Our board
Our board decides on strategic direction, within an agreed framework.
Meet our board
Betsy Bassis
Chief Executive (Board Director)
Betsy has extensive experience leading complex, customer-facing organisations across the private and public sectors. Before joining NHSBT in March 2019, she was the Chief Operating Officer at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Betsy spent 12 years at Centrica/British Gas in a range of senior roles, including Strategy Director for British Gas.
John Pattullo OBE
Chair (Board Director)
John has extensive experience in the fast-moving consumer goods and logistics sectors, working for companies including Procter & Gamble and DHL. He has been a non-executive with eight organisations and has been Chairman of four of these, including In Kind Direct (a Prince's Charity), and V Group, a PE owned Marine Service business. He was previously Chairman of NHSBT between 2013 and 2017.
Non-executive members
Professor Paresh Vyas
Board Director
Professor Vyas is a Professor of Haematology at Oxford University, he runs a research laboratory at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine. (Chair of the Research and Development Committee).
Charles St John
Board Director
Charles was a Partner at private equity investment firms Cognetas and Electra. He is also a Non-Executive Director of Capstone Fostercare, Marken Logistics and Whiteline Windows.
Helen Fridell
Board Director
Helen is the Transformation Director, Customer Experience at Cisco. She is on the UK Gambling Commission Digital Advisory Panel and participates in the Mentoring for Growth programme.
Piers White
Board Director
Piers White has held a number of executive roles in financial services including Barclays UK and Flemings. He was awarded an MBE for public service in 2009.
Professor Deirdre Kelly
Board Director
Deirdre is Professor of Paediatric Hepatology/Consultant Paediatric Hepatologist at Birmingham Children’s Hospital. She has significant Board experience, most notably in the Health Research Authority, General Medical Council, Care Quality Commission (CQC) and Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (SaBTO).
Joanna Lewis
Board Director
Jo was most recently People Director at Sky and joins us with 25 years’ experience in Human Resources. She is also a Trustee for Middlesex Learning Partnership Multi-Academy Trust and the London School of Mosaic.
Phil Huggon
Board Director
Phil is a Non-executive Director with several organisations mostly in health and education across the private, charitable and public sectors. His executive career has been in commercial, marketing and transformation roles with BP, MARS and Shell, both in the UK and across Europe. Phil now has various NED roles with the NHS, and currently is Chair of the NHS Transformation Unit, Vice Chair of Healthwatch England and NED with the Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS FT.
Directors
Rob Bradburn
Director of Finance (Board Director)
Qualified Chartered Accountant, Rob joined in April 2008 with 20+ years' senior financial management experience. Formerly he was Global Vice-President Finance & Planning, Foods at Quest International.
Anthony Clarkson
Director of Organ Donation and Transplantation / Tissue and Eye Services (Board Director)
A Registered Nurse with over 25 years' NHS experience Anthony is a transformational leader who has held a number of leadership roles including in Blood Donation, Tissue and Eye Service and ODT.
Dr Gail Miflin
Director of Clinical Services (Board Director)
Gail joined in 2010 and became a Director in 2016. Previously she was a Consultant Haematologist at hospitals and NHS Trusts, specialising in treating patients with red cell disorders.
Ian Bateman
Director of Quality (Director)
Ian joined in 2009 and became a Director in 2015. He has over 25 years' experience in senior national and international Quality and Regulatory Compliance roles in public and private organisations.
Stephen Cornes
Director of Blood Supply
Stephen has extensive experience across all areas of the supply chain, including business planning, manufacturing, distribution, supply and demand planning, customer service and customer logistics, working for large scale, complex companies including Procter & Gamble and Alliance Healthcare.
Wendy Clark
Chief Digital and Information Officer (Director)
Wendy is an experienced digital technology leader and CIO with a track record of delivering transformation. Wendy has worked across the private and public sectors and multiple industries.
David Rose
Director of Donor Experience (Director)
David joined as a Director in 2020 from Starbucks Coffee Company where he was responsible for digital customer experiences and engagement across EMEA. Previously he held a number of commercial leadership roles at Virgin Atlantic Airways in the UK, Kenya and China.
Deborah McKenzie
Chief People Officer
Deborah joined us from Public Health England where she was Chief People Officer. She has experience developing and implementing leadership programmes for the Department of Health. As an associate partner with Accenture she led a number of large-scale change programmes. Deb was also Senior Responsible Officer on the Public Health Reform consultation, leading a transfer of 11,500 colleagues to the new UK Health Security Agency.