The title or contractual capacity actually held.
Record
Commercial recovery, operating integration and judgement under consequence.
A selective record showing operating range, completion state and repeatable method. It is not a complete curriculum vitae.
How to read the recordFormal appointment Authority exercised Realised outcome Projection Subsequent context Evidence available
Claims are separated by evidential state.
The decision rights and operating control used in practice.
A result recorded during the mandate or programme.
A forecast or run-forward position, not a completed result.
A later event included for context but not claimed as Steven’s outcome.
Supporting records disclosed selectively during appropriate diligence.
National-scale operating integration
Formal OF5 appointment. COO function exercised.
As a Territorial Army officer, Steven was mobilised into full-time service in a Royal Navy OF5 billet within MOD Head Office, Whitehall. His formal appointment was OF5 Head of Plans, Risk and Integration. With an OF4 Head of Plans reporting to him, the breadth of responsibility developed within six months into the Chief Operating Officer function for an £18.6bn national transformation.
OF5 Head of Plans, Risk & Integration
A full-time Royal Navy OF5 billet within MOD Head Office, undertaken by a mobilised Territorial Army officer. The formal title and functional responsibility are stated separately.
Integrated operating responsibility
Integrated plans, risk and finance; supplier negotiations; TUPE and trade-union matters; land disposals; estate master planning; local-authority negotiations; closures, relocations, mergers and their subsequent integration.
One operating picture
Working with his OF4 Head of Plans, Steven converted 1,200 separate plans into a single physical operating picture approximately one metre wide and three metres long. It exposed dependencies, sequencing and slippage and supported direct accountability across affected organisations.
Post-merger and post-relocation integration
The central task was turning formally combined, closed or relocated organisations into coherent successor entities by integrating people, leadership, processes, assets, suppliers, estates and responsibilities.
Capital and operational risk
The portfolio included approximately £2.1bn of construction activity and a further approximately £2bn of quantified operational risk within the £18.6bn transformation. These are distinct measures and are not aggregated.
£4.33bn cash released
The programme consolidated 1,200 projects into six integrated programmes across 81 formally identified organisations, 54 sites and approximately 23,000 staff and contractors. Cash released was approximately 23% of programme value.
Evidence available: formal appointment and reporting material, programme records and contemporaneous operating documentation can be made available selectively during appropriate diligence.
Commercial turnaround evidence
Operating control restored within 100 days
- Starting condition
- A c.£64m-revenue motor legal-protection business with approximately 80 staff, about £11m of accumulated losses and a c.£3m annual loss.
- Authority exercised
- Steven took operating control. The incumbent CEO remained because his qualifications and regulated authorities were required; the change was to executive control, not the unnecessary loss of useful capability.
- Intervention
- Reset commercial and operating control, including an oversized and expensive sales cost base, while retaining the regulated continuity the business required.
- Realised outcome
- The business moved to positive EBITDA within 100 days.
- Subsequent context
- The wider FirstAssist Group was sold by RSA for £147m approximately 30 months after Steven’s departure. This was a group-level transaction and is not attributed to his intervention. Public transaction reporting →
- Evidence available
- Supporting mandate material and third-party transaction reporting can be supplied during appropriate diligence.
Parent-authorised operating leadership for approximately 90 days
- Starting condition
- A recently relocated bacon-packaging business was forecast to lose approximately £4m, with material-wastage, labour-deployment and leadership problems threatening performance and supply continuity.
- Authority exercised
- A consultancy engagement developed into operating leadership. With parent-company approval, the incumbent CEO and COO were placed on gardening leave so that clear control could be established.
- Intervention
- Steven ran the company for approximately three months, reset operating leadership and labour deployment, and resolved the principal material-wastage problem.
- Projection at handover
- The business moved from a forecast c.£4m loss towards c.£2m projected EBITDA in 90 days—a projected c.£6m improvement. This was a forecast position, not a realised full-year result.
- Subsequent context
- The company’s own history records a subsequent management buyout. That later event is relevant context but is not attributed solely to Steven’s intervention. Company history →
- Evidence available
- Supporting mandate records and the company’s published history can be supplied during appropriate diligence.
