Meet the Team
(Left-Right) David Simpson, Giles Sinclair, Gail Pyrah, Richard Silk, Gareth Silk
Gail Pyrah, Managing Director
Prior to the formation of Gail Pyrah & Associates in 1990 by Gail she had been employed by Reckitt & Colman (now Reckitt Benckiser) as a senior HR Manager, with a particular emphasis on employee resourcing and team development. During that part of her career she was actively involved in worldwide purchasing initiatives designed to strengthen the competence of all staff within the function.
Gail Pyrah & Associates became GPA when it was incorporated in 1997 and since 2005 the company has been successfully trading as CIPS GPA, bringing together two great names in Purchasing.
As Managing Director of the business, her main focus throughout has been to provide a quality recruitment service to clients and candidates alike. She has been responsible for helping to establish and develop best-in-class purchasing teams in many organisations and she continues to support the recruitment needs of a wide array of clients in both the private and public sector. MBA and HR qualified, she has established an excellent reputation in her field.
Gareth Silk, Account Director
•Gareth graduated with a BA Honours degree in Information Technology for Business from Aston University and immediately joined the Dixon Group as a Graduate IT Buyer. He managed some major IT projects and was promoted because of his contribution to the Procurement team. He gained invaluable sourcing experience and delivered tangible benefits within major projects.
•Gareth continued to further develop his career and his sourcing experience by joining the Royal Bank of Scotland in their world-class technology team. His last role was that of Sourcing Group Manager.
•He joins CIPS GPA having gained invaluable sourcing experience working in two key sectors – Retail and Financial Services.
•Key deliverables whilst working with RBS include managing a multi application hosting agreement in the US; a complex application packaging services contract supporting the roll out of Windows XP; various anti fraud tools and payment processing engines.
•Gareth has also successfully championed eSourcing and eAuctions within the technology team, running several successful events. He has also co-ordinated divestment activity for technology suppliers; supported their key supplier management programme and their global supplier performance assessment programme.
•Gareth joins the CIPS GPA team on the 14 September 2009 and brings with him invaluable experience that will support and enhance the business offering.
Richard Silk, Account Director
Richard has over 10 years of Procurement experience acquired in Blue Chip organisations and Big Four Consultancy. He began his career working for the BMW Group and later moved into a Senior Buyer position with Land Rover. During his time in the automotive industry Richard was promoted several times and in his last role was responsible for a £100+m chassis spend. Richard then joined Cadbury Schweppes as a Category Manager in the Raw Material team where he bought a diverse range of ingredients that included Chocolate, Glucose, Starch and Flavours. Richard’s next move was into consultancy and he joined KPMG in 2004. Richard’s engagement management and delivery experience included: Procurement Transformation at a FTSE 5 telecoms organisation; design and implementation of a strategic sourcing methodology with a global aerospace company and Pan European eSourcing with a household and personal care business. In addition, Richard worked with many medium sized organisations to deliver sourcing and eAuction programmes that achieved tangible benefits and impacted the clients’ bottom line. Richard left KPMG in 2008 after securing a role with Reckitt Benckiser Healthcare where he led the Raw Material Procurement team. Amongst other objectives, Richard was tasked with achieving Procurement synergies across the Healthcare business and raising the profile of the function with his peers in manufacturing, R&D and Technical. Richard joined CIPS GPA in September 2009 as Account Director and will bring a wealth of business, consultancy and procurement experience that will serve to further enhance the added value offering of the business.
Giles Sinclar, Interim Resource Director
Giles has been working within the Recruitment and Personnel Industry for over 13 years. After gaining his BA Honours Degree in Business Studies from Sheffield Hallam University, Giles went on to work for Barclays Bank as a Personnel Consultant where he employed the services of Manpower for the recruitment of 60 temps on a daily basis. This led to him being offered a role with Manpower as a Consultant and within 12 months of working as a Consultant, Giles was promoted to the role of Branch Manager. He continued to develop his career as both a Business Manager and as a Consultant working initially for Manpower and then for two other major high-street recruitment companies before joining GPA in 2000. Since joining GPA, Giles has developed excellent business relationships with his clients and has developed an impressive client base of FTSE100 companies. He has also developed an excellent client base within the public sector and has successfully managed key campaigns for numerous central and local government departments. He services a range of clients across various industry sectors supplying both permanent and interim staff and has managed major recruitment initiatives including search and advertising campaigns. Since 2005, Giles has headed up the Interim recruitment division within CIPS GPA providing added value interim resource to both private and public sector clients.
