Judges

The 2012 Jury

We are delighted to announce our 2012 jury. (Keep posted on the site as more have to be confirmed). Our panel is extremely experienced and highly regarded within the UK events industry. Judges bios are shown below outlining their experience and expertise.

Judges will gather in London in June to review the work entered for 2012. 
 

 What the judges are looking for:

 

For you, what makes an award winning event?

"A seamless flow of the hospitality on offer delivered by happy people. Only possible with meticulous and creative planning. It can be any event of any size or budget but always measured from the guest’s perspective."

Hugh Walker

 

"One where everyone who attended loved it."

Jasper Hope

 

"An event is a journey, an experience. Really getting under the skin of the client to ensure they receive maximum results. To deliver you must understand the sentiment as well as the logistics.  From the ethos to the delivery, every touch point has an impact."

Maria Duddin

 

"Having a clear objective form the onset, budget control and an open mind to creative solutions and technology, it is not about spending as much as possible, more about how you use it."

Mark Fry

 

"That overworked word ‘creativity’. Creativity does not have to mean bells and whistles communications or heli-flips over the moon! It can mean creative use of lower budgets, or being more thoughtful and less obvious with venue choices – but most of all, ‘creativity’ is about being ‘relevant’. Why offer a solution that the client may have been able to produce themselves?."

Chris Clarke

Chairman of the 2012 panel.

Nicky Wrighte is Commercial Director at KDM Events, a creative event management company with offices in both the Midlands and London. Nicky joined KDM as an Account Executive in 2000 and during her time at KDM has handled the nationwide launch of new products, annual conferences and awards and celebrity charity balls. She also works on community and corporate training and development programmes for key clients including Close Brothers Group, Mars and BOC.

Nicky has spearheaded KDM’s move into new business areas for the company including creative design and conference management. Her current role at KDM is to take overall responsibility for the achievement of the company’s sales and business development objectives including identifying opportunities for growth and action, product development, organising the sales team’s product and sales skill training and identifying market trends and anticipated business levels.

Highly driven and motivated Sales Director of the UK’s No1 Event Management Company.
Re-joining Venues Event Management in May 2008 as Business Development Manager, I was responsible for securing and implementing all new business conference and event opportunities.

Now heading up a sales team of 4 Client Development Managers and a Telesales Manager we are responsible for ensuring our client relationships are highly maintained, new business opportunities are established and secured, additionally I play an active role in the company strategy and business performance.

I have an established account management and sales career and was previously employed by the company for 6 years as an Account Manager responsible for a multi-million pound portfolio of accounts.

In my interim employment away from Venues Event Management used to further my knowledge and understanding of the agency market, I was employed as a National Meetings and Events Sales Manager for a large international hotel chain, Managing some of the UK’s largest agents.

A previous successful operational career in hotel management, offered the perfect grounding providing over 10 years operational experience.

Paul Bush OBE is Chief Operating Officer of EventScotland, Scotland’s National Events Agency which works to promote Scotland as an event destination by attracting, generating and sustaining a portfolio of world class events in Scotland; to position Scotland as “The Perfect Stage” for events and driving significant, sustainable economic benefit for the country. Scotland’s track record is the envy of many nations around the world.

Paul is responsible for the development of Scotland’s major international sports and cultural events strategy. This includes work on events such as Ryder Cup 2014, Commonwealth Games 2014, World Cross Country Championships, Edinburgh International Festivals, and securing the MOBO awards outside of London in 2009 for the first time and again for 2011, 2013 and 2015 with Glasgow partners, alongside numerous other international events.

Recent successes include, the acclaimed delivery of Scotland’s most complex and diverse event tourism programme, Homecoming 2009, the development with partners of a world leading ‘eventimpacts’ model and a volunteer database, alongside the successful delivery of Games for Scotland and St Andrews Day and Winter Festival programmes.

2011 saw Scotland starting to clearly deliver against its aspiration to be The Perfect Stage for events by 2020, securing major events for 2015 in World Gymnastics Championships, World Orienteering Championships and European Paralympic Swimming Championships. Several bids for future events to firmly build on the 2014 opportunity and provide true legacy include Tour de France and European Eventing Championships as well as several iconic cultural properties.

In previous voluntary roles, Paul was appointed as General Team Manager to the Scottish Commonwealth Games Team for Manchester 2002 and again as Chef de Mission for Melbourne 2006. The 2006 Scottish Team had their most successful Games ever winning a total of 29 medals including 11 gold.

During the 1992 Olympic Games, 1990 and 1994 Commonwealth Games and numerous World and European Championships, Paul was appointed team manager for both the GB and England swimming teams.

Paul’s other directorships include: Member of UK Sport Major Events Panel, Commonwealth Games Scotland Board Member, Member of the Edinburgh International Festival, Member of Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2014 Audit and Risk Committee and Business Club Scotland Board member.

Paul received an OBE in the 2007 New Year’s Honours for services to sport.

Having worked at London venue Brewery for over a decade post graduation, Maria has progressed from an event manager to an innovative sales and marketing Director to one of London's finest General Manager's. Her enthusiasm and passion for her sector is contagious - rarely a day goes by without her challenging the norms and making sure that the Brewery sets the pace for the competition.

Since being at the helm of the Brewery she has increased both profitability and client satisfaction. Maria is an inspirational leader with progressive ideas that are reflected in the various industry accolades she has secured for both herself and the venue. Maria has featured in the Event Magazine’s Event 100 Club for the last three years, since she assumed the role of general manager of the City based venue.

