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Business

Business Committee

The ICAEW Business Committee contributes to the development and implementation of ICAEW strategy and advises on the services, support and facilities for members in business.

The ICAEW Business team is here to support you. The team’s activities are guided by the ICAEW Business Committee (IBC) which is responsible for representing you and your views.

The IBC is accountable to ICAEW Members and Commercial Board (IMCB), who report to ICAEW Board and Council. This advisory body contributes to the development and implementation of ICAEW strategy and advises the ICAEW business team on the services, support and facilities required by members in business to help them in their professional lives.

The Business Committee also supports ICAEW’s overall vision of a world of sustainable economies and regularly comments on public policy. Gaining perspectives from members across a broad range of sectors helps to provide an evidence-backed viewpoint using real-world examples which makes a real difference.

Committee members represent ICAEW’s 76,000 members in business and work across a diverse range of locations, sectors and sizes of organisation.

IBC members make a personal and voluntary contribution to ICAEW, helping to shape strategy and activity. They gain insight and the opportunity to network with peers. The Committee meets four times a year.

We hear first-hand what issues are keeping Committee members up at night and I leave each meeting with the feeling that we have contributed to the work of ICAEW, specifically in its engagement with government.

Stephen Huyton, Group Finance Director, Thermopatch International BV, Business Committee Chair (2021-23)

Fascinating meetings filled with insights about the wider economic environment. The discussion is always dynamic and it's great to see our feedback being fed into ICAEW discussions and decisions.

Laura Beales, Co-founder and CFO of Tally Market

You get to shape the discussions that ICAEW has with government, and through this make a real difference.

David Carr, Chief Executive Officer, Bouygues Energies & Services (UK)

A great way to contribute to ICAEW’s agenda to ensure it becomes ever more relevant for business members throughout their careers.

Mike Clark, VP Finance Strategy & Transformation, Coca-Cola Europacific Partners, Business Committee Chair (2023)

I've picked up many ideas and approaches from the roundtables that I’ve gone on to use in my professional life.

Aisha Anwar, Head of Financial Control, On the Beach Group plc.

Interested in joining the IBC?

As a member of the Business Committee, you directly influence ICAEW's strategy, inform conversations with policy makers, and support ICAEW in promoting Chartered Accountants as drivers of business and innovation. Furthermore, being a member of the IBC gives you the opportunity to draw on a range of experiences to broaden your own perspective and to understand the perspectives of others through peer-to-peer networking.

Contact the business team
Image of Andrew Williams
Andrew Williams Managing Director, Haraled Consultancy.

Andrew is a portfolio Finance Director and consultant based in South Wales, focussing principally on owner-managed businesses. He qualified with Deloitte, Haskins & Sells, before moving to work in the oil, engineering and aerospace sectors including three years as General Manager in the USA and seven years as Finance Director in the UK. Andrew is also Managing Director of his own accountancy practice specialising in the outsourcing of finance departments.

Image of Alice Bessell
Alice Bessell Finance Director, Brown & Bright Holdings.

Alice is the Finance Director of Brown & Bright Holdings which runs crabbing vessels in both the UK and Netherlands. She is also an ICAEW younger member, having qualified in 2018. For the 2022 / 23 year, she is the Deputy Chair of ICAEW South West.

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Aisha Anwar Head of Financial Control, On the Beach Group plc.

Aisha joined On the Beach Group plc at a challenging time for the travel industry in September 2020. Prior to this, she was Financial Controller at Innovative Technologies, an electrical manufacturing business. She chaired and acted as President for Manchester’s Student Society of Chartered Accountants before joining the ICAEW Business Committee.

Image of Aneka Beneby
Aneka Beneby Portfolio Manager at Julius Baer International

Aneka is a Portfolio Manager within the discretionary team at Julius Baer International. She is responsible for global multi-asset class mandates and for fundamental equity research within the Global Equity Income team. Her career began in 2008 with Pictet Bank & Trust in the Investment Strategy team, and she joined Julius Baer in 2013. Aneka completed a bachelor of commerce degree (Economics) from McGill University in Montreal, with distinction. She is a CFA Charterholder, holder of the Investment Management Certificate and the CFA UK Certificate in ESG Investing, and also a member of and volunteer with CFA Society UK, Past President of CFA Society The Bahamas and a member of the Chartered Institute of Securities and Investments. In 2023, Aneka was named as one of the PAM Next Generation Leaders in the UK.

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Beth Abbott-Stratford CFO, Flexys Solutions.

