Simon Blenkin
Principal Consultant
A professionally qualified senior manager (Prince 2 Practitioner & ACIB) with a proven track record of managing projects and communication plans, maximising performance through integrated campaigns and achieving cultural change in financial services and digital businesses. Sharing the big picture by joining the dots and communicating simply, while guiding projects and portfolios as a critical friend.
A highly organised and energetic self-starter renowned for spreading enthusiasm, focus and belief. A subject matter expert in innovative engagement and communication, strategic change, and digital innovation. Sought out as a creative thought leader who energizes stakeholders through innovative approaches, logic and practicality.
Expertise
Planning & Organisation
– Planned and project managed IT, strategic change, and regulatory programmes in Financial Services and other organisations to great success.
– Established a Saturday banking review for Barclays resulting in a marked £M income uplift, a 25% increase in branches open for customers, and sharing best practice in a practical leader’s guide.
Leadership & Communication
– Matrix management of key stakeholders, influencers, functional and technical specialists to deliver against business portfolio priorities.
– Organised and motivated a large group of Managers and teams to heightened performance, exceeding all business objectives resulting in a balanced performance ranking of 3rd nationally overall out of 76 areas, while merging of two areas, aligning systems, culture and mind sets.
Collaboration & Stakeholder Management
– Integrated Barclays’ Citizenship agenda into national campaigns and plans. This resulted in the highest ever levels of colleague participation, some 86% of colleagues. Raising the amount donated to chosen charities from employee payroll fourfold in just five weeks.
– Pioneered the use of Customer “Vox-Pops” clips alongside colleague and “ask the expert” filming in employee communications and digital tools. Increasing awareness of customer issues, Barclay’s products and effective use of customer tools and enablers.
Creativity
– Scripted, wrote and co-ordinated teams across the UK and India to shoot and produce an engaging video describing the scope, scale and impact of the Digital Services team and its successes.
– Enhanced colleague engagement in Barclays across a diverse, geographically disparate audience of 25k through instigating digitalisation, bringing insights and strategy to life through bite sized accessible media and gamification.