Our trustees

The Council of Management consists of up to 16 members elected by the membership or co-opted by the Council.

Mind is governed by a board of trustees, known as the Council of Management, made up of 16 people drawn from Mind's membership and our network of local Minds.

Because Mind speaks for a diverse community, we aim to have that diversity reflected in the Council of Management's membership, half of whom must have direct experience of mental distress.

The Council takes a strategic overview of Mind's activities and the most important role of trustees is to ensure that the organisation is acting at all times in pursuit of its mission and setting the strategy. 

Members have terms of office lasting three years. They are eligible to stand for a maximum of three terms (nine years in total).

Biographies

Ryan Campbell - Chair

Ryan became Chair in December 2012. He has been a trustee of Mind for six years, including Vice Chair for Networks and Communities.

He has worked in the voluntary sector for 18 years, with much of this time spent in local organisations delivering services to vulnerable people, and alongside service users, families and carers, campaigning for their rights and dignity.  As a previous Chief Executive of a local Age Concern, followed by a role which fostered service development across Age Concern nationally, he has a background in the complexity and vibrancy of organisations which have both a national and local dimension.  He is currently working with The Rehabilitation for Addicted Prisoners Trust, which is the largest provider of drug and alcohol treatment in prisons. 

Ryan is a specialist in public services business strategy in health, social care and social welfare fields, with a particular interest in how these systems integrate with the communities of peer and family support which are usually more vital to most people in their recovery. 

Ryan has personal experience of both mental health issues and addiction; experience of the problems that come about with episodes of mental ill health, and also the benefits and enrichment that can come about from recovery.

Alison Cowan - Vice Chair and Chair of External Relations Committee

Alison became a Trustee at Mind hoping to use her personal experience to make a difference for others. She has been a campaigner on mental health issues since 2000 when she took part in the award-winning BBC documentary Black Dog. In 2001 she was an ambassador and consultant to the Department of Health Mind out for mental health anti-stigma campaign. Alison has appeared on TV and radio to raise awareness of depression and campaign against stigma and discrimination especially in the workplace. In 2007 she helped launch the Time to Change campaign on Radio 4's Today programme.

Alison has worked in marketing for 20 years and is Director of External Relations and Communities at the learning disability charity Mencap.

Alison is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, the Institute of Fundraising and the Network of Women Chairs. She is a humanist and supports Ipswich Town Football Club.

Mike Starkie – Trustee and Honorary Treasurer and Chair of Business Management Committee

Mike has a MA Cambridge University in philosophy and political and social sciences, qualified FCA with Price Waterhouse. Mike had a career with BP until 2009, as chief accountant, chairman of the CBI Financial Reporting Panel since 2006 to 2009, member of the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group since 2005 to 2009, member of the University of Cambridge Audit Committee since 2007. Previous voluntary sector experience includes - governor of a special needs school (Richard Cloudesley), trustee of the London Library, adviser to Compassion in World Farming.

Lesley Dixon - Vice Chair and Chair of Networks and Communities Committee

Lesley has been a trustee of Mind since December 2008 and Vice Chair since December 2012. Lesley chairs the Networks and Communities Committee and previously sat on the Business Management and Audit Committees. She is also a member of Mind’s governance working group.

Lesley’s first involvement in mental health charities was with Our Celebration, a mental health charity based in York that has now merged with York Mind.

Lesley is the Chief Executive of PSS. PSS is a social enterprise that works across the UK. It has one key purpose: to help people get the most from life, whether this is at home, in their families, in their health and well-being or within their wider support network. As an organisation it developed some of the best known names in community support including Age Concern, the Citizen's Advice Bureau and Legal Aid.

Lesley is a Chartered Manager, a fellow of the Chartered Management Institute and has an honorary doctorate from the University of Leeds.

Stephen Young - Trustee and Networks and Communities Committee member

Stephen Young - Trustee and Networks Committee member, and Chair of the LMA Fund.

Stephen is a Learning and Development Consultant with a varied portfolio of work across the health, social care and voluntary sector.  A nurse by profession, Stephen has worked mainly in the field of mental health as a senior manager and a clinician with extensive experience of project management, working with both local communities and statutory organisations in innovative and creative ways.  He is also Chair of Social Adventures Ltd which is a Social Enterprise delivering public health outcomes in some of Salford’s most deprived communities.

