Meet the Governors

Ian Billyard was the Principal & CEO of Leeds College of Building, the only specialist Further Education College for the Construction & Built Environment Sector in the UK, up until his retirement on 31st December 2018.  At this time Ian had been Principal for nearly sixteen years.  Prior to becoming Principal he was Deputy Principal at LCB, Head of Faculty, Head of Department and lecturer at a number of Further Education Colleges in England.

Latterly, as part of his role, Ian was a member of one of the Dfe/IfA groups involved in developing the new T Level qualifications for England. Additionally, Ian was a Council member with CGLI, a Board Member of the construction Cross-Industry Apprenticeship Task Force; Board Member of the Yorkshire Builders’ Federation (YBF); Chair of the West Yorkshire College Consortium; FE representative on the Leeds City Region LEP Employment & Skills Panel; Chair of the Leeds City Region Skills Network; Member of the FMB Area Board (Yorkshire & Trent) and Member of the NFB North East Region Executive Board and member of the FMB National Training Group.  He is also a member of various local, regional and national groups supporting education and training.

Prior to his move into the Further Education sector Ian trained as a building surveyor, initially with English China Clays in the South West, subsequently he worked for contracting companies and a Local Authority, also in the South West.

Post retirement Ian has been keen to maintain involvement in the sector and has maintained/taken on a number of roles, including; Fellow and Council member with CGLI; Board Member of the Yorkshire Builders’ Federation (YBF); member of the City & Guild Industry Board for Construction and member of BACH (British Association of Construction Head) National Executive Committee.

Mark is an experienced CIMA qualified accountant with over 10 years’ experience of working within the Lincolnshire healthcare sector.

In his current role, as the Deputy Director of Finance at Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, Mark is developing a strong awareness and knowledge of strategic management within a large successful organisation. This knowledge is being used to support the College’s management team to develop the continued growth and success of the College.

Originally from Leicestershire, Mark studied Accounting & Information Systems at Sheffield Hallam University and started his working career at Tesco, where he developed a strong passion for leadership and team development.

Mark enjoys spending time with family and has a number of interests including Motorcycling, mountain biking and running.

Mark Locking was appointed as the Principal / Chief Executive Officer of the Lincoln College Group on 1 April 2022.  He also holds voluntary positions as Chair of the Board of Active Lincolnshire, Director of the Lincolnshire Institute of Technology, Director of Association of Colleges Sport, and a member of the Lincoln University Technical College.

Starting out as a lecturer in Further Education in 1994 Mark has worked in education for over 25 years in a number of roles in colleges, a school and a specialist SEND college, interspersed with 2 separate roles in the commercial sector. These positions were across a range of teaching and leadership roles that as they became more senior transitioned into leadership roles with teaching no longer at their core. The 2 positions in the commercial sector, that were 10 years apart, gave Mark a commercial perspective to education and have helped him see training from an employer’s perspective when he came back to FE, having worked with the likes of Kellogg, JCB, Legal and General and Walkers.

Mark has underpinned his public and private sector career spanning nearly 28 years with high quality education and training including postgraduate qualifications and leadership training from the likes of the SAID Business School at Oxford University, Loughborough University and the Institute of Directors.  Time working in education and leadership has strengthened his view that people and talent are at the heart of an organisations’ success and an open and growth mindset to learning enhances the chances of success and happiness in life and the workplace.

Farhan Ahmed is a Senior Academic, with in excess of 20 years’ experience within Education and specifically Higher Education in Lincolnshire. Having held numerous positions in Higher Education, at the University of Lincoln, presently Farhan is Head of School and Dean. Farhan’s areas of expertise include Aviation, Aviation Safety, and Air transport networks.

Tim is a commercially focused senior HR professional, with a Masters in Strategic HRM and a further Post Graduate Diploma in Employment Law. Currently working within Dixons Carphone PLC who are Europe’s leading specialist electrical and telecommunications retailer and services company, employing over 41,000 people in nine countries.

