Honorary Fellows 2012
Carol Bagnald
Carol was appointed to the role of HSBC Regional Commercial Director, London in May 2009, with overall responsibility for commercial business across the capital. At the end of September she will celebrate 35 years with HSBC.
As well as her role with HSBC, Carol chairs Celsius – the exclusive top 100 Corporate Club for CEOs/MDs which is part of South London Business, where she held a non-executive director position for over 6 years. Carol is also Vice Chair for West London Business and has recently joined the London Council for the CBI. Carol is also involved in various industry groups - joining the board of the British Fashion Council in 2010, as well as becoming a member of Cosmetic Executive Women, CEW (UK), the leading organisation for women executives working within the cosmetics industry. Carol is also a fellow of the Institute of Directors.
Carol is a keen and committed supporter of Brunel, spearheading the corporate relationship the University has had with HSBC since 2006. Initiatives have included partnering the Brunel/HSBC Annual Lectures held here on campus, and Place West, and supporting the work of the University with the HSBC Education Trust on Made in Brunel.
Carol lives in Hampshire with her teenage son.
Marianne Bevis
Marianne joined Brunel in 1976 first as Personal Assistant to Professor Syd Urry in Building Technology, then to Secretary-General, David Neave. She changed roles to become Assistant Public Relations Officer in 1984, becoming Publications Officer in 1996 and Head of Publications in 2000. She retired in 2011 after more than 35 years’ service.
As Head of Publications, Marianne was responsible for the University’s undergraduate and postgraduate prospectuses, corporate communications, house style and the Brunel website.
Since leaving Brunel, Marianne has forged a new career in tennis writing and photography. She is a member of the Chartered Institute of Journalists and a chief contributor to “The Sport Review” website. She is now accredited to cover major tournaments such as the US Open, Wimbledon and the World Tour Finals.
Marianne attended Chatham Grammar School, then Northern Grammar School in Portsmouth before going on to receive a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature from Goldsmiths, University of London.
Her interests include playing squash in a social league here at Brunel, overseas travel, ballet, opera and visual arts. She is married to Paul, a Borough Road (Brunel) alumnus, and has two daughters.
Denise Bufton
Denise grew up in Guernsey and trained as a teacher in Devon. She then joined the Royal Marines, working as a civilian at the Ministry of Defence. She met her husband while she was with the Royal Marines and after they married they travelled with the Army.
After a career break to bring up her daughter and following her husband’s retirement from the Services, Denise moved to Chalfont St Giles where she resumed her career. She joined Brunel in 2001, initially in charge of timetabling and examinations in Registry, moving into the then Student Affairs office (now Student Services) as Assistant Registrar. She was appointed as Head of Student Services, a post she held for four years until her retirement in 2010.
As Head of Student Services, Denise led a development programme to enhance the student experience. She was the champion of One World Week (now an established annual celebration of the University’s diversity) and played a key role in enhancing registration week activity.
Following her retirement, Denise and her husband purchased properties on the coast in Devon and started a holiday cottage letting business.
Denise is married to Roger and has a daughter, Lucy.
Sue Curley
Sue was born close to the Brunel campus and attended Vyners School in Ickenham. She started work at the University in 1988 in the Chemistry department, before moving to the Brunel Business Partnership within the Research Services Bureau. In 1992, the Business Partnership was given responsibility for Brunel Alumni - at the time there were 9,000 past students on record. In 1995, when Brunel University merged with the West London Institute, Sue’s responsibilities changed and she became the full-time Alumni Officer with 14,000 alumni. By 2002, this number had risen to 55,000. The Development and Alumni Relations Office was established in 2003, with Sue retiring from her post as Head of Alumni Relations in 2011, after more than 22 years’ service at Brunel, and with over 80,000 alumni on the books.
In 1996, Sue trained as an Anglican Lay Chaplain and received the Brunel University licence on a voluntary basis. Sue continues as the Anglican Lay Chaplain here on a part-time basis.
Sue is also a member of the Hillingdon Hospital major incident support team (with which she has been involved since 1987), and continues to run the Carers Circle in the Chaplaincy at Brunel.
Sue is married to Mick and has three grown-up children; Nina, Nicky and Ross.
Professor Stephen A Greyser
Professor Greyser is the Richard P Chapman Professor (Marketing/Communications) Emeritus at Harvard Business School (HBS), where he specialises in brand marketing, corporate communications, advertising, and the business of sports.
A distinguished academic, Professor Greyser is a graduate of Harvard College and HBS, where he has been active in research and teaching since 1958. His publications include 16 books, journal articles, and over 300 HBS case studies. He created Harvard’s Corporate Communications and Business of Sports courses. With Brunel’s John Balmer he co-authored articles on monarchies as corporate brands and co-created the “heritage brands” concept.
Professor Greyser is former Editorial Board chairman of the Harvard Business Review, and past executive director of the Marketing Science Institute. He is an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Advertising. His awards include the Institute for Public Relations “lifetime contributions” award in corporate communications, the AMA’s 2010 Sports Marketing lifetime achievement award, and the Distinguished Graduate Award from Boston Latin School, America’s oldest school. He was national vice chairman of the U.S. public television system.
Professor Greyser has been involved with Brunel since 2007. He is a Visiting Professor of Corporate Communications at Brunel and he also serves on the Business School’s Advisory Board.
John Hall
John Hall receives an Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his significant contribution to the work of the University.