Starting her career with KPMG and then Lloyds Banking Group, Beth’s professional career has taken her through financial services & law firms before settling on SMEs, she is passionate about using her skills to support fast growing tech businesses. Beth is currently CFO at Flexys Solutions, a startup FinTech company disrupting the debt management and collections space. Beth is a member of a number of industry communities such as StartupCFO, Innovate Finance, TechSpark and she is a prominent advocate for women in tech and leadership roles.

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Chris Ford Senior Lecturer in Accounting and Management, Lancaster University.

Chris is a specialist in the performance management of collaborative innovation and ecosystem creation and has published world leading research in this domain. Prior to his return to academia in 2012 Chris worked as a Corporate Recovery Specialist for Deloitte, then spent 15 years running his own international mountain bike travel and training company working around the world with multiple partner organisations, whilst operating at the highest level in outdoor and coach education, and leadership development for two national governing bodies of sport in the UK. Chris has several advisory roles that connect to government and business, including Cabinet Office Policy Fellow advising the Cabinet Office Open Innovation Team. He previously served on the ICAEW Business and Management Faculty Board as an Academic Adviser.

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David Spiteri Managing Director – CFO, Credit Suisse.

David is a Managing Director of Credit Suisse based in London and CFO for UK Wealth Management and Head of Legal Entity Finance for UK and EMEA. He joined Credit Suisse in January 2022, prior to which he spent 21 years working at Barclays in London, New York and Singapore in regional and global finance roles. Prior to Barclays, David began his career at KPMG in Sydney. He is a member of both ICAEW and CA ANZ.

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David Carr Chief Executive Officer, Bouygues Energies & Services (UK).

David joined the Bouygues Group in the UK over 20 years ago as a newly qualified Chartered Accountant. During this time, David has moved across the group, working in a number of different industries such as waste management and building services. He became Financial Director of the Facilities Management business in 2001 and later moved to the role of Chief Operating Officer, before becoming Managing Director in 2009. David was appointed CEO for Bouygues Energies and Services in January 2016. He is an ICAEW Council Member and was the former Chair of the ICAEW Business and Management Faculty Board.

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Gareth John Executive Chairman and Director, First Intuition.

Gareth has been involved in professional education since qualifying and has strong relationships with the major UK accountancy awarding bodies. He has been involved in the roll-out of the accountancy apprenticeship standards as well as apprenticeship policy discussions with multiple stakeholders. He is now involved in the design and development of post-qualification education programmes for finance professionals, covering rapidly emerging skills in digital finance and data analytics as well as interpersonal skills in leadership and management. Gareth is an ICAEW Council member, a member of the CBI East of England Regional Council, Chair of the ICAEW East of England Strategy Board, Chair of the Skills Group of Cambridge Ahead, a member of the ICAEW Education & Training Board and co-chair of the Institute of Director’s Education Special Interest Group.

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George Acquah Senior Finance Business Partner Scientific Affairs, MundiPharma

Born in London, the foundations of George’s accountancy career were laid in the East Midlands, where he trained with PwC, before moving to Rolls-Royce in Derby, in late 2015. George spent time overseas as Business Manager at Aero Gearbox International SAS, a JV-owned group of companies headquartered just outside Paris, France, before returning to the UK as Finance Business Partner for Purchasing. George has had a long history of volunteer involvement with ICAEW, having previously served in the student society in Nottingham, and is a Past-President of the Nottingham, Derby and Lincoln Society of Chartered Accountants.

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Jo Muncaster Finance Lead, digiLab

Jo trained as an auditor and in 2016, moved 8,000 miles to be Financial Controller for the National Development Agency and Tourist Board in the Falkland Islands, supporting growth of the local economy. Back in the UK, she has focused on supporting companies with building and improving their company processes with a focus on decarbonisation decision-making and data analytics. Jo is currently the Finance Lead for digiLab, a tech start-up building digital twin software and supporting the integration of AI into all sectors. She is Chair of the ICAEW Southern, Wales and South West Sustainability Committee, supporting regional members with practical advice on sustainability matters.

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Karen Shaw Group Financial Controller, Johnstons of Elgin.

Karen runs the finance team in family-owned Johnston’s of Elgin, a textile manufacturer and retailer with international operations. She is a law graduate, Chartered Tax Advisor and studying for an MBA at the University of Strathclyde.

Image of Laura Beales
Laura Beales Co-Founder, Tally Market.

