Newcastle legal specialists give the green light to blue light team

A new leadership consultancy is using key skills and experiences gained from more than 50 years of policing to help businesses and organisations “adapt and evolve”.

Mark Pannone and Zoe Billings have formed the Adapt and Evolve Consultancy. The pair met while Mark was an assistant chief constable for North Yorkshire Police and Zoe was his staff officer.

Now, despite the company having only recently taken its first steps in the world of consultancy and leadership training, it has already gained a number of national clients who value its unique approach to training. Phil King from Irwin Mitchell’s Newcastle based Serious Injury Team embraced the pair to carry out wellbeing training.

Phil said: “We’ve asked Mark and Zoe to look at how biological well-being can be supported and how to improve dynamics within our teams. Our team works across the UK assisting clients and their families who are victims to road traffic collisions, some sadly resulting in fatalities.

“Mark and Zoe have first-hand experience of the traumas and emotions we face on a day-to-day basis and so they can not only prepare the right training for us, but they can relate to our lives and show empathy because they too have been in those tragic situations”

Mark who lives in North Cumbria, served with Essex Police, Cumbria Police and latterly with North Yorkshire Police as an assistant chief constable while Zoe from York is still a serving officer. Both realised that they had a passion for “training, engagement and community focused work, with helping people being at the core of their shared values”.

Mark said: “I really enjoy the management of complex situations having been involved in many major incidents throughout my career. It’s very satisfying to be able to make sense out of chaos.

“Zoe and I can help individuals and organisations gain the confidence they need to make tough business choices and help people understand how to make defensible decisions through effective problem solving.

Zoe added: “I use my background as a biologist to challenge thinking on how we perform and how we need to adapt, and balance this with my experience in the workplace as a senior investigator managing road traffic fatalities.

“Everything we do relates to the mind and the body and there is still a stigma about mental health. By looking at the biology of it rather than the psychological side, this reduces any perceived stigma related to chronic stress and really increases engagement.”

By Matthew Neville – Correspondent, Bdaily

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