Simon Jackson – Group MD
Simon joined Direct Valuations and Shepherd in 2007 as Managing Director. Simon has a wealth of expertise and experience gained in over 20 years working in the financial services and operations arena. His initial career was in branch banking with Midland Bank, subsequently moving to HSBC to run its Card Services operation.

Simon joined Egg in 1998 where he initially ran the call centre and moved to run the back office operation. In 2004 Simon was appointed Chief Operating Officer for the retail division of Aon responsible for global corporate clients and there rolled out a massive operational improvement and cultural change programme

In addition Simon was appointed MD of moneyQuest in July 2008.

In his spare time, Simon enjoys spending time with his children, ferrying them around to various football events. He relaxes watching Rugby and the odd pint!

 

Paul Gratton – Director
Paul joined Midland Bank in 1978 and undertook a full range of branch and area management roles, in 1989 joined the team that designed and launched First Direct where he was Financial Services Director. In 1996 he joined Prudential to work on building a direct financial services business. The result was Egg which Paul led as CEO until 2006 when he left to develop his own portfolio of businesses in a mix of executive and non executive roles.

Direct Valuations was the first of those businesses which he founded with Chris Hickling in 1989 and was the UK’s first valuation panel manager.

 

George Brewster – Director
George Brewster, Director, qualified as a Chartered Surveyor in 1983 and joined the partnership of J & E Shepherd that same year. George has gained a considerable knowledge and expertise during his many years practising as a chartered surveyor and he has worked all over the country particularly in Tayside, Aberdeen and Dumfries but now considers his home to be Edinburgh.

He became a partner at J & E in 1990. In 2002 George was responsible for cementing and building the relationship between the J & E S Partnership and Direct Valuations with the extension of the traditional core valuation business into England and Wales. In 2007 George was appointed as Senior Partner. His wealth of experience gained over 25 years adds an additional layer of strength and expertise to the Board.

In his spare time, George enjoys driving and taking part in motorsports, he also manages to fit in the odd game of golf and football match when time allows. He sometimes enjoys the occasional cigar and glass or two of fine wine.

 

Ian J Fergusson – Director
Ian, Board Director and Managing Partner, BSc MRICS, joined J & E Shepherd in 1994. Ian has a vast knowledge and experience of the property market acquired over twenty years in the sector. During the past few years Ian has been directly responsible for overseeing the expansion of Shepherd Surveyors England and Wales since its inception in 2002. More recently Ian has been actively involved in the expansion of the professional services business by opening new offices in Mayfair, London & St Hellier, Jersey.

A main Board Director of Shepherd Direct Ltd, Ian has also been involved in the management and shaping of the co-branded businesses including Direct Valuations and Shepherd. In addition Ian has been directly involved in “delivering the business solution” by embracing new and improved IT systems to improve customer service.

Prior to joining J & E Shepherd, Ian worked in his family business, the successful Fergusson Group (Coal Merchants) and then decided to pursue a career in property by commencing a degree in Land Economics.

In his spare time, Ian’s interests include a round or two games of golf, travelling and, in particular, snow skiing.

Mark Philpott
Mark joined Shepherd Direct in September 2008 as Business Development Director. Working with the existing relationship management team he is building new connections across the building society and banking sectors as well as with mortgage intermediaries and brokers. Since leaving University where Mark completed a BA (Hons) degree in Accounting & Finance, he has been involved with the property and lending industry.

Prior to joining Shepherds Direct, Mark worked for the Nottingham Building Society, which he joined in 1989 to set up and run their estate agency subsidiary. Mark spent 18 years at The Nottingham and was predominantly involved with managing its branch operations, which involved mortgages, savings, property sales, conveyancing, financial service and insurance sales.

Outside work, Mark plays golf at Beeston Fields Golf Club, and enjoys spending valuable time with his family and friends.

 

Claire is responsible for maintaining and developing the relationships we have with several of our lender clients. Claire is also very much involved with meeting new prospective clients and introducing them to our operation based in Nottingham. Claire is extremely knowledgeable of the panel management and surveying industry and is happy to advise and help whenever she can.

Prior to being one of our senior relationship managers Claire was the operations manager and so fully understands the booking and delivery of valuation reports and making sure the SLA’s we have in place with our clients are met. When Claire originally joined the business she was an adviser who had daily contact with homeowners who were having their properties valued and surveyors who were carrying out the work and so fully understands the need for a quick turn around of reports be they a valuation for a house purchase or remortgage.

Outside work Claire is a sun worshiper who enjoys travelling and taking holidays.

 

Giles Smith - Chief Surveyor for England & Wales
Amersham-born Giles Smith is Chief Surveyor at Shepherd Chartered Surveyors, based in the Victoria Street, Central London office.

After leaving school, Giles qualified as a Chartered Building Surveyor in 1989 via the external examination route. Starting out in private practice, he gained extensive experience of the residential property markets across the South of England, working in locations as diverse as London, the Home Counties and North Devon, before changing focus to work as a staff surveyor for C&G/Lloyds, where he spent over a decade gaining valuable professional management experience and insight into the workings of a large financial institution.

Giles joined Shepherd Chartered Surveyors in 2007 and is now Chief Surveyor for England and Wales, with multi-disciplinary responsibility and a specialism in residential surveying.

A resident of High Wycombe, Bucks, Giles enjoys time with his wife, family and friends, is interested in sports (still playing badminton), history, the environment and enjoys foreign travel and good food.....especially where these are to be found in combination with nature, peace and quiet.

