Adrian is a leadership developer with over 30 years experience, having worked for one of Europe's longest established management schools for over 15 years. This has given him the privilege of developing and coaching leaders up to and including Chief Executive level across the private, public and not-for-profit sectors and across the world. He is the Founding Director of Deeper Leaders, a collective of leadership development consultants dedicated to developing organisational and community leadership 'for a kinder, fairer and more sustainable world'. Adrian is passionate about social and climate justice and in 2021, set up the White Allies Network to support those that aspire to be better allies against racism in the world.

 

On graduating from Durham University in Biology-Ecology, Adrian sensed God steering him away from his planned career path to be an Ecologist and was birthing in him a passion for developing and supporting leaders. This was partly triggered by growing up in a Vicarage context and sensing the lack of supervision and support for his father in ministry. Adrian explored God’s plans for him, first as a Careforce volunteer as part of a team ministry on Nottingham’s council estates and then with Youth With a Mission (YWAM). With YWAM he worked in the UK, Holland, Denmark and Lebanon on a variety of mission and relief projects before undergoing YWAM’s leadership training and leading a short-term mission team to Kenya.

 

Having met his wife, Laura, in YWAM, they both sensed their long-term call lay in the local church and they settled at Streatham Baptist Church in South London, becoming part of the leadership team of a church plant. During this time Adrian worked in central government, holding various inner-city jobcentre management roles before focusing on his passion for leadership development. This led to a training consultant role at Croydon Council, where he also developed a freelance career before taking up a full-time position at the Roffey Park Institute as Senior Consultant.

 

For the next 15 years, Adrian designed and delivered leadership and team development programmes for well-known names including Chevron, Lloyds Banking Group, Ministry of Defence, Surrey CC, St John Ambulance, Christian Aid, Macmillan Cancer Support and the Ministry of Health, Singapore. To date, he has coached over 200 managers, up to and including CEO level, and worked with more than 30 Top Teams to develop their strategic thinking and team effectiveness. He was also Programme Director for Roffey Park’s Strategic Leadership Programme for seven years and for the award-winning Leadership 2025 programme - Roffey Park's first positive action programme, that has successfully increased the diversity of senior leaders in the social housing sector.

 

Adrian is a writer and conference speaker and his views on leadership have been sought by the national press and online publications such as Forbes.com. After 10 years as a guest lecturer at Spurgeons College, delivering two sessions on leadership each year,  he was made a Teaching Fellow at Spurgeons, along with Laura, to develop a new unit on Effective Christian Leadership, which is now in its second year. He is also an approved coach on the Church of England’s Strategic Leadership Development Programme. Click here for access to two articles he wrote for CPAS on Leading with Agility.

 

Adrian and Laura have three grown up daughters and one grandchild. They are still members of Streatham Baptist Church, where they have been responsible for developing the church’s discipleship and small group strategy based on an extensive spiritual life and health survey they designed and administered for the church. They have developed leadership development programmes for the Ministerial Team, for a wider group of 50 with leadership responsibilities and a small group leaders’ training programme.

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Adrian's spare-time activities include landscape photography, kayaking, country walks, DIY, thrashing Laura at Scrabble and keeping squirrels off his birdfeeders.

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