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presidential election

The Chamber has new faces at the helm following its recent AGM, with a new president and two new vice-presidents.  President Colin Crosby outlines his objectives for his term of office.

Colin Crosby sees his challenge, as newly appointed president of Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce, to help provide a confident and positive business environment for all 1200 members. In keeping with this, he is keen to ensure than whichever sector members may work in they are afforded the maximum opportunity to prosper.

“Of course oil and gas is vital but there are many other businesses which make up the total economy and if they are all firing well, including oil and gas, the whole area will benefit,” he said. “Oil and gas has to be doing well, leading from the front, but then the universities have also to thrive. They have a huge contribution to make as has food manufacturing with almost 10% of Scotland’s food and drink turnover coming out of the North-east.

“There is also tourism, retail, property, construction and they all need the support of the Chamber and if there is anything which needs to be done, in terms of a lobbying platform for example, that has to be done.”

He is keen to see the city centre revitalised because of the ripple effect it might have.

“If you can get the city centre to be positive and confident that is all part and parcel of the overall exercise.”

He has supported the redevelopment of Union Terrace Gardens since the early proposals which failed to win Lottery funding. The location of some of his interests outside his job as a consultant for Brewin Dolphin make it evident why. He is on the development Board of the Mither Kirk Project which aims to make St Nicholas a focal point of the city and he is also chairman of Robert Gordon’s College. Both lie a stone’s throw from what could become the new city square.

“You would create civic pride in a great area as an anchor to retail and if done properly a great anchor for tourism. All sorts of things start spinning off of that. You then also have a great anchor for arts and culture which the North-east needs to do provide more support for.”

Mr Crosby, who replaced outgoing president Mike Salter on completion of his term of office, was awarded an OBE in 1994 for his services to the housing movement and has worked in the investment industry for many years. The embryonic Aberdeen Asset Management had 12 employees when he joined in 1988, having been enticed away from the legal profession where he was a partner in a local firm. The move to Investment management enabled him to use more of his accountancy skills having also qualified as a CA. He headed the private client side of AAM until it was sold in 2007 to Brewin Dolphin (formerly Bell Lawrie) where he moved with his team.

Also recently appointed to the board of ACSEF, he hints at a touch of frustration that there are many proposals for the North-east at the moment - from the Trump development and the Western Peripheral Route to Union Terrace Gardens and Energetica – but few tangibles and he is keen to do his bit to drive them forward.

“There is no point in sitting on the sidelines complaining that nothing ever gets done,” he said. “As John Michie said at the Chamber AGM, there comes a time when you have to ‘not be dour, but be a doer’.”

A full list of the Chamber’s Board and Policy Council is on our website under the Meet the Team section.

meet the vice-presidents

Zoe Corsi is a Director of the BIG Partnership and a highly regarded public relations practitioner in the North of Scotland. With almost 20 years experience in PR she has a vast network of contacts at the highest levels in the media and the private and public sectors in Scotland. She was recently ranked 14th in a poll of the top 50 most influential women in communications and the media by The Drum magazine.

Zoe worked for an international PR and marketing agency in Paris from 1986 until 1992 when she returned to Aberdeen as Public Affairs Manager at Aberdeen Chamber of Commerce. She was head-hunted from the Chamber in 1999 to set up an Aberdeen office for a UK-wide consultancy and then in 2002 set up the Big Partnership in the North of Scotland. It now employs more than 90 across the UK and has a turnover of just over £7 million. The agency has been ranked number one outwith London by PR Week for the last two years.

Chris Lloyd is a Chartered Accountant and has spent more than 25 years in corporate finance and industry. He worked with PriceWaterhouseCoopers in Edinburgh before transferring to Aberdeen in 1990. He joined the MBO team at British International Helicopters in 1993 as Finance Director and, after the company was acquired by CHC Helicopter Corporation the following year, he transferred to the head office in St. John's Newfoundland for three years becoming CFO of the group.

Chris returned to Aberdeen in 1997 as Finance Director of ASCO becoming European Managing Director in 2003. Following the company's sale to private equity firm Phoenix Equity Partners he left to set up his own Environmental Services business, Steminic Limited, in April 2007. Steminic is backed by Maven Capital Partners and Barclays and provides specialist cleaning and equipment rental services to the offshore oil and gas industry and onshore distillery, utilities and construction sectors.