In his current role within the Technology Division, Tim’s remit focusses on the Technology, Transformation, eCommerce and Data teams – across Newark, Acton and our store locations. This remit includes challenging how we attract, engage and develop our colleagues – in a fiercely contested digital space and where we have a number of large scale transformations being undertaken.

https://www.dixonscarphone.com

Previously Tim has held a number of senior roles covering predominately the 3^rd Party logistics fields as well as various national and international mining businesses. Originally South African Tim retains a passion for travelling and experiencing other cultures as well as spending time together as a family.

Amy Conyard attended Wisbech Grammar School, Cambridgeshire and completed up to AS Levels before leaving to pursue a career in hospitality management.

Amy went through the management training programme with a large pub company to become a unit manager, along with working with new open set ups and area training inclusive of company inductions.

After moving to Lincolnshire, Amy left the hospitality industry and joined the Danwood Group, where she worked within the Customer Resolutions Team, resolving cases from query up to legal disputes.

Whilst on maternity leave, Amy co-founded Bottomley Distillers Ltd and brought Pin Gin to market. Bottomley Distillers grew from a small batch gin, distilled in the garage, to one of the county’s most recognisable brands within just a few years and in the last month completed the acquisition of the company by global enterprise, Next Frontier Brands Ltd.

Amy is now Managing Director of Distillery Operations for the group. The distillery facility is at the heart of the group’s spirit plans and over the next two years will see £5m of investment into a new distillery and visitor centre.

Ellie is a first year degree student undertaking the Professional Policing Degree with Lincoln College. She has studied with Lincoln college for 3 years now and has previously attended the college and completed a National Extended Diploma in Uniformed Protective Services. 

Alongside her studies Ellie has recently been accepted into Lincolnshire Police force as a Special Constable, a frontline volunteer role that will give her an insight to her future career. 

In Ellie's very limited spare time she likes to spend time in her hometown by the seaside, Cleethorpes! No where serves a better fish and chips than Cleethorpes. 

Having recently retired from his main career leading the NatWest Commercial Bank offering across Greater Lincolnshire, and earlier this year his time as Director and Chair of the Greater Lincolnshire LEP , Pat now spends his time engaged with a portfolio of social impact board memberships including , Lincoln College (where both his children attended), University of Lincoln, Lincoln City Foundation, Lincoln Prison EAB, BNA charity, Connected Coast and the Lincoln Poverty Truth Commission .

Spare time is taken up by some fitness cycling, walking and swimming as well as watching live sport inc Lincoln City FC and as much welsh rugby as I'm allowed ! I have built up a strong network across Greater Lincolnshire in my time here, some 33 years and do my best to put that to work for the organisations I'm lucky enough to work with.

Tim comes from a Lincolnshire farming family, having trained and qualified as a Chartered Accountant in Leeds he returned to the county in 1996. He is a director of Duncan & Toplis Limited and is based in their Lincoln office and lives just north of Lincoln. Although a general practioner Tim is a member of the specialist team providing all manner of support to the firm’s academy clients. In addition, Tim is the firm’s Audit Compliance Director as well as being the head of student training.

Outside of work Tim undertakes all manner of activities in trying to keep himself fit including walking and cycling. He is also a keen Leicester Tigers supporter.

After getting a First-Class degree from the University of Nottingham in Finance, Accounting and Management, Lucy Goodier started her professional career at Deloitte LLP in Leeds in their Audit Practice, where she trained to become a Chartered Accountant. Lucy’s clients were in a range of sectors but included manufacturing, energy and education.
After leaving Deloitte, Lucy has spent the last 8 years working in industry and has gained experience at ASDA in their Finance Controllership team, Branston Limited as Group Financial Controller, and current role is at Cranswick Pet Products as Financial Controller.

Following a 30-year career in Royal Air Force, Chris has held director level appointments in large and small Defence companies, including as manging director of Lincoln-based Metrea Mission Data. He is a Chartered Manager and holds an MA in Defence Studies from Kings College London.  

