Beverley, England, United Kingdom
Managing Director | Conservation Leader | Educator | Nuffield Scholar I lead practical environmental change at landscape scale, combining frontline environmental management, training and land-use strategy. As Managing Director of Riverlution, I oversee nature-based projects that tackle flood risk, biodiversity loss, and skills development—working with local authorities, utilities, businesses, and third-sector partners across the North of England. My background blends countryside management, vocational education and outdoor instruction with a deep commitment to community engagement and long-term stewardship. I am a Nuffield Farming Scholar (2021) and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, with fieldwork experience across the UK, Scandinavia, New Zealand, and North America exploring large herbivore management and rural livelihoods. I continue to contribute to public discourse and sector improvement through public speaking, and publications, #ConservationLeadership #LandscapeRestoration #NatureBasedSolutions #RuralSkills #FloodResilience #CountrysideManagement #DeerManagement #EnvironmentalTraining
As the Managing Director of Riverlution, I lead a passionate team in our mission to revolutionize river stewardship. In my current role, I oversee the strategic direction and operations of Riverlution, ensuring our commitment to social impact and sustainability is at the forefront. The Riverlution 'stewardship skills scheme,' a cornerstone initiative, has expanded into a comprehensive stewardship partnership funded by the River Stewardship Company and various socially conscious companies. This initiative empowers a team of dedicated 'river stewards' to undertake crucial environmental tasks in often-neglected river and riparian habitats. Key Achievements and Responsibilities: +Successfully expanded the stewardship skills scheme, now integral to a broader stewardship partnership. +Line management of associated staff, overseeing day-to-day operations. +Extensive relationship building and partnership work with businesses, grant funding organizations, conservation charities, and local government. +Manage and drive the growth of Riverlution as a leading training provider in the environmental sector. +Maintain responsibility within the River Stewardship Company for social impact and training.
Governance of Riverlution's training activities, specifically Apprenticeships but also other publicly funded and commercial training offers.
I have writen and developed a range of qualifications or qualification components and learning materials (including text book chapters for international qualifications) for awarding organisations such as BTEC, City and Guilds and OCN. All these materials and qualification components relate to land based and outdoor topics including land based business, deer management, bushcraft, the water environment and similar topics.
I write mostly on the topics of bushcraft, traditional rural living sills, countryside pursuits, environmental education, deer and woodland management. I was a regular contributor to The Countrymans Weekly from 2014 untill its merger with the Shooting Times in 2024 I have also contributed articles to a range of print publications including The Bushcraft and Survival Skills Magazine as well as to the journals of the Institute for Outdoor Learning, The Association of Mountaineering Instructors, The Royal Forestry Society and the National Association of Environmental Education. I originally established the Bushcraft Education blog in 2013 with the intention of sharing ideas of how to use bushcraft as a tool in teaching and education. The blog has proved popular and become a platform for many teaching opportunities. I have also writen guest blogs and pieces for online publishers including for the UK's National Association of Environmental Education and for a range of other online publishers (linked below) on topics such as bushcraft, outdoor recreation, survival skills and other aspects of the outdoors and environment.
Since 2008 I have been advising on deer management including the preparation and execution of deer management plans. I carry out practical deer management and stalking to reduce damage to crops and timber and nationally important nature reserves and conservation areas. I also guide stalking clients.
I joined the River Stewardship Company as manager of 'Riverlution' the organisations community interest project to establish the 'stewardship skills scheme' a training and career enhancement programme to help people make a start in an environmental career, to manage the organisations social impact efforts and programme of community events and volunteer days that we facilitate for commuity groups and businesses. I am also responsible for a range of practical conservation projects and delivery of training to internal staff and external clients. In July of 2022 Riverlution became a Community Interest Company in it's own right and I was responsible for a great deal of the establishment of the new company including policy creation, business planning and budget creation. The stewardship skills scheme was developed from a concept, after a succesfull pilot over the Winter of 2021-22, into a full fledged programme sponsored by local businesses and the River Stewardship Company and in the 2022-23 financial year delivered training, provided work experience and facilitated over 700 hours of environmental voluntary work. To provide the best experience and value for stewardship skills participants I gained accreditation with a number of awarding organisations to deliver formal training and qualifications and thanks to this Riverlution/The River Stewardship Company is now a provider of a range of specialist courses and competency qualifications and of End Point Assessments for apprentices in the 'water environment' and 'landbased' sectors.
November 2021-March 2022; Head of Department Landbased, Foundation Studies and Construction; Bishop Burton College. I was responsible for the management of a large department and team across a range of subject areas which included the development of new courses including t-levels, project managing resource development and improvements and contributing to cross college initiatives (particularly on sustainability issues). July 2019 - Sep 2021 Section Manager Landbased and Environmental Industries; SMB College Group I managed the Landbased and Environmental Industries section of the colleges further education provision and was responsible for work based and full-time vocational courses in a diverse range of subjects including agriculture, countryside management, forestry, arboriculture, horticulture and floristry. I was responsible for all aspects of departmental management including quality assurance, budgets, curriculum planning and leadership. I managed a team of full and part time lecturers and assessors and also supervised the writing of a new degree programme and a project establishing a sylvo-pastoral agroforestry enterprise on the college farm. Sep 2018 - Jul 2019 Manager; Game and Countryside Management; Hartpury College The game and countryside subject area at Hartpury College underwent a phase of significant enhancement and expansion under my management and I was responsible for the management of a range of gamekeeping and countryside management resources, including a new deer larder. I also managed the colleges small game shoot and am responsible for the physical resources, day to day operation of the shoot and it's budget. I also led on the development of new courses and provision related to game, wildlife and countryside management and played a key role in recruiting new students and publicising/ marketing the courses.