People on the move: Social Communications; Duchy Homes; GCA Altium; Birch Green Care Home

Social Communications, a complete communications and creative agency, with offices in Manchester, Leeds and London has bolstered its PR team with the appointment of Janelle Hardacre as senior account manager.

It has more than doubled in size over the past year and now employs a team of 26 consultants.

Hardacre, who has more than seven years’ experience in B2B and B2C PR, has been hired after a number of new client wins in the housing and property sector.

She brings a wealth of experience in housing, property and construction to the agency having spent three years working in communications for the National Housing Federation, the trade body which represents more than 900 housing associations in England.

Hardacre also has strong experience in tech and healthcare. She helped to launch machine learning start-up DigitalBridge and edtech platform Kortext and has delivered PR campaigns for NHS Knowsley CCG and Clatterbridge Cancer Centre as well as a number of household consumer brands.

She said: “I was really drawn to Social Communications due to its impactful work in sectors that affect all our lives. The agency has an enviable team culture and strong values which shone as soon as I met them.”

Caty Cartwright, director at Social Communications, said: “Having Janelle as a key part of the PR team not only strengthens our expertise in housing, property and technology, but our overall added value for clients and their campaigns.”

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Luxury housebuilder Duchy Homes has bolstered its North West division with the appointment of three industry professionals – Peter Hines joins as site manager, Emma Neal as divisional administrator and Christine Hunt as sales manager.

Hines has already begun work on the region’s first development at the exciting bespoke designed residential site, The Grange in Bunbury, taking responsibility for maintaining the highest of standards in build quality and health and safety.

Having worked in the housebuilding industry for more than 30 years, Hines is perfectly-placed to oversee the Duchy Homes site.

He said: “I take great pride in ensuring attention-to-detail at every stage of the build, and I enjoy being personally involved in our customers’ home-buying journeys from start to finish.”

Hunt joins the team ahead of the highly-anticipated launch of The Grange, which is already proving to be in demand by Cheshire homebuyers.

With more than 20 years’ experience, Hunt said: “I am really excited about working with the team to establish Duchy Homes in the North West and to launch sales on our first site – The Grange.”

Divisional administrator Neal will support the growth of the division using her valuable experience with an architectural practice to assist with Duchy Homes’ development in the region.

Duchy Homes is celebrating a successful six years of trading and is set on significant further expansion as it heads towards its first decade on the housebuilding market. Its North West division was set up in 2016 by managing director Ian Honeybill, and the launch of the region’s first developmen in Bunbury will be closely followed by The Paddock at Milton Green.

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GCA Altium announces that it has hired James Craven to join its Global Technology team as managing director, based in London.

Craven has 17 years’ experience in the technology sector, having previously been with Canaccord Genuity, DC Advisory, and PwC.

He has expertise across a wide range of technology sub-sectors including software, fintech, data & analytics, broadcasting technology, tech enabled services, IT services, managed services and telecom services.

In recent years, Craven has completed several high-profile transactions including Broadridge, Callcredit, Civica, Epicor, Infor, NTT Data, Park Place Technologies and Tata.

His deals include extensive cross border M&A experience across private and public companies having completed deals in Europe, the US and Asia, as well as strong relationships in the European and US private equity communities.

Phil Adams, chief executive at GCA Altium, said: “I am happy that James has decided to join GCA Altium. Our business has enjoyed dramatic growth in the last five years and attracting talent of the calibre of James is a reflection of the strength of our global platform as well as in the UK.

“Our merger has expanded our deep expertise in technology to cover Silicon Valley, the East Coast as well as India, China and Japan. We believe that technology will continue to be the primary driver of growth in all industries and so further strengthening our team in this area is particularly exciting.”

Craven said: “Following the merger last year with GCA Savvian, GCA Altium has become one of the only investment banks which is focused on offering sector specialist, independent advice to the mid-market on a global basis.”

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Birch Green Care Home in Skelmersdale, West Lancashire has appointed a new deputy general manager as the home develops its range of services.

With many years of experience in the NHS as a fully qualified nurse Vicky Sudworth has joined the team to help develop services to the local community including nursing and personal care, specialist dementia care, learning disabilities and mental health conditions.

She said: “I’m hugely excited to be joining Birch Green at this time as we understand further the needs of the local community and how we can offer them quality of services locally that live up to the vision and values of the company.”

Sudworth moves to Birch Green from her role working as a nurse in the accident and emergency department at Wigan Royal Albert Edward Infirmary.

Phillippa McGrath, manager of Birch Green Care Home, said: “Vicky brings a wealth of experience from the nursing sector and a great positive attitude as we move forward.

“This will help us as we further develop our services to even higher levels for now and the longer term.”

Birch Green Care Home is part of the award-winning Springhill Care Group, which also operates homes in Accrington and Bristol.