He is a Registered Mental Nurse (RMN), a Registered General Nurse (RGN) and holds a PhD and MSC by Action Learning and Research. 

He has a passion for supporting people to realise their aspirations and dreams.

Sir Paul Britton – Trustee and External Relations Committee member

Paul took partial retirement from the Civil Service in 2009, where he was Director General for Domestic Policy (and Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet) at the Cabinet Office.

Paul has worked in policy development for 38 years. Up to 1997 main his experience was in housing and local government policy, this included 5 years as Director of Local Government Finance Policy at the former DOE. From 1998, apart from a short spell as Director of Town and Country Planning at DETR, Paul worked in the cabinet secretariat. From 2001 he was Head of the Economic and Domestic secretariat, supporting the Prime Minister and Cabinet on the full range of domestic policy. This included organising the cabinets agenda, preparing its papers and briefing the Prime Minister. In addition, from 2005, he was also responsible for the SETF, the office of the Third Sector and the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit. 

He is currently the Appointments Secretary to the Prime Minister.

Melanie Brooks - Trustee and Networks and Communities Committee member

Melanie joined the Council of Management in 2009 and has been involved in local Minds for over 15 years in a variety of roles. Melanie currently runs her own business delivering consultancy and coaching services.

Melanie has had a varied career in Health and Social care and has managed advocacy services, commissioned services for Primary Care Trusts and Councils, has been Chief Executive of a local Mind  and a Mental Health Act Commissioner for the Care Quality Commission. Melanie works to bring about service change for people so everyone can be treated with respect and courtesy, getting services that supports good mental health and allows people to achieve their potential.

Melanie is a Psychology graduate, has an MBA, and post-graduate qualifications in therapy and coaching. Melanie is a mum of two young children and in between parenting and work, is a keen runner and runs regularly for Mind as well as local charities.

Andrea Woodside - Trustee and Networks and Communities Committee Member

Andrea joins the trustee board after serving on Mind's External Relations Committee.  A current member of the Networks Committee, she is also an active media spokesperson for Mind, and has acted as a volunteer consultant on Mind's Taking Care of Business campaign (2010/2011).

After a career spent in the Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) field, Andrea launched her own workplace wellbeing consultancy in January of 2010, Minding Work, which offers employers of all sizes support in reducing stigma and promoting best practice around mental health at work. Recent projects have included the development of ‘resilience through change’ programmes aimed at employees and managers, the assessment of client organisations' mental health policies, and the development of health promotion programmes to promote disclosure in supportive environments.

Andrea is a member of the UK Employee Assistance Programme Professionals Association, the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy Workplace, and the Faculty of Public Health.  She also serves on various governmental panels to help improve workplace health legislation and practice.  Active in the hospice movement since 1993, Andrea volunteers as an end of life care supporter at a London hospice.

Linda Seymour – Trustee and External Relations Committee member

Linda has a broad range of experience in mental health. She was a Non Executive Director of two different NHS mental health trusts in Sussex in the 1990s and the 2000s. She got to know many service users through regular one-to-one visits, attending ward rounds and by chairing patients' appeals against detention. She acquired invaluable knowledge and insight into conditions in mental health units and the stigma and discrimination attached to receiving a mental ill health diagnosis. 

For ten years she worked full-time in mental health research and policy, first at the now dissolved mental health charity - mentality (2002 - 2006) and latterly at the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health (2006 - 2010).  Her particular areas of interest and expertise include promotion of mental health and wellbeing for those who use services as well as for whole populations; work and mental health; offender health and mental health; and the links between physical and mental health. 

In 2010 she took voluntary redundancy from the Sainsbury Centre and decided to retire. Alongside her role as a Mind trustee she is also a Non Executive Director of the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE); and a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Public Mental Health.

Sarah Rae - Trustee and External Relations Committee member

Sarah Rae joined Mind's Council of Management in November 2011. After a negative experience of acute care in 2005 Sarah became determined to have some influence in the decision making process in her local Trust. She trained to be an 'Expert by Experience' and since then she has worked for the Cambridge and Peterborough Foundation Trust as a researcher, service user representative and trainer.

In 2011 Sarah was appointed as the Non-Executive Patient and Public (PPI) Advisor to the Cambridge and Peterborough Collaborations for Leadership in Applied Research and Care (CLAHRC) Board, which undertakes high quality applied health and social care research.

