Employee Benefits Awards 2013: Meet the judges

Debi O’Donovan

editor, Employee Benefits

Debi is responsible for editorial strategy across events, web and the magazine.

Debbie Lovewell

deputy editor, Employee Benefits

Debbie is an award-winning journalist who is responsible for news and features across the magazine and website.

Clare Bettelley

associate editor, Employee Benefits

Clare joined Employee Benefits in 2012. She oversees all supplements for the magazine, and writes on all areas of reward and benefits.

Neal Blackshire

benefits and compensation manager, McDonald’s Restaurants

Neal has worked for McDonald’s for more than 25 years. In 1995, he brought his operational management experience to the corporate HR team and was promoted to benefits and compensation manager in 2000. McDonald’s has been shortlisted for several Employee Benefits Awards and in 2012 won the Grand Prix award.

Masha Boldyreva

head of reward, Europe markets, Mondelez International

Masha started her career as an HR graduate. She then moved into a specialist international mobility role and spent 10 years in global mobility roles. She joined Cadbury in 2003 and has had a variety of corporate, project and business lead roles. Most recently, Masha led T&C’s harmonisation for Kraft/Cadbury.

Gary Brewer

head of reward and organisational development, William Grant and Sons

Gary has held senior global and UK HR, reward and business roles across a range of sectors, including pharmaceuticals, banking, media, transport and public administration.

Debra Corey

group compensation and benefits Director, Merlin Entertainments

Debra has over 20 years’ experience in compensation and benefits. She entered international compensation and benefits while with Gap in 1998 and has since held European and global roles with Gap, AS Watson, Honeywell, Morrisons and Quintiles. She took up her current role at Merlin in July 2011.

Ian Cunning

lead reward consultant, HSBC

Ian took up his current role in 2011. Before joining HSBC, he was senior reward manager at Banco Santander. He has also held compensation and benefits roles at Jardine Lloyd Thompson, AutoLogic and First Data Corporation.

Jill Cunnison

HR benefits and operations manager, Capital One

Jill’s responsibilities include defining the benefits offer for Capital One employees, including pensions. Jill is also responsible for the HR operations function, which includes managing HR vendors, payroll processing and HR services.

Mel Duffield

head of research and strategic policy, National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF)

Mel joined the NAPF as head of research and strategic policy in July 2011. Before that, she worked in the civil service for almost 11 years, and held posts at HM Treasury, the Department for Work and Pensions, and the Department for Education.

Jane Earnshaw

head of reward and recognition, Asda

Jane has worked with Asda for 17 years. In 2001, she moved into the reward arena and has experience in all areas of reward. She has led the reward team for more than 12 months.

Ian Hodson

reward and benefits manager, University of Lincoln

Ian oversees all aspects of reward, including all employee benefits, pensions, payroll and role evaluation. He has a background in both the public and private sector, having previously worked for Moy Park, Egg and Lincolnshire County Council. Ian has overseen teams that have been acknowledged for their achievements for pay and benefits, including being a previous winner at the Employee Benefits Awards.

Euan Hutchinson

EMEA rewards director, Johnson and Johnson

Euan has held this role since December 2011. He is responsible, with his team, for driving Johnson and Johnson’s compensation and benefits activities across the region. He is also leader of the organisation’s global centres of expertise on reward communications.

Euan was previously director of rewards at Skype from 2009 to 2011 and before that spent 10 years with Hewlett Packard and Compaq in various total reward roles.

Matthew Johnson

head of compensation and benefits, Adecco

Matthew has worked across various industry sectors. He specialised in compensation and benefits in 2003 with BDO before moving on to Steria and, more recently, the Adecco Group.

Ethan Kelly-Wilson

HR manager – UK and Ireland, Epson Europe

In his current role, Ethan supports the UK senior management team, as well as having accountability for payroll, benefi ts and HR systems across EMEA. Ethan has implemented a number of pension and benefits changes, some of which resulted in his previous organisation winning the 2011 Employee Benefits Award for ‘Most effective pensions strategy’.

James Kirkland

director of remuneration and pensions, Axa UK

James is responsible for reward, benefits, recognition and pensions for Axa’s UK organisations. Before taking up this role in January 2013, he spent seven years as head of pensions, benefits and recognition at Telefónica Europe.

