35 Years of award winning media

PR, Communications, & Brand Strategies
Media, Comms & Event HostingLeadership,Coaching & Change Management

ABOUT ME

Media & Management Consultancy

  • Brand Strategy & PR
  • Reputational/Crisis Management
  • Media & Communications
  • Event Hosting & Moderating 
  • Leadership & management training
  • Executive coaching & mentoring
  • Media Training
  • Journalism and Ethics Training

Award-winning National and Regional Editor with 35 years’ experience leading and managing National, Regional, Sunday, Daily and Weekly newspaper and magazine titles across the UK, including The Herald; Herald on Sunday; The Sunday Post; My Weekly, The People’s Friend, The Glasgow Evening Times; and The Aberdeen Evening Express

MEDIA

Skills & Experience

Media consultant with excellent contacts, particularly across press, politics and business.

Major clients include leading businesses in travel, hospitality, construction, sport and training plus individuals in entertainment, politics and media.

Management of major media & publishing businesses (including Newsquest Scotland; DC Thomson; Northcliffe, Iliffe, & CN Group) with responsibility for the brand; editorial strategy; business transformation; external communications, engagement & relationships.

Editor-in-Chief of Newsquest Scotland from 2017 to August 2022 and Editor of The Herald and the Evening Times and Launch Editor of the Herald on Sunday. The multi-media portfolio included The Greenock Telegraph, 21 titles in Central Scotland and the Impartial Reporter in Northern Ireland.

Head of Publishing from 2015 for DC Thomson’s magazines including The People’s Friend, My Weekly and the Scots Mag. Key role as part of the executive management team to modernise working practices and create a portfolio of new launch products.

Editor-in-Chief Newspapers DC Thomson. Editor of The Sunday Post and The Weekly News from 2010. Appointed Editor-in-Chief of DC Thomson Newspapers Group in 2011.  Key role to refresh The Sunday Post, an iconic legacy brand, make it competitive and relevant in a changing marketplace and create a sustainable long-term future.

Editor-in-Chief Herald & Times Group 2008 -2010 and Editor of The Herald. Key role to restructure the business, including integrating The Herald, Herald on Sunday, and Evening Times as a joint 7-day digitally-focused operation.

Additional and previous media roles included:

EDITOR: Evening Times; EDITOR: Evening Express (Aberdeen Journals Ltd);

EDITOR & DIRECTOR: North West Evening Mail (CN Group); DEPUTY EDITOR: Cambridge Evening News; PRODUCTION EDITOR: Reading Evening Post. 

GROUP EDITOR: Thames Valley Free Newspapers.

LAUNCH EDITOR: Edinburgh and Lothians Post – aged 24.

35 Years on the front page

BranD, PR & Communication

Reputational brand management and communication skills

Frontline experience of managing brand reputation in the face of a hostile media, the scrutiny of politicians, and key business clients during numerous sensitive periods of business restructuring and digital transformation.

Leading iconic and treasured brands such as The Herald and the Sunday Post through seismic change required carefully planned communications and engagement, both internally and externally, to ensure successful delivery and positive PR.

More than three decades of experience as a public facing barometer of societal moods and trends; morality and ethics. Intuitive understanding of public opinion, key issues and importance of brand values and media management.

Brand ambassador/host: Regularly participate in events, conferences, debates, and award ceremonies, including: the Scottish Politician of the Year Awards; NY Times Cop26 debates; UK Society of Editors conferences; The Athens Democracy Forum; Future News Worldwide; and two years as host of the Go Radio Business Show with Sir Tom Hunter and Lord Willie Haughey.

Comfortable in front of camera, on radio and on stage and able to tailor brand messages and delivery for different audiences.

  • Made the strategic brand decisions to allow the BBC to film A Century of Scottish Sundays: 100 years of the Sunday Post in 2014 and recently The Papers where cameras were given unrestricted access to The Herald editorial for six months. We used the opportunity of free brand marketing to change reader perceptions, provide insight and understanding, and increase customer loyalty and engagement.

SKILLS & EXPERIENCE

Regulatory compliance & ethics

Regular speaker on ethics, fake news and journalism and recently took part in the Athens Democracy Forum debating Truth & Democracy, including award-winning Ukrainian journalists.

Deliver an entertaining interactive media ethics session for aspiring journalists attending Future News Worldwide as well as behind the headlines talks for businesses.

Extensive practical experience of overseeing legal and regulatory compliance and governance. Former Scottish media representative on the Independent Press Standards Organisation’s Code Committee and former member of the Press Complaints Commission’s adjudication panel.

Coaching & Mentoring 

Leadership & People Skills

Including internal team building, coaching, mentoring, and influencing during periods of seismic and difficult changes. I am a CMI coach and have guided numerous dynamic management teams and executives – and take enormous pride in the fact many have become editors, MDs, or publishers.

At times of business transformation and tough conversations, it is important the leadership team have the skills and understanding to both deliver key messages in the right manner and have the resilience and coping mechanism to handle the impact of being the face of that upheaval and disruption.

Values

  • Trusted & confidential
  • Respected
  • Fair and balanced
  • Measured and considered
  • Empathy and understanding

I have built a career and strong contacts book on the back of my own personal key values; never breaking a confidence and being prepared to listen to all sides before acting in a measured, fair and proportionate manner. It chimes with my commitment to a free press regulated by IPSO and my industry work on journalism standards and ethics.

Change Management

Successfully led businesses, iconic national brands and individuals through change management and culture shifts: restructuring staffing, systems, and processes to drive efficiencies, implement modern best practice and future proof the businesses.

  • The newspaper industry has faced the enormous challenges of managing the decline of its traditional commercial markets whilst trying to create and build opportunities for growth in a highly competitive digital landscape. I have been at the eye of the storm for several decades, delivering change and success.

Board Positions

Longest serving board member of the UK Society of Editors, the organisation representing the media industry, and until recently a board member of the National Council for the Training of Journalists. Previously UK & Scottish President of the Society of Editors and Chair of the Scottish Daily Newspapers.

On Advisory Board of Future News Worldwide, an organisation promoting quality journalism and standards.

Former Scottish media representative on the Independent Press Standards Organisation’s Code Committee and former member of the Press Complaints Commission’s adjudication panel.

Get In Touch

T. 07711 451330
info@dmmediaconsultancy.co.uk