David Simpson, Account Director
David gained a Diploma in Business Studies in 1986 at Glasgow Caledonian University and then went to London to work in Marketing, initially with DHL and subsequently with United Parcel Services. One of his primary responsibilities involved developing and implementing the pricing model for both businesses. David moved to Yorkshire in 1997 and was approached by Michael Page to become a Recruitment Consultant specifically recruiting Marketing professionals in the north east/north west region. He was promoted to Managing Consultant in 2001 and was responsible for leading a team that were tasked with servicing and business developing clients across various industry sectors, supplying both permanent and interim personnel. During his career in Recruitment, David has successfully managed significant recruitment initiatives for Advertised Selection, Headhunt and contingency based assignments. David further developed his recruitment experience with 2 other major players before joining GPA in March 2005. David now leads the Public sector practice at CIPS GPA and has successfully managed major multiple recruitment campaigns for numerous central and local government organisations.
Michael Holding, Consultant
Michael has been working in recruitment for over 8 years. Having initially graduated with a BA (Hons) in Tourism and Planning, he joined TMP Worldwide in London to work as a Resourcer within the Banking & Finance team where he spent 18 months resourcing newly qualified accountants into Investment Banking and Financial Services. In pursuit of a better quality of life, he relocated to Harrogate and worked as a Researcher for a local firm working with both direct clients and Executive Search firms. Having spent 2.5 years there, he was headhunted to join a construction specialist recruiter based in Leeds. Michael spent 4 successful years there recruiting quantity surveyors and project managers into construction consultancies and was promoted from Consultant to Senior Consultant. Michael joined the CIPS GPA team in September 2008 and has been managing multiple and single contingency based recruitment campaigns across a wide range of sectors.
Alex Steel, Consultant
Alex’s career in Recruitment started in 1995 when she joined an International Search organisation, initially as a Researcher before being promoted and professionally trained in London to become an Executive Search Consultant. Alex specialised in Procurement related roles having built a recruitment desk from scratch. In this role Alex was involved in the sourcing, marketing and placement of high calibre individuals, incorporating head-hunting and full search and selection techniques. Deciding to capitalise on her success in the Procurement Industry, Alex marketed her own CV to CIPS and joined CIPS Recruitment in 1997, before becoming part of CIPS GPA in September 2005. In her time with CIPS, Alex presented to numerous Branches across the UK with a Recruitment Road show entitled “Your career, it’s not a rehearsal” and assisted numerous CIPS Members over the years with invaluable advice on how to market themselves through their CV and how to interview for success.
Alex briefly left CIPS GPA in August 2007, having taken the decision to work in a more generalist environment for a few months but soon recognised that once Procurement was in her blood it was there to stay! She returned to CIPS GPA in June 2008 and is delighted to be back as a Consultant with the CIPS GPA team. Although she works on a broad range of assignments, her principal focus is within the Public Sector and she is part of a winning team that has made many successful placements.
Marcus Ritchie, Account Director
Marcus has significant experience in both procurement line roles and specialist procurement recruitment. His 9 years in procurement began with Rolls-Royce buying a range of indirect goods and services for global operations. At Asda, in a quasi procurement-supply chain role, he was responsible for overhauling supplier delivery performance via negotiating improved supply chain SLA’s to ease pressure on distribution sectors. Marcus also spent a year on the procurement contracting market working as Procurement Development Manager within the manufacturing sector.
Marcus changed career direction and has spent the last 9 years specialising in the recruitment of procurement professionals across the UK and Europe. He has interviewed over 1,000 procurement professionals and has worked with over 300 different organisations across a wide range of sectors, developing successful and long-term relationships with a number of key clients. He has a strong track record of delivery in search and in managing volume campaigns across multiple sectors recruiting candidates up to CPO level. As Head of Procurement Practice he established a new regional recruitment office, managing a small team of UK based procurement specialists before joining CIPS GPA in January 2010.