Janet McKenzie

reward manager, B&Q

Janet has more than 15 years’ experience covering all aspects of reward. Before joining B&Q, she worked for The Body Shop, NATS and Arqiva.

Jeremy Mindell

former senior reward and tax manager, Henderson Global Investors

Jeremy has worked in international employment taxation and remuneration for over 20 years. After working in the Big 4 accountancy practices, latterly as a senior manager, he moved to Henderson. He specialises in devising cost-effective and tax-compliant pay share schemes and reward structures.

Donna Nind

head of compensation and benefits, CSC

Donna is part of CSC’s global compensation and benefits centre of expertise, responsible for all elements of reward for the 7,500 staff in CSC UK and Ireland. She has led a number of key initiatives, including the redesign and improvement of CSC’s UK flexible benefits scheme, the launch of a voluntary benefits plan and the launch of an online recognition scheme.

Julie Osman

director of pensions and benefits, Eli Lilly

Julie joined Lilly in 1991 and spent 10 years in financial management before moving to HR in 2001 as director of pensions and benefits. Benefits she has introduced include share plans, flexible benefits and an EAP, and she has managed pension change for the UK and Ireland.

Jackie Palmer

senior manager, compensation and benefits, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP

Jackie joined Freshfields in 2005, specialising in employee reward and benefits. Previously, she spent four years at law firm Herbert Smith, and has had roles in HR and graduate recruitment with engineering and management consultancies.

Sarah Perkins

UK healthy living manager, American Express

Sarah is a lifelong advocate of health and wellbeing. Her role involves managing the evolution and implementation of proactive and reactive integrated health services to improve staff health and wellbeing. She joined American Express from a healthcare consulting capacity.

Louise Phillips

MEA benefits senior leader, IBM

Louise has experience of working in most areas of HR, including compensation and benefits global strategies, global HR outsourcing and engagement, process redesign of HR policy global tools and processes, and project management of many large HR projects.

Phil Rixon

pensions and benefits manager, Ladbrokes

Phil spent over 10 years in pensions and benefits consultancy before joining Ladbrokes in September 2011. His primary responsibilities include the development, construction and delivery of its pension aims and strategy.

Janine Sparks

senior reward manager, BA

Janine has proven expertise in managing a broad reward agenda. At British Airways, she has responsibility for UK benefits, including pensions, medical schemes, risk benefits and staff travel policy, plus total reward communications.

Trevor Sparrow

head of international pensions and benefits, Lloyds Banking Group

In a 30-year career, Trevor has worked in pensions and benefits for nine multinational employers across more than 100 countries. Apart from Lloyds, his other banking sector experience includes periods at Barclays, Citigroup and JP Morgan.

Maria Strid

head of performance and reward, HSBC

Before joining HSBC in January 2011, Maria was head of reward and international mobility at Santander UK, where she was responsible for redesigning and executing the bank’s reward strategy. Maria started her compensation and benefits career at Arup Group.

Tim Taylor

head of group reward, TUI UK

Tim is responsible for setting and implementing the group reward strategy and manages executive reward, share schemes, employee benefits, pensions and international assignments. Before moving into reward, Tim held a variety of senior HR roles with First Choice, the UK division of Lidl Supermarkets and Tempo.

Martin Todd

head of reward and policy, Grant Thornton

Martin started his career in tax before moving into consultancy, advising on tax-effective reward and general reward projects. He moved to Norwich Union (now Aviva) as a reward manager, then became head of reward for the general insurance and RAC businesses. Since 2007, he has worked for organisations such as Alliance Pharmacy, the BBC and PWC.

Ingrid Waterfield

UK head of reward, KPMG

Ingrid has worked in KPMG’s UK reward team since 2005, heading the UK team since April 2009. Before that, she was a manager in KPMG’s people services practice, advising on all aspects of remuneration strategy.

Ashleigh Witcher

senior benefits administrator, Serco

Ashleigh mainly looks after staff on long-term absence in the UK and Northern Ireland. She has an HR background and has experience in payroll and benefits, organisational development, HR policy and relations and recruitment. Serco won the ‘most effective absence and rehabilitation strategy’ at the Employee Benefits Awards 2012.

Carol Young

pensions manager, Heineken UK

Carol leads the team responsible for all aspects of Heineken’s UK pension strategy. She was previously an investment consultant with Mercer and has served as an independent trustee on a number of DB and DC pension boards.