A navigator by trade, Chris joined the RAF straight from school after A-levels. He is a former station commander at RAF Waddington and he ended his time in uniform with responsibility for the Ministry of Defence’s portfolio of information and intelligence system capabilities. He moved from there into a senior business development role with the multinational engineering company Atkins before returning to work in Lincoln in 2017 at MMD, where he progressed through strategy and leadership positions to become managing director in 2020. He led the company’s transition to a front-line operational services business delivering global support to Defence customers as part of the Metrea group. He now works part-time for Metrea leading strategic bids.    

Chris is member of Lincolnshire Local Enterprise Partnership Defence and Security Advisory Board, pushing growth initiatives in the region and creating opportunities for collaboration between industry, academia and government. Originally from Nottingham, he has lived in Lincoln with his family for over twenty years.        

Don has worked at Lincoln College since 2018 in the Business Studies department. He leads/has led the Business BTEC Studies, Access to Higher Education in Business, and Higher National Certificate in Business courses, as well being the Lead Internal Verifier of Quality for the Level 3.

He is currently studying a Masters Degree in Business to provide a greater quality of teaching and learning to his students.

Ashok is the Assistant Director of Education and Library Knowledge Services at United Lincolnshire Hospital NHS Trust (ULHT).  He has a background in education having taught both Engineering and Motor Vehicle. 

I am currently the Student Enterprise Manager at The University of Lincoln, my role is to lead the Student Enterprise activity across the institution and support students in crafting their business plans, developing their pitches and identifying the resources they need to launch their businesses. This involves mentoring and coaching individual students, as well as organising events and workshops that provide opportunities for students to learn and network with professionals in the industry.

For over 5 years, I worked at The Grimsby Institute, initially as a Programme Leader for L3 Business, Enterprise & Entrepreneurship, before then moving on to be the Curriculum Manager for FE Business, Tourism, Hospitality & HE Business with a team of 25 staff and 350+ students. Prior to this I worked in the private sector in both the UK & USA. 

For 8 years, I was a Governor & Chair of Governors at Cambridge Park Academy in Grimsby. This 3-19 special school provides support for pupils with ASD (Autistic Spectrum Disorder) and complex learning needs, and can accommodate up to 220 students from the North East Lincolnshire and North Lincolnshire area. 

I am also a member of the City & Guilds Employer Industry Board for the T Level in Management, Business and Digital. Additionally, I am a Princes Trust mentor and previously a Vice-Chair for Young Enterprise Humber.

When I'm not working, I enjoy spending my time walking through the countryside, reading, and spending time with family & friends. 

Thomas McKenzie started his career straight from school, becoming an engineering apprenticeship with Siemens, based in Lincoln. Throughout his apprenticeship he completed an NVQ level 3 in Technical Engineering while also completing a National Diploma and National Certificate in Engineering at Lincoln College.

After completing his apprenticeship, Thomas took a job within the Spares Stores department working on specific projects while also working as a storeman. From here he moved into the Sales Support department, supporting the Sales Managers with quotations and orders for customers around the world.

From this role, Thomas began a secondment as a Sales Manager to support with customers within Europe to gain further knowledge of the role. After four months on secondment he became a permanent Sales Manager and now manages customer accounts worldwide, focusing on India, Bangladesh, Japan, Vietnam, Libya and Turkey. Thomas has now taken on the role of Regional Product development Manager, overseeing the growth of the Small Gas Turbine product line in the Regions of Asia and China.

Paul’s career in food manufacturing started as a Sainsbury-sponsored A level trainee studying for an HND in Business & Finance at Cambridgeshire College of Arts & Technology - he believes that the ‘sandwich’ nature of this course (alternating periods of academic study with time in a variety of ‘hands-on' factory environments) gave him a real advantage over others who took a purely academic approach to their Further/Higher Education paths, and established an ongoing approach to learning that ultimately helped him achieve successful career progression to Managing Director roles. 

