Regional Business Information for Yorkshire
About Us
Insightful, thought-provoking and always relevant, TheBusinessDesk.com is the only website dedicated to Yorkshire business news.
We offer:
- The news you want when you want it (to your PC, PDA, mobile and BlackBerry).
- Authoritative articles on issues relevant to the region.
- Interviews with the movers and shakers of Yorkshire business.
- Online exclusives.
- Searchable archive.
Led by David Parkin, our team of award-winning journalists includes former regional business editors and published business authors.
Corporate Information
TheBusinessDesk.com was launched in November 2007 by former Yorkshire Post 
business editor David Parkin backed by a group of professional investors and entrepreneurs. Bringing the highest standards of regional business information to the Internet and mobile devices, it is the only website dedicated to Yorkshire business news.
TheBusinessDesk.com is owned and operated by TheBusinessDesk Ltd. Registered office: Convention House, St Mary's Street, Leeds, LS9 7HD.
The Board
Editor & Director - David Parkin
David was Business Editor of the Yorkshire Post from 2000 to 2007, responsible for its award-winning business pages.
He has built unrivalled contacts in the region's business community and expanded the newspaper's business coverage to include two weekly broadsheet supplements and high profile business events.
As a high profile figure in the business community, David is often called upon to host and chair events and is regularly invited to offer his opinions on major business stories on national TV and radio.
David has held senior roles on newspapers in London, Cardiff and the Midlands, and he has secured many exclusive interviews with major business figures including Sir Ken Morrison, Lord Hanson - and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Tel: 0113 394 4324, Email: David.Parkin@thebusinessdesk.com
Chairman - Chris Jones
Chris is a highly experienced corporate lawyer and businessman with a strong executive and non-executive track record.
He has been a non-executive director of Britannia Building Society since 2003. With over £30bn of assets and 4,000 staff in over 190 retail branches, it is a major retail network and a model of corporate governance..
Chris was Chairman of Clarity Credit Management Solutions Ltd since formation in 2005. Chris oversaw the sale of Clarity to Nikko Principal Investments Aug 2006.
He is a senior non-executive director of Agenda Management Services Ltd, a highly profitable £6m turn over outsourcing business with 125 staff. Agenda specialised recovery business covering mortgage arrears retail recoveries etc.
Chris is a non- executive director of Samian Underwriting Agencies Ltd, a City of London based insurer of intellectual property assets and he is also a non-executive director of Trango Ltd, the Chichester safe travel and disaster recovery business.
Chris was Managing Partner of International law firm Hammonds for nine years. He managed the firm's growth from £30m to £130m turnover including major international expansion. The firm employed over 1,800 staff when he retired from the role in 2004.
His role as managing partner of Tourmalet Consulting - an advisory firm dealing with start ups/turnaround and general business advice - keeps Chris in contact with numerous Yorkshire professionals. He has 20 years experience as corporate recovery and reconstruction lawyer handling major business reconstructions.
Finance Director - Colin Glass
Colin is a Chartered Accountant with his own Practice, Winburn Glass Norfolk (WGN) which he founded in 1974.
He is a non-executive director of several companies, including Surgical Innovations Group plc, Straight plc and GETECH Group plc all of which are quoted on AIM and which came out of the WGN portfolio.
Colin is a non-executive director of The Partnership Investment Fund PIF (http://www.partnershipif.co.uk/), a £37m fund set up, with funding from Europe and Barclays Bank, to support SMEs and social achievement in the Objective 2 areas of Yorkshire and The Humber.
Colin is also a non-executive director of a number of private companies being groomed and developed with a view to a future trade sale or flotation.
The Team
Deputy Editor - Ian Briggs
Ian is an award-winning journalist who helped to expand the Yorkshire Post's successful business coverage.
During his time at the Yorkshire Post as a business reporter between 2005 and 2007, Ian broke a host of exclusive stories, including high profile deals from the region such as the record-breaking sales of Keepmoat and Firth Rixson. He has also interviewed many of Yorkshire's major business personalities.
Ian was named Business Writer of the Year at the Yorkshire Press Awards in 2006.
He has built up an enviable contacts book, has strong relationships with the regional business community and within Yorkshire's commercial property sector.
Prior to working at the Yorkshire Post, Ian started his career as a news reporter at the Telegraph & Argus in Bradford where he was named Young Journalist of the Year at the Yorkshire Press Awards in 2004.
Tel: 0113 394 4325. Email: Ian.Briggs@thebusinessdesk.com
Business Correspondent - Kathryn Moore
Kathryn Moore started her journalism career at the Yorkshire Post, completing her training on news before moving to business where she was part of the team which won the Newspaper Business Team of the Year award at the Yorkshire Bank Northern Business Journalist Awards in 2006.
During her time at the Yorkshire Post she broke a number of exclusive stories and interviewed many of Yorkshire's major business personalities. Kathryn has also covered high profile events including the Yorkshire International Business Convention and a number of key conferences and economic briefings.
