About Us
Meet the Team
Rob and Joanne McKay are a husband and wife team who started Sherrington Associates in 2014, after long careers in executive search and education. Both graduates of Liverpool John Moore’s University, they founded Sherrington with the sole purpose of enhancing people’s lives by creating exemplary leadership teams, capable of making positive change in their organisations.
After gaining a 2:1 in Sociology at Liverpool John Moore’s University, Rob’s recruitment career began in 2001. After 10 years in sales and marketing recruitment, Rob moved into executive search in 2011, recruiting senior leaders across the globe for a firm of international headhunters before founding Sherrington in 2014 with wife and business partner Joanne.
Over a 20+ year career, Rob has recruited senior leaders across multiple sectors, both private and public, specialising in C-suite, executive and non-executive appointments. Rob has worked with both global corporates and SMEs alike and has been the retained search partner for high-profile charities including the RNLI and British Red Cross. Rob is a qualified executive coach and has coached CEO’s and senior managers at many of Sherrington’s clients.
Until 2020, Rob was the Chair of the Institute of Directors in Cheshire, was a founding member of the IoD’s National Sustainability Interest Group and chaired IoD North West’s ‘Sustainable Leadership Series’. His interest in corporate sustainability saw him complete a Certificate in Sustainability Management with the University of Cambridge in 2020 and then completed courses on Systems Thinking with UCL and The Open University, all helping to inform an assessment model for sustainable leadership for use in Sherrington’s executive search work.
Today, Rob is a Non Executive Director at sub-regional tourist board ‘Marketing Cheshire’ and is a Trustee at Cheshire Connect, a charity that provides leadership development for charity CEO’s. Rob is an accredited practitioner of psychometric tools endorsed by The British Psychological Society and in 2022 Rob became a fully certified user of cultural diagnostic tools with Barrett Values Centre, helping to support clients accurately diagnose culture and values and develop transformation strategies.
Joanne graduated with a 2:1 in Biomedical Science at Liverpool John Moore’s University in 2001. Before founding Sherrington with Rob in 2014, Joanne held senior management roles in the education sector for ten years before finishing as Assistant Head Teacher at a large school in Liverpool, where she also held the role of Head of Data & Research.
This experience has proven invaluable in heading up the research function for Sherrington Associates, delivering highly targeted data-gathering and research work on behalf of our clients. Joanne manages Sherrington’s research partners, both through the internal team’s activities and via several carefully-selected external research partners, delivering bespoke research for executive search mandates as well as benchmarking and talent pooling projects.
Joanne is a long-serving member of the Institute of Directors, a member of the PTA at a local primary school, a member of the CIPD and is currently studying for CIPD Level 5 Diploma in HR Management. Outside of work, Joanne is an active supporter of several charities, including Act for Wildlife, RNLI, Chester Women’s Aid and St Kentigern’s Hospice.
Born and raised in Chester, Joe joined Sherrington Associates in 2021 following an eight year career in property and real estate. During his time in property, Joe helped launch the ‘Select’ division of regional estate agents Humphreys, developing their portfolio of high-value and bespoke properties for HNW customers across the North West and North Wales. Joe brings a wealth of transferable skills to Sherrington.
His background in researching, matching and finding creative solutions for customers in the property sector, provided a strong platform for his transition into executive search and selection. Joe now leads on Sherrington's 'Future Sustainable Leaders' programme, recruiting and developing high-potential future leaders united by a passion for sustainable leadership.
Prior to joining Sherrington Joe founded and managed a highly subscribed men’s mental health podcast ‘Men to Talk’. Joe remains a passionate advocate of championing positive mental health in the workplace and is currently researching the subject of climate anxiety and it’s impact on young workers. Today, Joe is a Trustee on the board of healthcare charity 'Active Cheshire' and sits on the ethics advisory panel for Cheshire Police. When not recruiting, Joe can be found running up mountains... often fundraising for Alder Hey Children's Charity.
Ian has over 40 years’ leadership experience in the engineering support sector. Prior to his non- executive career, Ian was a senior director of Amec’s asset support business, heading group-wide shutdowns and turnaround activity globally, working across Europe, Middle East, South East Asia and Australia. During his time with Amec, Ian was the assigned mentor for MBA candidates and high-potential senior managers working with several managers who went on to leadership positions within the group.
Today, Ian is an advisor to several global engineering businesses and a founding member of Travivas, a global network of subject-matter- experts in the energy and industrial sectors.
As well as supporting Sherrington with strategic direction and governance, Ian’s experience is invaluable in supporting our clients with executive candidate assessment, executive coaching and professional mentoring, particularly in the context of large-scale strategic re-direction and culture change.
Our Advisory Board are a highly experienced selection of leaders who provide advice for Sherrington’s work across executive search, culture diagnostics and sustainable leadership development. The advisors have been handpicked based on their knowledge, skills and experience and most of all their personal values.