Most recently Sarah has become a member of a NICE Topic Expert Group which is currently developing a Quality Standard for Self Harm.

Joanna Bogacz - Trustee and Pwyllgor Cymru Member

Joanna joined the Council of Management in 2012.

Joanna has personal and professional experience of supporting people with mental health problems and takes a holistic approach to her work; her aim is to empower service users to become active stakeholders in their recovery and wellbeing.

Joanna completed her postgraduate training to become a Solicitor in 2012 and currently works as a Mental Health Advocate for Advocacy Support Cymru. Frontline experience includes: providing community pro-bono legal services to socially disadvantaged adults; supporting detainees in police custody as an Appropriate Adult for mental health charity, Hafal; and facilitating self-management courses for Bi-Polar UK. Joanna’s passion to empower people with mental ill health stems from her own experiences in the late ‘90s.

Joanna gained an LLB (hons) degree through the Open University, studied at Birmingham and Cardiff Universities and has worked as a complementary therapy practitioner. Joanna has been a member of Mind Cymru’s governance committee, Pwllgor Cymru, since 2009.

John Binns -Trustee and Networks and Communities Committee member

John Binns became a Mind trustee in February 2012, after a period of considerable involvement with Mind’s work.

John is a partner at Deloitte, and after suffering a period of significant depression in 2007, he personally launched a programme of activity within Deloitte to raise awareness of mental health, including a Mental Health Champions network. He worked closely with Mind in the development of this programme and in the subsequent wider work taking the Deloitte experience to other city firms and institutions.

His personal experience has given him valuable insights into how mental health problems can manifest themselves and the services and approaches that are available (or unavailable). John is passionate about improving the awareness and understanding of mental health in our society, and is an advocate of promoting openness about mental health problems. Already, this has included being a spokesperson during Mind week in 2011 and being interviewed for the BBC as part of the launch of phase two of 'Taking care of business', as well as other activities for Mind.

John has a wealth of business experience from his many senior positions within Deloitte and its predecessor forms since 1994. He has 10 years experience working in the social housing sector for both local authorities and a Housing association. He was also a Board member and Chair of the Humanist Housing Association.

Richard Addy - Trustee and External Relations Committee member

Richard joined the Council of Management in 2012, after advising Mind on its strategy in 2011.  Richard has personal experience of tackling mental health challenges in his family, and it is this experience that encouraged him to join Mind.

In 2012, Richard set up his own strategy, audience insight and facilitation consultancy, Addy-Kassova Audience Strategy Ltd, with his partner, Luba Kassova.

Prior to this, Richard was at the BBC, where he was the Chief Adviser to the Deputy Director General and then the Special Audience Strategy Adviser to the Director of BBC News. He also held the position of Head of the BBC's Creative Network.

In his early career, Richard advised ministers as a Government Economist in the Department of Health, and worked in strategy roles in financial services and in digital media.  

He also gives university lectures for the Adab Trust, a charity helping ethnic minority undergraduates gain employment.

Dr Charlotte Venkatraman - Trustee and External Relations Committee member

Charlotte is new to trusteeship, which began in December 2012. She is a qualified psychiatrist and worked within the NHS in this capacity for 7 years. She worked with various disadvantaged groups in that time including those with alcohol or drug problems and Men and Women within the criminal justice system. After suffering a personal loss she left psychiatry and began running a business in holistic therapies including aromatherapy, Thai massage, reiki and tarot card reading. 

Her involvement with Mind to date is with events such as the Royal Parks half marathon and fundraising with her sister. She has taken part in campaigns at a local level including Ecominds.

Charlotte is passionate about promoting mental wellbeing, improving opportunities for those experiencing mental health problems and increasing awareness within the general population. She uses both a personal and professional approach in her attempts to achieve these aims.

Jose Grayson - Trustee and Networks and Communities Committee Member

Jose has been a trustee of Mind since December 2012 . He is a solicitor specialising in crime and mental health law, motivated to support the most marginalised members of society whatever their circumstances. He is also an advocate at Mind In Barnet and Director of the Barnet Centre for Independent Living, a user led organisation providing peer-led services for all disabled and impaired members of the local community. He is active in his local service user group and professionally involved with JAMI and Jewish Care in their mental health services.

Following his personal experience of illness and hospitalisation in 2008, he regularly presents on his own successful recovery as well as lecturing and training in the voluntary sector on mental health law and advocacy generally.