Head of Strategic Planning & Economic Research
Spent more than six years leading strategic planning, economic and labour-market research and enterprise-development analysis for a Training and Enterprise Council, alongside work as the senior commercial and analytical backstop to Business Link.
Senior Commercial and Procurement Lead
Undertook senior commercial, procurement and programme-governance responsibilities across high-value, high-risk Defence programmes, including maritime renegotiation, performance controls and nuclear commissioning and decommissioning supply-chain risk.
Operational reform across a 28-nation secure hub
Led an ITIL-based turnaround of a secure IT environment linking 28 NATO nations and UK and US embassies. Reduced staff overheads by 75%, established a six-year outsourcing arrangement and delivered a c.£6m saving against projection.
Chair · NED · Board Adviser
Held Chair, non-executive, audit, risk and board-advisory responsibilities across regulated care, technology, private capital, defence and governance environments, including continuing board-advisory work with NEDonBoard.
Transaction documentation completed across 10 targets
Designed a cyber-security consolidation and AIM pathway. The programme did not proceed before acquisition funding completed. Subsequent review identified insufficient independent vetting, key-person protection and control over a material shareholder and cross-venture dependency; these governance lessons now form part of Steven’s diligence practice.
c.£15m acquisition-capital package agreed
As Chair and Interim Co-CEO, established the governance, safeguarding and acquisition platform for a multi-site care-home strategy. Funding was agreed and diligence completed on three targets. When the same cross-entity dependency failed alongside a serious founder-capacity shock, the acquisition strategy was halted. Agreed capital and completed diligence are not represented as funded acquisitions.
Pan Africa Agric
CEO, principal investor and strategic architect of a separately constituted commercial, asset-backed food-security programme. The platform remains in capital formation; prospective value and operating plans are not represented as completed funding or realised value.
Deployed three-star NATO headquarters
Served full-time within a deployed three-star joint, combined and forward NATO headquarters under sustained hostile fire. Accepted short-notice command of participating Iraqi generals and Regional Command Centres in national homeland-security exercises involving up to approximately 200,000 security, police and intelligence personnel.
13 years President of Courts Martial
Held independent responsibility for evidential scrutiny, procedural fairness, proportionality and legitimate authority under serious personal and institutional consequence.
162 LinkedIn articles and long-form posts
As recorded at 3 July 2026, sustained more than a decade of publication across leadership, governance, transformation, defence, private capital, technology and institutional adaptation, combining original analysis, commentary and selected curated material.
Repeatable operating patternCondition Intervention Outcome
Establish reality
Separate the presenting narrative from the actual condition of cash, earnings, authority, people, risk and execution.
Recover control
Align decision rights, integrate the operating picture, redirect resources and work through capable leaders wherever possible.
Institutionalise progress
Embed decision-grade reporting, capable leadership and an operating model able to continue beyond the intervention.
Experienced by others
Public LinkedIn recommendation
Public LinkedIn recommendation
Public LinkedIn recommendation
Formal military appraisal report
Formal military appraisal report
Written operational commendation
Observed across employers, clients, commanders, board colleagues and peers.
“Steven brings tremendous value to our board… a highly focused executor, who gets straight to the bottom line.”Jean-Philippe Perraud
Public LinkedIn recommendation
“Unflappable… proven leader… wise mentor… high levels of professional integrity… engages stakeholders at all levels.”Rachel Bendle
Public LinkedIn recommendation
“A strategic thinker with the pragmatism to turn strategy into detailed plans.”Fred Church
Public LinkedIn recommendation
“Ability to allow others to fulfil their potential.”Brigadier
Formal military appraisal report
“Very good at inspiring people to deliver.”Lieutenant General
Formal military appraisal report
“Your stepping in… was absolutely imperative… I am convinced the exercise would not have run… had you not been there.”Wing Commander
Written operational commendation
Named endorsements are public recommendations whose authors chose to publish them. Confidential reporting is identified by rank or appointment only. Material claims and extracts are supported by contemporaneous records, formal reports, public recommendations, transaction reporting or other third-party evidence. A dated CV, appropriate source material and referee access can be made available confidentially to verified principals and their professional advisers.