The Engagement Coach was founded by Amrit Sandhar, who has worked with a number of well-known brands across the UK, to improve employee engagement/ experience, ultimately to improve organisational productivity. With a particular passion for neuroscience and psychology to drive behavioural change, combined with his experience in employee engagement, he uses a data-driven approach to identify the issues organisations are struggling with, and to work with them to create solutions leading to drive sustainable change, thereby improving productivity.
Amrit has a passion for developing people, as he believes highly engaged leaders drive better business performance by getting the best out of their colleagues.
Amrit originally started a career in healthcare as a qualified Pharmacist, and after spending a number of years in Operations, he went on to oversee half of the UK’s Pharmacy and Optical units for Walmart’s UK business, Asda. Having successfully worked in the healthcare sector, Amrit went on to head up Employee Engagement for Asda, before taking up a role with the prestigious Best Companies (the name behind The Sunday Times Best Companies list), working at boardroom level, helping organisations improve their employee engagement. Amrit is a qualified executive coach, a Walmart accredited change trainer, and has a CIPD Advanced Diploma (Level 7) in HRM/HRD.
Amrit was a Finalist in the 2019 NatWest Great British Entrepreneur Awards for ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ (Service Industries - Midlands), and The Engagement Coach were Finalists in the CIPD People Management Awards 2020, for the ‘Best Learning & Development Initiative in the Private Sector’.
Amrit advises Sherrington Associate's 'culture diagnostics' work and is our trusted partner for supporting clients with culture change and transformation.
Hil has spent more than 25 years supporting corporate, public and third sector organisations to integrate purpose into strategy and to campaign for change, with a focus on climate and social justice, and social innovation.
As Head of Strategy at M&C Saatchi Life- a global strategic and creative consultancy, she works with corporates and household-name brands on transformative sustainability strategies.
Previously Head of Sustainability at UK supermarket Iceland Foods, she devised and led its award-winning ‘Doing it Right’ strategy; involving brand activism campaigns; social innovation projects on food insecurity, family poverty and financial inclusion; and reduction of carbon, plastic and food waste. Prior to Iceland, she was Director of Communications and Marketing at Alder Hey Hospital, the biggest and busiest children’s hospital in Europe.
Hil’s work has won multiple industry awards. She has twice been named Outstanding UK Independent Consultant by the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) and was one of the country’s founding Chartered PR Practitioners. She has a Masters in PR and Communications for Social Change, with a research specialism in brand activism. She is a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations Global ESG Panel; an Advisory Board Member for Business in the Community; and a Trustee of two charities: Feeding Britain and the Rothesay Foundation and is a consultant for the Alder Hey Children’s Charity.
In recent years Hil has worked closely with Sherrington Associates, advising on the development of 'The 4A Model of Sustainable Leadership'.
Paul Beers’ career reflects his extensive experience in the use of science, education and skills in business development and commercial success.
After 14 years working in higher education Paul joined Unilever and gained a significant amount of commercial experience in this multi-national company working in the corporate environmental unit. He moved on to join the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) responsible for leading the development of Environmental Technology Skills across the West Midlands.
In 2004 he founded his own company, Paul Beers Innovations and developed and delivered change management programmes, strategy advice, and consultancy to The Dept. for Business, Innovation & Skills, (BIS) now known as The Dept. for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, (BEIS), The Dept. for Energy and Climate Change (DECC), The Dept. for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), LSC, The Northwest Development Agency (NWDA), the Northwest Environmental and Food and Drink Business Clusters as well as numerous private sector organisations.
Paul acted as an independent ministerial advisor to the Department for Business Innovation and Skills, where he advised ministers on maximising the contribution of low carbon and environmental technologies to the UK economy. He chaired the UK Forum for Environmental Industries Skills Interest Group and has also been an expert member of a number of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) review panels. As part of his consultancy Paul now writes learning material for The University of Derby Online, mentors students and teaches subject modules for the MSc in Sustainability and Environmental Management. Paul was instrumental in helping Sherrington Associates develop The 4A Model of Sustainable Leadership and continues to provide advice and support to the senior management on the subject of sustainability and sustainable leadership.
Ian has more than 30 years of experience in financial services in the USA, Ireland and the UK, nine years of which were spent as Chairman and CEO of Chester-based MBNA Ltd, a leading consumer credit provider. He was also CEO of AIM-listed Appreciate Group plc, based in Liverpool, a provider of prepaid gift cards, multi-retailer gift vouchers and digital rewards services to corporate and consumer markets across the UK.
Ian is currently non-executive Chair of Chester Race Company Ltd, a private company whose principal activities are horse racing, events and hospitality. He provides advisory services to a number of businesses and organisations.
Ian holds degrees in Civil Engineering and Business Administration. He is a former Governor of the King’s School Chester and a prospective* Trustees of Crewe Youth Zone. Ian is married with three grown-up children and lives in Chester.
*the appointment is due to be finalised shortly
We know that clients value working with a partner who actually cares about helping their business. When clients retain us, it’s not because they want to work with a big brand or because they want a partner with multiple offices and hundreds of consultants. They retain us because they know their business matters to us and we’ll work harder than anyone else to give them value.
Joe Onions - Executive Search Consultant
