An international, cross-industry career that has moved from corporate management to extensive research, advisory and capability development services to public, private and third sector organisations. Tim has lived and worked in the UK, France (3 years) and United States (20 years), building an impressive research and entrepreneurial record, with demonstrated commitment to delivering social benefit.

As Founder and President, World Commerce & Contracting (formerly International Association for Contract & Commercial Management), Tim has built a 72,000 member worldwide non-profit association which increasingly influences commercial policies and contracting practices in major corporations and governments. In September 2019, he was presented with the Financial Times ‘Market Shaper of the Year’ Award.

Tim was until recently Professor and Chair, International Commercial & Contract Management, University of Leeds, School of Law, where he taught and led development of inter-disciplinary commercial programs.

Prior to founding World Commerce & Contracting, Tim was on the Chairman’s staff at IBM Corporation and led the development of worldwide commercial processes and skills. His early career included management roles in banking, automotive and aerospace industries, where he led negotiations up to $1.5 billion in value. He has served in advisory roles for government departments in various countries, including the US, UK, Australia, Canada, and Japan.

Adrian Furner has 30+ years' experience in the design, implementation, and delivery of commercial transactions using a wide portfolio of models from the simple traditional models though to new and novel business models. He has worked in a variety of sectors including defence and security, aviation, technology, infrastructure, banking and financial services, creative industries, public sector, and natural resources.

As an experienced practitioner Adrian is focused on 'Commercial Excellence', supporting organizations in developing and leveraging their 'commercial acumen' to gain better business outcomes. This includes: raising their commercial awareness; designing and implementing innovation models; and deploying relational contracting to enhance business performance.

Adrian held a number of VP/Director level commercial, procurement, and operations roles within FTSE30 organisations, giving him significant cross-border international experience ranging from complex capital intensive projects, thought to lower complexity operational opportunities. This includes: multi-billion £, long term Private Finance Initiative (PFI) bids; joint venture creation and management; outsourced training management; portfolio management; asset financing; civil aircraft sale, leasing and broking; M&As; technology innovation investment; and fully financed naval ship reactivations.

Adrian is a member of the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET), and an Honorary Fellow of World Commerce & Contracting (formerly IACCM), where he is a former member elected Board Director. He has a BEng in Production Engineering and Management from the University of Nottingham, and has also completed the London Business School Corporate Finance Programme along with executive education programmes at both Wharton Business School and Oxford Saïd Business School. Adrian has contributed to a number of books on commercial and contract management and co-authored the Professional Services Leadership Handbook (www.koganpage.com/pslh).

Ajay Agrawal is the Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Sirion. Ajay has been a securities lawyer and a product visionary in the strategic legal technology space for more than 20 years. Ajay founded and led UnitedLex Corporation in 2006 – a global leader in the legal process outsourcing and strategic legal technology space. Ajay also serves as an entrepreneur-in-residence at CodeX, the Center for Legal Informatics at Stanford University. He has received an LL.M. from Columbia University and holds an LL.B. from Trinity College, Cambridge and a B.A. in Semiotics from Brown University. 

As Global CEO of one of the world’s fastest growing non-profits, Sally’s mission is to inspire and support the World Commerce & Contracting (WorldCC) team and global community to collectively drive recognition and excellence in Commercial and Contract Management.

She is an experienced and accomplished commercial and contracts management professional, holding senior commercial positions at a range of corporate and multi-national organizations. Her focus is on the creation of positive and successful business relationships, constantly striving to ensure that businesses realize their true potential and value.

In 2019 Sally was invited to become Chair of the Board for the Open Contracting Partnership (OCP) and in 2021 she was appointed Professor in Practice in Strategy and Innovation at the University of Durham Business School.

Fraser leads the digital transformation agenda within the managed supply chain across Upstream, Downstream, Integrated Gas, Projects and Technology in Shell. His team of 120 staff is accountable for digital transformation of the supply chain, technology, process design, AI, big data and digital.
Fraser has also been the driving force behind the development and implementation of a new operating model, known as Project Optimus

Prior to this role, Mark held various positions in the Group, most recently as Head of Legal and Commercial. Mark has been a member of the Rolls-Royce Power Systems AG (RRPS) Supervisory Board since March 2016 and sits on the Supervisory Board’s Executive Committee. Before joining Rolls-Royce in 2005, Mark trained and practiced at Lovells (now Hogan Lovells) in London and Hong Kong. He studied English and German law and is a practicing Solicitor (England and Wales).

Paula is a lawyer with over 20 years’ experience of working in industry, having spent 13 of those years at IBM specialising in “as a Service” transactions, heading up the Cloud and Solutions legal team across Europe. In 2018, Paula left full-time lawyering to work with innovative organisations on the business side, initially joining late-stage start-up Globality as part of the legal services senior management team and then joining WorldCC as its Chief Legal Innovation Officer.

Today, Paula has her own consultancy PaLiDa Ltd and works as a legal innovation advisor to a broad base of clients ranging from Fortune 500 companies to start-ups. She also works closely with Passera Designs on contract simplification and design.

Paula is passionate about better contracts and empathetic leadership.

Sean Williams is the Founder and Chief Executive of AutogenAI. AutogenAI uses cutting-edge natural language processing technology to help companies write tenders, proposals and marketing copy, saving time and money and improving win rates.

Sean has worked in research, policy, business development and operational management for some of the largest, most successful public service providers in the UK. He has designed and managed large-scale public service contracts both across the UK and abroad, managing businesses turning over in excess of £75 million.

Sean founded, and was the Chief Executive at, Corndel Ltd, where he grew the business from scratch to 350 people. Sean later sold Corndel in November 2020 to THI Holdings.

Sean is interested in artificial intelligence, the future of work, business creation, evidence-based policy, sustainable social enterprise, systems, incentives, technology, human potential, ideas and delivery.