She has built up a comprehensive contacts book and has strong relationships within the regional business community and commercial property sector.
Before becoming a journalist Kathryn held roles with high street bank Abbey National and the Australian Government.
Tel: 0113 394 4323. Email: kathryn.moore@thebusinessdesk.com
Business Correspondent - Anastasia Weiner
Anastasia is a Yorkshire-based business journalist with experience in the newsroom and business desks of local, regional and daily newspapers.
At the end of 2003 she left the Yorkshire Post to become a freelance business writer and author. Her first book, Beyond Governance: Creating Corporate Value through Performance, Conformance and Responsibility, co-authored with an academic and the CEO of a global software company, was published by John Wiley in January 2005.
In addition to ongoing book related work, she writes extensively on corporate responsibility, corporate governance, business strategy, finance issues, renewable energy and general business for magazines and newspapers including Finance Director, Growing Business and Corporate Responsibility Magazine.
She also regularly writes white papers, case studies and reports for private sector firms, including FTSE 100 organisations, and has worked with leading non-governmental organisations such as Business in the Community and AccountAbility.
In her career she has interviewed a string of key business leaders including the CEO of fast food chain McDonald's and politicians such as former US president Bill Clinton.
Email: Anastasia.Weiner@thebusinessdesk.com
Sales Manager - Emily Boldison
Emily Boldison is an English and Media graduate from Trinity and All Saints College, University of Leeds.
She has experience in public relations and journalism and joined TheBusinessDesk.com from an executive search firm where she worked as a researcher, Before that role she worked as a customer service advisor at GE Money.
Tel: 0113 394 4326, Email: Emily.Boldison@thebusinessdesk.com
The North West Team
Deputy Editor- Joanne Birtwistle
Joanne has spent her entire journalistic career working in business news.
Before joining TheBusinessDesk.com, she was a senior business reporter at Crain’s Manchester Business.
Prior to that, she was a journalist with Insider magazine for more than three years, where she worked on a wide range of news and features as well as being editor of many of its supplements and contract print publications.
After graduating with a degree in politics, Joanne’s first job was at business information and analysis company Datamonitor. As senior editor she managed the online CommentWire team, responsible for all the commentarial and news analysis content produced by the company. She was also editor of Datamonitor’s weekly Business Review e-newsletter, which was electronically circulated to around 30,000 subscribers.
Tel: 0161 935 8108 Email: joanne.birtwistle@thebusinessdesk.com
Business Correspondent- Sheryl Moore
Sheryl Moore is an award-winning journalist who has held a number of senior editorial roles in regional newspapers.
Sheryl was formerly the Business Editor of the Manchester Evening News. It was a post she held for more than three years, during which time she was credited with transforming the M.E.N business section and won a number of awards including Yorkshire Bank’s Business Journalist of the Year and the London Stock Exchange’s AIM Journalist of the Year.
Previous roles include the Deputy Business Editor at the Yorkshire Post.
A high-profile figure in the north west business and media communities, Sheryl has built up extensive contacts and, after leaving the Manchester Evening News in 2006, is now a freelance journalist.
Tel: 0161 935 8107 Email: sheryl.moore@thebusinessdesk.com
Business Correspondent- James Graham
James has been working as a print journalist for the past 10 years.
Since 2004 he has been a freelance contributing to the Independent, the Guardian, the Herald and the Times Educational Supplement as well as regional business titles and the Estates Gazette.
He started his career on a small community paper in Manchester before joining the Gloucestershire Echo as a general reporter. He moved to the Yorkshire Post in 2001 to specialise in business and became the paper's deputy business editor in 2003.
At TheBusinessDesk.com he has a particular interest in private companies and corporate finance.
Tel: 0161 935 8109 Email: james.graham@thebusinessdesk.com
Media Assistant- Katharine Taylor
Katharine Taylor is an English Language graduate from the University of Manchester.
She has experience in customer service working for Alpha Retail, John Lennon Airport and the John Lewis Partnership.
She joined TheBusinessDesk.com following the completion of her university course.
Tel: 0161 935 8380
Email: katharine.taylor@thebusinessdesk.com
TheBusinessDesk in the News:
PR Studies - 'When did business become sexy?' http://prstudies.typepad.com/weblog/
Financial Times - 'Media interest in regions on increase' - http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/87c4165a-a777-11dc-a25a-0000779fd2ac.html
Greenblog - 'Good luck to Parky and TheBusinessDesk.com' - http://www.greenblog.co.uk/2007/11/19/businessdesk-david-parkin-business/
NewSkylines.co.uk - 'Northern Property News' - http://newskylines.co.uk/2007/11/23/weekly-northern-property-news-update-24th-nov/
Wolfstar - 'Mainstream Media is quaking in its boots' - http://www.wolfstarconsultancy.com/page/2/
HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk - 'New website launched by former business editor' - http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/news/2007/11nov/071126business.shtml
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