John French
COO & Programme Director
A creative tinkerer, cerebral thinker and Social Marketer in training. John has over a decade of experience working as a marketing professional across both the public and private sectors in a range of industries including major national museums and galleries, local authorities, market research and events management. Having cut his teeth creating and managing national campaigns for major exhibitions for organisations such as Royal Museums Greenwich and the British Library John brings a creative flair to event programming and is passionate about bringing content to delegates which inspires, engages and provokes positive social change. Has beard.
Sarah Whitehead
Events Director
Sarah knows events. 20 years of meticulous event planning, organising and managing have taught her to always expect the unexpected. She has managed events from Arizona to Yorkshire, from Annecy to New York and a few weird and wonderful places in between.
Her attention to detail is second to none (well maybe except Rose!). Her calm nature and can-do attitude when facing the daily challenges of organising events will ease you through the most challenging of tasks. Keynote Speaker left at the Cowboy Ranch? Meeting with the head of the Turkish Military? Delegates stuck at American customs? Nothing she can’t handle and all with a smile on her face.
Sonia Stray
Operations & Events Manager
Sonia brings over 20 years of experience in Operations from the training industry. She has experience of working with clients across all sectors with an energy and enthusiasm that is infectious. Sonia will ensure that every client and delegate receives a first class ‘Fuse’ experience and any challenges, that inevitably, arise are resolved with, professionalism, creativity and a smile.
Alice Lum
Operations Executive
Alice’s career has been quite varied; after graduating in 2017, she went on to manage a restaurant and nanny children, work 3 years as a personal assistant in the private equity sector before a short stint at St John Ambulance in the events department. Alice is now excited to progress her career into events and social enterprise with the Fuse team, putting all of those organisational skills to good use! Alice is a food enthusiast and a dab hand at DIY and is ready to take on any challenge, work or otherwise, with a can do attitude!
India Casey-Harwood
Operations Executive
India is a recent addition to the Fuse team. She graduated from University in 2019 and since then has had experience working in communications in the public sector and was the co-ordinator of a Ministry of Defence owned national awards scheme. Fuse is her first experience with social enterprise and she is excited to get involved with clients who advocate for social change.
Matt Wilson
Founder & Trustee
Matt has worked in the events industry for over 25 years. He’s managed, promoted and produced global sales incentives, international sports events, awards ceremonies and everything in between.
Matt set up Fuse in 2013, building on what he’d learned from working on projects with Social Enterprise UK, Co-operatives UK and the National Social Marketing Centre, with a simple goal to create positive change by bringing people together and learning from each other.
He spends most of his free time walking his dogs, riding rollercoasters with his daughter, cycling, and watching Liverpool FC conquer the world (sometimes).
Although Matt no longer takes a role in the day to day operaiton of Fuse he is still very much part of the team as a senior freelancer, advisor, mentor and consultant. After a lifetime in the events industry Matt took the opportunity in 2020 to attend University for the first time and pursue a career in Social Care, an area of work he and Fuse are passionate about.