorkshire branch along with a number of other volunteering activities.

Gillian first joined public sector procurement in 2013 as Head of Procurement for Nottingham Trent University, she was also a non-executive director of NEUPC during her tenure there. She then joined YPO in 2016 as Head of Procurement Services responsible for over £600m public sector spend under management. Prior to this Gillian worked as Supply Chain Director within Babcock International Group leading global procurement and supply chain teams in asset infrastructure. In addition, Gillian has extensive experience as a small business owner including business acquisition and start up.