John is Chair of the education group of Eversheds LLP, and for over 20 years has been closely associated with developments in higher and further education law in the UK and internationally. His particular area of expertise is giving strategic advice to education institutions on managing structural change, and providing guidance on their international activity. Eversheds are legal advisors to many HE and FE institutions, and for many years John was client partner for Brunel.
John is a member of the international advisory board of the Center for Excellence in Higher Education Law and Policy at Florida’s Stetson University College of Law; an honorary member of the Royal College of Music; a board member of the national federation of UK academies, E-ACT; Chair of two academy schools in West London; a governor of an independent boys’ preparatory school in Hertfordshire; a trustee and warden of his local church in Hadley Wood in North London; and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
John read law at Wadham College, Oxford. He has had many articles published and is general editor and principal author of ‘Purposive Governance’, a publication for further education colleges. He is the only UK education lawyer accorded leading lawyer "star" status in Chambers Directory to the UK Legal Profession.
Peter Hall
Peter Hall receives an Honorary Fellowship in recognition of his significant contribution to the work of the University.
After graduating from Bristol with a degree in Chemistry, Peter studied Management Studies at Brunel and has two MSc degrees from the Open University. By profession he is a policy evaluation expert with a background in accountancy. Peter has 25 years’ experience of managing organisational change and development, especially in the water and environment sector, mainly on projects for the European Commission and the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development. He has travelled extensively, working in Europe, India, Malaysia and the US.
Peter joined the London Livery Company the Worshipful Company of Water Conservators in 1999. He was elected to the management board and appointed Trustee to its charity, the Water Conservation Trust. He has led the development of relationships with universities in the Company’s key task areas, water and environment, and the Trust now has eleven postgraduate bursary programmes in nine universities. Since 2008, two bursaries have been offered to Brunel students on MSc programmes in the Institute for the Environment, and strong links with Brunel led to a joint lecture in 2010.
Peter is Honorary Secretary for the Thames Valley Branch of CIMA and Treasurer of Reading Coin Club due to his interest in Roman coinage. He is married, with two married sons.
Robert Lougee
Robert Lougee was co-opted onto the University’s Audit Committee in 2002 before joining Council as a member in 2004. In 2006, he was asked to chair the newly formed Health and Safety Assurance Committee established to monitor the University’s Health and Safety Committee on behalf of Council. Robert retired from Council at the conclusion of his term of office in 2011.
Robert qualified as a chartered accountant with Deloitte Haskins and Sells in 1975. He joined the Dalgety Spillers Group in 1980 and after managing the UK’s Internal Audit and Systems Department, was appointed Financial Director of the group’s chemical distribution trading company, K&K-Greeff Ltd. Company takeovers followed and Robert worked for Beijer Industries and subsequently Univar Inc, the largest North American chemical distribution operation. Robert was Director of Finance of Univar Europe, as well as Finance and Operations Director of Univar plc, the UK business. His role included responsibility for finance, IT, HR and Health and Safety.
In 1995, Univar Inc was acquired by the Royal Pakhoed Group and in 1997, a merger with Royal Van Ommeren took place, creating Vopak. After more than 20 years in the business serving in finance and health and safety roles, Robert left Vopak at the end of 2001.
Robert is currently Bursar at Salesian College in Farnborough.
John Thirkettle
After National Service in the RAF, John joined the family photographic equipment manufacturing businesses as an apprentice, working his way up to General Manager. He then worked for companies including Zeiss and Brother in technical sales, organisation, administration and senior management positions before joining Leeds Photovisual where he held a number of directorships within the group. He fully retired in 2000.
John is involved with a large number of voluntary/community activities and associations. He is Vice-Chairman of the Hillingdon Federation of Community Associations and of the Uxbridge Old Peoples’ Association. He is a committee member of the Hillingdon Youth & Community Safety Association.
He is also a member of the Hillingdon Community and Police Consultative Group, a former Chairman of the Hillingdon Crime Prevention Panel and a member of the Cavendish Ward Police Panel. He has been a Neighbourhood Watch co-ordinator since 1986.
In 2006, John encouraged Brunel’s Sports Centre to set up a physical activity programme for the over 50’s and in 2008 set up a sports/activity children’s programme here.
John is a keen social and competitive table tennis player. He is married with two daughters.
Bob Westaway
After attending school in East London, Bob obtained a BSc in Psychology from Hull in 1975. He became President of the Students’ Union at Hull, before joining British Rail in 1978 as a Traffic Management Trainee, then as Traffic Assistant and subsequently Station Supervisor in a busy London terminal station. During this time he also obtained an MSc in Industrial Psychology.
A change of career followed when Bob became Assistant Registrar at Imperial College of Science and Technology, with responsibility for the Student Records Office. In 1991, Bob moved to become Senior Assistant Registrar at Queen Mary and Westfield College.
September 1997 saw Bob join Brunel as Senior Assistant Registrar. He became Acting Head of Registry in October 2002 and Head of Registry in March 2003. Late in 2005, Bob moved to Goldsmiths, University of London, as Academic Registrar and then to Imperial in 2008. Bob returned to Brunel in June 2009 and was Interim Academic Registrar for two years, before leaving Brunel in July 2011. Bob is now working in Higher Education as a freelance consultant, and following a period of shorter-term projects, has been Interim Academic Registrar at Kingston University since March 2012.
Bob completed an MA in Shakespeare and Theatre from the University of Birmingham in 2008.
