Dr. David Hancock

Dr. David Hancock is Director of Risk & Assurance for the London Development Agency (LDA) with responsibilities for all risk management activities including health & safety, business continuity and audit throughout the Agency and its partners. The LDA works for the Mayor, co-ordinating economic development and regeneration across the capital. With a budget of £700 million, it promotes business and works in partnership with industry, the public and voluntary sectors to create opportunities so all can benefit from London's economy. The variety of projects ranges from construction and infrastructure projects such as Wembley stadium and the Olympics to tourism, health, diversity and worklessness. Before that he was an Executive Director with Halcrow Group, responsible for growing their Consultancy business from 270 staff to over 700 in 5 years. He has a wide breadth of knowledge in project management and complex projects and extensive experience in opportunity & risk management, with special regard to the people & behavioural aspects and is trained in applied business psychology. His research areas include; developing high performing teams for projects, creative industries and sports teams and rethinking project management as a social rather than a process driven delivery mechanism. From 1998-2001 he was responsible for developing and delivering the Opportunity-Risk management system for the £4.2bn Terminal 5 Project at Heathrow, working with British Airways (BA), British Airports Authority (BAA) and their suppliers. From 1996–1997 he was the Risk Manager for the £500M Copenhagen Metro project integrating Companies from 5 different national backgrounds into a single risk management process. Prior to this he was involved with the Nirex underground nuclear waste repository as principal mining consultant and before that spent 10 years with the Army and the Royal Marines. His Clients have included; Ministry Of Defence, Qatar Petroleum, BAE Systems and a variety of Engineering contracting organisations and has been involved with Public Sector projects developing PFI and PPP contracts. He has spoken and lectured in Asia, Africa, North & South America and Europe and has an engineering degree and PhD in from the University of Nottingham and later added an MBA from the University of Bath and a political and social science qualification from the University of Oxford. He is a Chartered Engineer and a Chartered Fellow of the Institute of Personnel and Development.

The London Development Agency is the Mayor of London’s agency responsible for driving London's sustainable economic growth - its job is to ensure that London remains a global success story. To help deliver this it works with partners from industry, public and voluntary sectors. As well as driving forward equality, health and sustainability, its work is prioritised by four themes.

Investment in places and infrastructure:
to deliver more effective infrastructure for future growth and create healthy, sustainable, high-quality communities. We are investing in the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games as part of our effort to regenerate the Lower Lea Valley and the wider Thames Gateway.

Investment in people:
to tackle the barriers to employment that still affects too many Londoners. We rolled out the Diversity Works campaign to tackle discrimination in all its forms - against disabled people, older people, women, and people from BME communities.

Investment in enterprise:
to tackle the barriers to enterprise start-up, growth and competitiveness. We want to maintain London's position as a key enterprise and trading location; to support new business start-ups and medium-sized business growth.

Finally, investment in marketing and promotion:
is about harmonising the way we promote this city to the rest of the UK and the outside world. We aim to maintain and develop London as a top international destination and the principal UK gateway for tourism, education and investment.