Under Maria’s leadership, 2012 will see the Brewery announce a redesign of the venue’s brand, including a new logo and website focussing on the service and people behind the venue, rather than the space alone. This new look will allow the Brewery to reconnect with the City, and offer quality in a market which is tired of austerity and cut-price solutions.

Away from the venue Maria has spoken at several industry events on the issue of social media for events, advising her industry peers on how to utilise social media to engage with clients.

Jasper joined the Royal Albert Hall as Director of Events in January 2008, responsible for overseeing all aspects of the Hall’s programming, including services to third party event promoters and introducing a series of Hall own-promoted events including the premieres of the Lord of the Rings trilogy with live orchestra. He also oversaw the opening of the Hall’s new small-scale purpose-built performance space, the Elgar Room, in September 2009 which now hosts around 80 events a year with comedy, jazz and classical chamber music series alongside hush, a series for just signed indie bands.

He is also responsible for the Hall’s marketing, sponsorship and corporate business and an extensive education programme which involves over 30,000 young people each year. He has negotiated major sponsorship and supplier deals with premium brands including Moët & Chandon, Hildon Water, Asahi, Spitfire Ale, Cloudy Bay and Aspall Cyder as well as establishing a new corporate hospitality service to provide packages and sales for promoters such as Cirque du Soleil. In addition in September 2010, he oversaw the appointment of the Hall’s new contract caterer, “rhubarb”, following an extensive tender process.

In October 2010, he was promoted to Chief Operating Officer responsible for overseeing the all the day-to-day operational management of the Hall in addition to his above responsibilities. He continues to promote more Hall owned content in the main auditorium with Matrix Live and Captain Beaky this autumn, a brand new co-production of Aida in February 2012, Lang Lang’s first ever UK performances of the Beethoven Piano Concerto Cycle in March, an newly adapted co-production of Swan Lake on Ice in May and the European Premiere of the newly re-mastered film of West Side Story with the score played live in June.

Hugh is a highly experienced catering entrepreneur having developed businesses in the industry since his graduation in Catering Systems. His working career began in 80s London designing catering operations for hotels, restaurants, hospitals and the then burgeoning fast food industry. Quickly feeling the urge to run operations he developed a 75 strong chain of cafes throughout the UK within Do It All the WH Smith DIY venture. This led to further cafes within Garden Centres, Leisure Centres and Hospitals. In the early 90s an interest in developing a delivered catering concept serving the central London business community materialised in the formation of Eden Caterers.

Eden is distinguished by their sustainability credentials being a forerunner and champion of the cause. The drive for home made and local even extends to them keeping bees in their car park.

Eden now serves hundreds of major clients with their catering requirements from business lunches through to client receptions both at their own premises and the capitals key venues.

Chris Clarke is the Director of Events and Communications for P&MM, one of the country’s premier Event Management agencies.

Growing up in the travel and events industry; covering areas as diverse as tour operator management, cruise liners, hotel contracting and all aspects of conferences, incentives and bespoke corporate hospitality. Chris has worked for P&MM for 9 years (this time around!) and currently runs a division of industry professionals responsible for the provision of corporate event solutions to some of the country’s most high-profile Blue Chips.

Chris has helped to grow and refine an events and communications division that is regarded as one of the best in the industry; widely recognised for its high standards of creative solutions, health and safety protocols and innovative strategies helping it stay one step ahead of the competition. His division is financially healthy, has one of the lowest rates of staff turnover of any large agency, is the most prolific award winner in the industry, operating 100’s of events annually with a team of professionals that always want to deliver the best events... every time!

The Events and Communications division currently numbers just over 45 staff, turns over in excess of £23m per year.

Sarah began working for AEG Live in 2007, managing Hyde Park Winter Wonderland as well as various outdoor events at The O2 including Afrika- Afrika and the Christmas Fair. In 2011, Sarah was made AEG’s Director of
Events and brought the inaugural 7up Winter Wonderland event to Dublin, which attracted 200,000 visitors.
A graduate of Birmingham University, Sarah has worked in the events industry for over fifteen years. She began her career in folk festivals in the US, and on returning to the UK in 1996 began a six year tenure with Mean Fiddler (now Festival Republic) where she contributed to the development & growth some of the world’s best known music festivals. Sarah also spent eighteen months in New York with Mean Fiddler. From 2002 to 2006, Sarah
took various consultancy roles; highlights include producing the LeftField Stage at the Glastonbury Festival and creating fundraising events & corporate sponsorship packages for the charity UNICEF.

Clive Little is the Director of Events and Programming at the Olympic Park Legacy Company, with responsibility for the strategic planning and delivery of a diverse portfolio of events and programmes across the entire Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. With over 250 acres of parkland and public realm and a set of world class venues he leads on shaping and implementing what will be probably be London’s largest and most diverse events programmes.

Previous to his role at the Olympic Park, Clive held the position of Global Events Director for Cake, a specialist ideas and experiential events agency sitting within the Havas Sports and Entertainment Group. Clive has over 20 years of experience in delivering events and venue programming in both indoor and outdoor spaces, to a wide variety of audiences. In his work Clive has delivered global event solutions and blueprints for high profile brands such as Motorola, Vodafone and Yahoo. He has also led on domestic events for clients such as Clarence House and Nintendo and EDF.