Emily Campbell
Director of Design Royal Society of Arts
Emily Campbell, born in Liverpool in 1966, has recently joined the RSA as Director of Design to develop its major project, Design & Society. She was previously the British Council Arts Group's first Head of Design & Architecture. For twelve years her critical expertise in design shaped an extensive programme to enhance Britain’s international reputation for creativity; to increase understanding of design in the world at large; and to expand the international perspective of design in the UK.
Emily commissioned the British Pavilion at the Venice Biennales of Architecture from 2002 to 2008; and two of the first major international design exhibitions to tour India and China. Emily has initiated a series of critical debates on design including How Global is Design? at the Victoria & Albert Museum in 2005, My Kind of Town at the Venice Biennale of Architecture in 2006, Has the Silk Road Gone for Good? which she chaired at Asia House in London in March 2007 and most recently, How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling: building homes in the 21st Century at the 2008 Venice Biennale of Architecture.
Emily has a BA in English Literature from Clare College, Cambridge, a Diploma in Clothing Technology from the London College of Fashion and an MFA in Graphic Design from Yale School of Art, which she attended as a Mellon Fellow from 1991-3. She has been a pattern-cutter for the fashion designer Jean Muir, a project manager at the design consultancy Pentagram in London and a graphic designer at Pentagram in New York, where she and partner Michael Bierut created very successful visual identities and campaigns for Brooklyn Academy of Music, Nickelodeon and Princeton University.
Emily has served as a visiting critic at Kingston University and the Royal College of Art; as a jury member for the Design Museum’s Designer of the Year, the RIBA Awards and the Prix Emil Hermes; and as Chair of the RSA Design Directions student award and Grand Designs Product of the Year. Her essay on contemporary London was recently published in the catalogue to Design Cities for the Design Museum and Istanbul Modern. With Shumon Basar and Josh Bolchover, Emily selected the British designers and artists for the 2007 edition of Get it Louder in China.
Alison Benjamin
Editor - Society section The Guardian
Alison Benjamin is editor of the Society section of The Guardian. She started her new job in October 2008. Alison joined The Guardian in 2002 as Society deputy editor and is a well known voice across the public services having written on a wide range of social affairs ranging from social housing and homelessness to asylum seekers and charities. Before joining the paper, Alison edited a journal on corporate social responsibility and wrote for a number of specialist publications covering public services and the voluntary sector. Last year, she edited The Guardian's environment website. In 2008, she co-authored two environmental books A World Without Bees and Keeping Bees and Making Honey.
John-Paul Nunes
Head of Education Projects RIBA
John-Paul Nunes joined the RIBA in January 2004, having worked as translator, researcher, lecturer in higher education institutions, and as manager for professional development training events in education. He has over 14 years’ experience in the processes of teaching and learning and managing projects in education.
As head of education projects at the RIBA he is responsible for the strategic development of funding programmes and benefits for RIBA student and graduate members and for the management of the institute's education awards. These include international awards such as the President's Medals Student Awards and the Annie Spink Award for Excellence in Architectural Education. He also manages the provision of careers information about the professional qualification in architecture to the public and RIBA members, the development of competitions for students and young graduates, and is responsible for the implementation and delivery of communications with student members, including programmes of talks and lectures in Schools of Architecture, and editing e-newsletters and print publications.
He has a BA Hons in English and Portuguese (major), Spanish (minor) with a specialisation in Education (PGCE equivalent), and an MA in English and American Studies from the University of Coimbra, Portugal, and an MPhil in English from King's College London. He is also a trustee of the charity Raw Material Music and Media and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
Neil Crockett
Director of Public Sector Operations
at Cisco UK and Ireland Cisco
Neil leads Cisco’s extensive Public Sector organisation across the UK and Ireland helping central and local government bodies, education and healthcare providers harness their technology to drive more effective public services.
Neil has been with Cisco for ten years in a variety of roles, including Global Account Manager for EDS and Director of the European, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) Solutions Centre, where he was responsible for developing and bringing to market enterprise and managed service solutions with Cisco partners; EMEA Marketing Director for Manufacturing Vertical where he led a virtual team in this sector, and EMEA Director Cisco Capital, Cisco’s customer financing group. For the last two years Neil has been the Managing Director for Cisco Global BT Operations where he led the team to 50% global growth.
Neil has been involved in Cisco’s Connected Urban Development (CUD) initiative, which is a partnership between Cisco and cities around the world to create urban communications infrastructures that demonstrate how network connectivity can reduce carbon emissions in urban environments.
Prior to Cisco Neil was the Global Sales and Marketing Director for Husky Computers, 10-years in Compaq with a variety of Channel roles including National Sales Manager, 5-years in direct sales at Xerox and 3-years at Arthur Anderson where he trained as an accountant.
Mike Perry
Intelligent Buildings Group,
senior member BRE
Mike has had a long engagement with the intelligent building sector, promoting and supporting effective implementation of Intelligent Building technologies to realise the substantial benefits of the connected built environment. He is a senior member of BRE’s intelligent building consultancy group, Chairman of an industry interest group of TAHI, a member of the DAP Forum and formerly Deputy Chairman of the Intelligent Building Group.
