This week’s Yorkshire appointments

Regional law firm Andrew Jackson announced the appointment of senior solicitor Erika Sinclair.

With over 15 years’ legal experience, Erika, who moves from the York office of Lupton Fawcett Denison Till, has forged a strong reputation for advising on a complete range of private client matters including inheritance tax and lifetime estate planning, the preparation of wills and Powers of Attorney.

A full member of STEP, Erika deals with administering trusts and deceased estates of all sizes and complexities.

Erika’s appointment signals further expansion for Andrew Jackson in the York market and follows the recent announcement that Philip Ashworth, one of Yorkshire’s leading corporate lawyers, has joined the firm as a partner from Bond Dickinson. Prior to that, he ran his own firm Philip Ashworth & Co in York before its merger with Dickinson Dees in 2007.

Partner Richard Hoare, head of private client services at Andrew Jackson, said: “Erika has built a strong reputation for private client work and her depth of legal knowledge in this area is further strengthened by her STEP qualification, which is recognised within the industry as the benchmark qualification for those working within this field. Full STEP membership is a hallmark of quality for any private client practitioners.

“Our private client practice has grown in recent years and Erika will play a key role in helping us to continue to deliver the high levels of client service which we aim for across the firm.”

Tony Strong, Parseq

Rotherham-headquartered Parseq, a provider of multi-channel business services, has appointed Tony Strong to lead its management team.

Tony joins from Communisis where he doubled turnover over the last five years in his role as group operations managing director responsible for 2,000 staff and 14 locations across the UK.

Before Communisis Tony held a number of senior executive positions including UK regional manager at Cargill, a global grain and oil seed producer and general manager for the UK operation at Lubrizol, a US-based chemical manufacturer with a turnover of $350m across three sites in the UK.

David Carman, Parseq chairman, said: “Tony is used to working in multi-disciplined, highly regulated environments, he understands our clients’ businesses and has a great affinity with the people on the shop floor because that is where he started his career.

“We are delighted to welcome Tony to the Board of Parseq and look forward to working with him as he supports our divisional managing directors to build our client relationships. His total focus will be to put us in a different and differentiated league to our competitors.”

Tony Strong, Chief Executive Officer, added: “I plan to focus on three key areas to achieve our ambitions: attracting and retaining the best talent, profitable growth and operational excellence.

“Parseq has already invested a significant sum in the last six months improving the support we provide to our people through development opportunities, including Lean and Six Sigma qualifications. We have unveiled a new brand which categorises and measures all of our employees performance by linking their job roles to the service they provide for our clients which are to:

“Acquire new customers for our clients, Retain existing customers for our clients or Improve internal client processes.”

Deloitte, Richard Bolton, Matt Clarke, Darren Hattersley, Joanna Herschell-Smith and Gavin Quantock

Deloitte, the business advisory firm, has promoted five of its senior staff in Yorkshire to director.

Richard Bolton, Matt Clarke, Darren Hattersley, Joanna Herschell-Smith and Gavin Quantock are all based in the firm’s Leeds office.

Richard Bolton becomes a director in the corporate tax team. He leads Deloitte’s transfer pricing team in the region and has more than 10 years’ experience dealing with transfer pricing and international tax-related matters.

Matt Clarke has 10 years’ experience in financial services and has been promoted to director in the regional financial services tax practice. He provides a range of tax advisory and compliance services to banks, building societies, insurance companies, IFAs and non-standard lenders.

Darren Hattersley, a member of the indirect tax team in Leeds, has been with Deloitte for the past 15 years, having previously worked with HM Revenue & Customs. Darren works with many of the region’s largest businesses and specialises in the consumer business and manufacturing sectors.

Joanna Herschell-Smith is a director in the Leeds-based Corporate Audit team, covering Yorkshire and the North East. She is currently focusing on supporting the partners in developing relationships with strategic targets in the North and leads Deloitte’s tendering activity on regional audit bids.

The fifth new director, Gavin Quantock, works in corporate finance advisory across Deloitte’s Leeds and London offices. He works largely in the energy and infrastructure sectors.

Martin Jenkins, practice senior partner at Deloitte in Yorkshire, said: “The five promotions are a reflection of the depth of talent we have in the region and of our continued investment in our people. Individually they are great assets to us and our clients, and collectively they will help ensure Deloitte continues to make a significant impact in Yorkshire and beyond.”

Khush Johal, Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking

Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking has appointed Khush Johal as its new Liquidity Associate Director in South Yorkshire to support the growth of small and medium-sized businesses in the region.

