Board

Jo joined UK100 in August 2020 bringing 15 years of experience in financial planning, HR, governance and compliance in the not-for-profit sector with her. She has been operations director and company secretary at Green Alliance, a think tank and charity focussed on ambitious leadership for the environment, since 2016. She has held a number of senior operations and company secretary roles in the charity sector, overseeing financial, HR and governance matters. She holds a Master’s degree in Voluntary Sector Management from Cass Business School’s Centre for Charity Effectiveness and a BA in Religious Studies and Philosophy from Lancaster University.

Polly established UK100 in 2016 and led the organisation until early 2023. She is a campaigning and communications specialist with extensive experience in media, government and politics. Polly liaises with local leaders and directly elected mayors and is able to develop and maintain strong relationships with extensive contacts across the political and nonprofit spectrum. A former broadcast journalist (BBC 1993-2007), she was special adviser at DECC (2008-10), Director of Communications on Sadiq Khan’s selection campaign to be a London Mayoral candidate (2015), and Head of Communications and Campaigns at Citizens Advice (2013-15).

Isabella is an experienced and highly-networked environmental strategic communications professional with a political background in Westminster and Brussels. She founded Seahorse Environmental following a corporate background at two of Europe’s leading communications consultancies Burson-Marsteller, part of WPP, and Maitland, part of Havas, where she headed up their environmental practice. For a number of years, Isabella was Policy Adviser to Zac Goldsmith MP where she helped shape his policies, led the development of policy proposals to Government and managed his international environmental campaigns.

Guy oversees policy, marketing and communications, bid management and stakeholder relations for Energy Systems Catapult, as well as being responsible for developing and monitoring the Catapult’s overall strategy. He joined Energy Systems Catapult in September 2018 after being Energy and Climate Adviser to Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Greg Clark. Guy was previously Special Adviser to former Energy Secretary Amber Rudd. Before that, he was Head of Policy at energy supplier, Ovo Energy and worked at the think tank, Policy Exchange, where he was Head of Environment and Energy. He was previously a journalist, including three years as a foreign correspondent in Hong Kong for the newswire, AFP.

Rishi oversees NatWest Group's climate and sustainable finance activities, also exploring other funding opportunities with social impact and purpose for the bank and communities its active in. He also leads on the bank's response to the just transition. Rishi is also a Camden Council councillor representing Bloomsbury Ward. He also Chair of the London Borough of Camden's Pension Committee which is a £1.8bn LGPS pension scheme. In all his roles Rishi seeks to champion diversity and inclusion and drive more sustainable thinking and behaviours across sectors.

Maddy is a communications and campaigns expert, specialised in coaching and mentoring teams to be ambitious in strategy and delivery in dynamic fast-moving environments. Currently with the UK programme of the European Climate Foundation, she has worked for a wide range of organisations, including digital campaign platforms, climate action groups, think tanks and for-profit businesses.

Emma Pinchbeck is the Chief Executive of Energy UK, a position that she has held since July 2020. She is an expert in whole-economy decarbonisation and the energy transition. She also holds several board advisory positions. Emma has two children and shares childcare with her husband. She is passionate about efforts to improve diversity in the energy industry. From 2016-2020, she served as Deputy CEO of the trade body Renewable UK, in which role she also sat on the Board of Scottish Renewables. Prior to this, Emma was Head of Climate Change at WWFU-K. She has an MA from the University of Oxford.