Laura qualified at KPMG where she worked in audit and management consultancy. Her first start-up role was at The Accountancy Cloud where she managed a portfolio of over 200 tech start-ups acting as their outsourced accountancy team. Her first in-house role was as Head of Finance at Florence supporting their £5m Series A fundraise. She is the Co-Founder of Tally Market which provides companies with a one-stop solution for workspace, including full-time offices, meeting rooms, event spaces or hot desks. The company has grown rapidly with more than 1,500 workspaces available to book. It was ranked in the top 100 Start-ups for 2021.

Image of Mike Clark
Mike Clark VP Finance Strategy and Transformation, Coca-Cola Europacific Partners.

Mike started in sales for American Express before training as a Chartered Accountant with Landau Morley. He has spent 22 years in the FMCG / CPG sector, initially for Kerry Foods and then The Tetley Group / Tata Global Beverages in roles including, Group Financial Controller, CFO for Tetley USA and Operations Finance Director. Mike joined Coca-Cola Enterprises in 2011 as Commercial Finance Director and then became VP Finance Strategic Initiatives leading the finance function’s change initiatives and strategic direction. From 2016, he was CFO for Great Britain within Coca-Cola European Partners, leading the finance function and delivering record results. Mike now leads finance strategy and transformation for Coca-Cola Europacific Partners, looking to the future for finance and bringing together the European and Australia, Pacific and Indonesian finance functions.

Image of Mitesh Patel
Mitesh Patel Group Financial Controller, Renewable Energy Systems Ltd

Mitesh is the Group Financial Controller for a leading global independent renewable energy company which develops, constructs and maintains renewable energy assets. He obtained his ICAEW qualification whilst training at PwC before moving to the private equity sector.

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Neil Cutting Transformation Director, Oracle Corporation Incorporated

Neil is a Transformation Director with Oracle Corporation Incorporated, one of the largest tech firms. Qualifying with PWC, he then moved into global finance leadership roles with Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), Mars and Jacobs Solutions Incorporated. Neil spent 17 years at Jacobs (a Fortune 250 company), where he was Vice President of Finance. His experience included Divisional CFO, International Accounting Director and Transformation Director. In addition to his international career, Neil has been an active volunteer for ICAEW, including being a member and President of the West of England Board, Chair of the Aerospace & Defence CFO Forum, a member of the Business Committee and in 2023, was elected to ICAEW Council.

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Roger Finnie CEO, Bloomberg Technoz.

Roger has spent most of his career in the Asia-Pacific region since qualifying in 1988. Originally working on insolvency and administration assignments in Australia and London, he joined LVMH in 1995 after moving to Hong Kong SAR where he spent 20 years working with the fashion businesses both as CFO and COO in countries including Singapore, Guam and Japan, before joining DFS as Managing Director. He was responsible for managing their duty-free partnerships and securing new business opportunities in China, Vietnam, Japan, Cambodia, Sri Lanka and Indonesia. For the past seven years he has worked at Mayapada Group as an advisor to the owners with responsibilities as COO for Mayapada Healthcare Group and latterly, CEO of Bloomberg Technoz. Roger is the Chair of the Stakeholder Advisory Board for ICAEW Indonesia.

Image of Sam Tasker Grindley
Sam Tasker Grindley Head of Advisor Channel, Swoop.

Sam supports accountants and SMEs in gaining access to funding. He spent eight years working in practice before moving into the fintech industry to help accounting firms build their business advisory offering. He is Deputy President of the Yorkshire District Society and founder of two community interest companies.

Image of Vivek Patankar
Vivek Patankar Divisional CFO at Convatec Group plc

Vivek is a Chartered Accountant (ICAEW/ICAI) and MBA (Finance) from India with 20 years of leadership experience and a track record of driving business turnarounds, corporate strategy, finance transformation & supply chain in high growth consumer, pharma, and e-commerce businesses. He started his career with General Electric in their leadership development program, then spent a decade at Unilever in roles including supply chain, management accounting, divisional CFO before moving to London as part of their Global FP&A team. He then joined Snapdeal as VP Finance where he led the business turnaround towards sustainable and profitable growth. Vivek is now the Divisional CFO at Convatec Group plc for their Advanced Wound Dressings business managing Europe and North America. He is also on the board of Convatec Ltd (UK subsidiary) and recently acquired Starlight Sciences UK.

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Get in touch

The IBC and the business team are always keen to hear from business members.

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Too many emails, or are you missing out?

Communicating effectively with business members is a key objective for us. Keeping your member profile up to date, ensures we better understand your interests and that you hear about ICAEW services and events that are of relevance to you (and only those that are relevant).

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More on ICAEW committees

Read about ICAEW's committees and their responsibilities and about ICAEW's governance structure.