Khush will report into area director, Jon Pulford, and will be responsible for providing strategic guidance and bespoke solutions to help businesses with turnovers up to £25m maximise their cash positions and capitalise on growth opportunities in both domestic and international markets.

Working alongside existing Business Development Director, Paul Stevenson, Khush brings a wealth of relationship and transactional experience to the position. Having originally joined Lloyds Bank 20 years ago, he has worked in a variety of roles across both retail and commercial banking.

Jon Pulford, area director for SME Banking in the East Midlands and South Yorkshire, Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking, said: “By putting our clients first we are able to deliver innovative solutions to help them achieve their growth aims. South Yorkshire is seeing strong improvement in business conditions as confidence returns to the UK economy, and Khush is well placed to use his experience to help businesses seek and activate new opportunities for growth.”

Khush added: “There are a wealth of successful businesses based in the region, and I will be working closely with firms to help them reach a sensible balance between investing their cash surpluses and retaining money to manage liquidity.

“At a time when we are increasing our lending to small and medium-sized businesses, I am looking forward to working with the local business community and using my experience to help them achieve their goals.”

Katherine Scarff , BCL Legal

Leeds based BCL Legal, one of the UK’s leading legal recruitment consultancies which also has offices in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool and Bristol, has made a new appointment to its team of consultants.

Katherine Scarff has joined as a consultant in the Leeds office where she will be specialising in residential conveyancing recruitment in the Yorkshire & the North East region. Katherine has joined BCL Legal from Celsius Graduate Recruitment.

Katherine saidt: “BCL Legal has a great reputation in the legal and recruitment sectors so I’m delighted to now be part of the team. Property is an exciting area of the law so I’m looking forward to helping further cement BCL Legal’s presence in the sector.”

James Batt, managing director of BCL Legal, added: “2015 is shaping up to be a very strong year for us with property being particularly buoyant. Katherine’s appointment reflects that demand so her focus is now firmly on working with - and adding value to - our clients and candidates across Yorkshire & the North East.”

Darren Findlay, Investec Wealth & Investment

Investec Wealth & Investment has promoted Darren Findlay from Associate Director, Financial Planning to Financial Planning Director at its Sheffield office, based on Napier Street.

Over the past nine years at the company, Darren has developed in his role and now as Financial Planning Director will be responsible for advising local, regional and national clients on financial planning matters, such as pensions and inheritance tax.

Tom Street, Director in charge of the Sheffield office of Investec Wealth & Investment, said: “Darren’s promotion reflects his expertise and dedication to our financial planning department. Financial planning is a very important service we offer to clients, helping them to prepare for their retirement and safeguard their investments for the future.

“In his new role, Darren will be given greater responsibility to lead our financial planning department and further enhance our services to clients.”

Sarah Weatherall, Raleys Solicitors

Barnsley law firm Raleys Solicitors has strengthened its team with the appointment of Sarah Weatherall as its new conveyancing specialist.

With more than a decade of experience, Sarah has joined the Regent Street-based firm to head up the department handling all conveyancing matters - from re-mortgaging, house moves and new build homes through to shared ownership, leasehold and unregistered properties.

Sarah began her career within a high street law firm in Huddersfield, where she worked and trained before qualifying with the Council for Licensed Conveyancers (CLC) in 2011. She then led a team at another large firm in Wakefield, dealing with London-based clients and large volumes of residential and commercial conveyancing, before joining Raleys.

Carol Gill, managing partner of Raleys, said: “Sarah just typifies the Raleys approach – listening to the client’s needs and offering practical, no-nonsense help and advice,” she said. “I’m thrilled that Sarah will be here to help us as we continue to develop and grow our team and expand into new areas.”

Lloyd Buckley, Vital Telecommunications

Vital Telecommunications has appointed a business development manager to drive forward the company’s growth as it look to increase its market share across the Yorkshire region.

Lloyd Buckley has worked in the telecoms sector for the past eight years specialising in fixed-line services, broadband, hosted, cloud, text, data, mobile and smarter number solutions to B2B customers.

Lloyd’s appointment sees him move across the Pennines from Alderley Edge, in Cheshire, to Burton Leonard.

Lloyd said: “It’s a really exciting time to be joining Vital as the telecoms market is undergoing a rapid shift towards IP and data network based systems, and I’m looking forward to helping the company become a major player across the region.”

Lee Evans, managing director of Vital Telecommunications, said: “Lloyd brings with him a huge amount of telecoms sales experience so his appointment is a great asset to the Vital team.”

Vital Telecommunications is part of Vital technology Group and is based in Knaresborough.