Mark Francis - Shepherd Prime
Mark joined Shepherd Surveyors in 2003 as Area Surveyor for North West London and was promoted to Regional Surveyor for the London area in 2004. Mark has been a practicing Chartered Surveyor for nearly 20 years, mainly in the London area. In 2008, Shepherd Prime, a bespoke division of the company, was set up to concentrate and provide specialist advice on high value properties in prime parts of London. Mark was appointed to head up this division and he currently leads a small and hard working team of 3 and is based in our West End office.

Mark read Urban Estate Surveying at Trent Polytechnic (now called Nottingham Trent University). Having obtained his degree, Mark headed south to the smoke and worked for a large West London and Buckinghamshire based multi-disciplinary chartered surveying practice. Having qualified in 1990, Mark decided that he wanted to specialise in residential surveying. He worked through the heady days of the late 1980s and then the last recession in the early 1990s in the London area for specialist residential surveying practices. In the mid-1990s, Mark opted for a change and became a Staff Surveyor for Cheltenham & Gloucester for the North West London area, near where he lived.

Outside work, Mark is married with a young, growing family and spends weekends ferrying his boys around to parties, football, rugby and cricket matches and helping them with homework! He enjoys (mainly watching) sport, holidays and generally relaxing after busy working weeks.

Cathy Staley
Cathy Staley, joined Direct Valuations in 1989 and is currently Head of Compliance. Since joining the business the Group has grown substantially and Cathy’s wealth of experience and expertise of start ups has proved to be a significant factor in the ongoing success of the business. One of the key projects has been her role in helping to set up Shepherd Chartered Surveyors when they became part of the Group in 2002.. Cathy currently has responsibility for all the statutory financial requirements of the Group which include compliance, tax and audit.

With a 2.1 degree in Geography at Sheffield University, Cathy then trained as a chartered accountant at a large independant firm of accountants in Leeds. After gaining first time passes in 1993, Cathy worked for PWC in Manchester, subsequently returning to her first practice to specialise in tax and start up ventures.

In her spare time Cathy enjoy’s heavy duty sporting challenges and has taken part in a 26 mile walk (commencing at midnight!) and also completed in and finished the Great North Run, both of which were for charity.

 

Joe Miller
Joe, Shepherd Direct Head of Operations, joined Direct Valuations in the Summer of 2007 after consulting into the business as the Operations Manager. Joe thrives within a change environment and has quickly imposed his mark on the organisation working closely with the businesses, people, processes and systems to drive out superior results across the operation. His appointment as Head of Operations of Shepherd Direct will now see Joe's experience impact on a larger scale working with all areas of the organisation and the group. He has been heavily involved in the improvement of business service and profitability as well as building great relationships with the field of Surveyors.

Prior to joining the Company, Joe gained a good knowledge and understanding of the financial services sector from his time working firstly at Egg Banking Plc where he was involved in all aspects of operational training and subsequently moving from Egg to Gasbox Ltd where Joe was responsible for the implementation and organisation of the Customer Service Consultancy, working closely with a number of key financial services clients.

In his spare time Joe takes every opportunity to watch Derby County, and loves to spend his weekends sampling local restaurants with his Fiancée.

Michele Southern
Michele joined Direct Valuations in June 2006 and is responsible primarily for managing the company's business operation and plays a pivotal role in developing and implementing major business change initiatives across the entire business. In addition her role requires her to build and maintain excellent working relationships with the Company's panel surveyors. Michele constantly strives to achieve superior business results and uses the experience she has gained from her previous roles.

Prior to joining DV, Michele was with a major UK PLC company for a number of years, Boots Healthcare International, where Michele gained a wealth of knowledge and expertise in relationship management skills from her experience working within Consumer Relations, Payroll and Pension Management and International Warehousing and Export.

Michele in her spare time likes nothing better than going to music concerts and events.

Laura Hill
Laura, Operations Manager joined Shepherd Chartered Surveyors at the start of 2007 and has played a pivotal role in the successful running of the business on a day to day basis but has played a significant role in developing and implementing many of the company's change initiatives. Laura's considerable experience has been gained from her previous roles within the Financial Services Sector where she undertook various leadership roles.

Prior to joining Shepherd Chartered Laura was at Egg Banking Plc and of the many leadership roles she had there one of the key contributions was her responsibility in Managing the company's Nationwide Community Policy.

Laura's real passion is food and when spare time permits, Laura will use the opportunity to enjoy good restaurants or host a dinner party, where she uses the opportunity to try out new recipes.

 

Paul Sandhu
Paul, Head of IT Operations, joined Direct Valuations in 1996 and part of his role was the immediate implementation to initiate the Microsoft Windows domain environment and bring the company forward with its systems and IT. Key projects have included data interfaces with financial corporations, deploying the IT infrastructure for a number of affiliated companies, including Mortgage Force Ltd, Gasbox Ltd and the contact centre for Kaupthing Edge (on-line bank), plus bespoke application production and managing outsourced resources. Providing the group with high quality support services has been an on going focus, with accreditations in ITIL and two MCSEs.

Prior to joining DV, Paul gained an enormous degree of knowledge and expertise of the property and financial sectors over nearly 20 years whilst working with Information Systems and technical projects, predominantly in the property and financial sector. An initial period with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers working on a technical projects and IT systems across 3 main MOD sites.

In his spare time, Paul likes to steer away from the traditional sun, sea and sand holiday and opts for exciting and interesting holidays, such as cyling, walking and camping. Other key activities include football, cricket and mountain biking.