Paul has worked in Senior Business Leadership roles across many parts of the food industry (in the UK and internationally), several of which involved major strategic change programs such as start-ups, capital projects, business restructuring and challenging performance turn-arounds.

Paul is now focused on Board Advisory/Non-Exec Director roles balanced with a couple of voluntary roles: as well as being a Governor of Lincoln College, he’s also a Trustee of Transaid, an international development charity with a focus on improving healthcare access and reducing road traffic casualties across sub-Saharan Africa.

Peter Price is Finance Business Partner at AB Mauri, a global business of Associated British Foods plc. Prior to joining AB Mauri, Peter was Finance Manager at L.J. Fairburn & Son Ltd., one of the UK’s largest egg producers and distributors. Peter did his initial accountancy training at Lincolnshire-based accountancy firms Peach & Co. and Dexter and Sharpe.

In additional to being a member of the Association of Accounting Technicians and Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, Peter has a first-class BSc (Hons) Degree in Applied Accounting from Oxford Brookes University and an MSc with distinction in Professional Accountancy from the University of London. Peter is currently studying for an MBA at Warwick Business School.

Evie attended De Aston school before deciding to do A-levels at Lincoln College, where she is in her second year of Politics, Geography and English Literature. 

She is passionate about English, winning a prize for English Language while at secondary school. She also won a scholarship to study creative writing at an Oxford University summer school. 

When not at College, she can often be found working as a waitress, or attending concerts with her friends (with lots of revision in between, of course!). 

Charlotte graduated from Liverpool John Moores in 2011 and started at her first Marketing and Communications job at South Kesteven District Council, working alongside the economic development team. Charlotte took 18-months out to travel, during which time she visited Thailand, Singapore, Bali, Australia and New Zealand and while travelling secured short term project, event and marketing positions, which were in the public and higher education sector.

Charlotte progressed through a series of promotions at Waldeck Consulting, starting out as Copywrite and Marketing Coordinator, progressing to Marketing Manager, before leaving the company in October 2018. 

In October 2018 Charlotte joined Lincolnshire Chamber of Commerce, progressing to a Senior Leadership role in just a year.

Kerrin completed 30 years Policing service in December 2022 after almost 5 years as Assistant Chief Constable with Lincolnshire Police, in the UK. Her service spanned across 5 police forces and included a 12 month secondment with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to Baghdad, Iraq. A posting she describes as the turning point in her policing career and also the best and worst year of her life.

She has a background in a variety of disciplines at all levels of her career from operational uniform, CID and specialist roles which included over 20 years as Hostage Negotiator, undertaking national and international responsibilities in this capacity. From developing policy, training curriculum to operational deployments in hostile environments. Plus reviewing New South Wales Police effectiveness in the Lindt Cafe terrorist siege.

As a Chief Officer, Kerrin was responsible for National policing (NPCC) portfolios on Professionalising Investigations (PIP) and Progression and Leadership under Race Religion and Belief portfolio; within this role she worked alongside others to develop the ‘Future Supers’ programme aimed at developing career progression opportunities for minority police colleagues, and the Women of Colour in Policing (WoCiP) network to enable women of colour to thrive within the service.

Life beyond policing sees Kerrin undertaking a number of Non Exec Director roles; Chair of the Board of Trustees for YMCA Lincolnshire, Governor Lincoln College, Senior Associate Fellow with the Police Foundation, committee member of the Cumberland Lodge police think tank, a College of Policing Associate and public speaker. Kerrin has recently taken on a part time role as a recruitment specialist with the Judicial Appointments Commission.

Kerrin has been bestowed with a number of awards particularly in respect of Leadership and Diversity. In 2021 she was honoured with the Queens Police Medal from HM Queen Elizabeth II for services to policing and diversity.

Kerrin is married, no children, a million godchildren, loves life, adventure, travel, music and socialising.