An introduction to our newest star recruits
As 2022 gets off to a rollicking start, we’re incredibly excited to report that our team is continuing to grow with new appointments across all areas of the business. We’ll be sharing stories of our teams and introducing PebblePaddlers old and new to you over coming months as we provide a bit of an insight into the people at the heart of our Learning Journey Platform. First up, we welcome Lisa and Sallie.
People and Education – the two biggest passions driving us here at PebblePad, and it’s no coincidence that the two latest amazing people to join our team are coming on board with missions to help us in those two areas. It’s a pleasure to introduce Lisa Gray, our new Senior Consultant (Learning, Teaching and Assessment) and Sallie Allen, People and Culture Manager.
Lisa brings over two decades of experience working with universities and colleges (with over 17 at with renowned digital solutions and research provider Jisc), helping to support the use of digital approaches to enhance learning, teaching and assessment. We’re incredibly privileged to have her join the company, in a role helping customers address their most pressing issues as well as having an integral role in supporting PebblePad’s continued growth.
Sallie’s responsibilities will centre on supporting the team in all we do over the time we spend designing, building and delivering PebblePad to our wonderful customers. Sallie has a background as Head of HR for an IT services business and in recent years enjoyed running her own blended learning business. Most recently she’s been looking at virtual reality experiences as part of soft skills training as well as working as a HR Consultant, and again, we are very fortunate to have Sallie’s expertise in ensuring the fabulous people in our employment are happy, healthy and enjoying their PebblePad roles.
We’re delighted to welcome Lisa and Sallie to our fabulous team. Just a month in, and they are already making a huge difference and I look forward to seeing them more regularly in person as we start to be able to actually see each other face to face – hopefully with coffee, and accompanied by the cake our CEO Shane Sutherland keeps promising.
A few words from Lisa
I’m passionate about helping to ensure that students can excel in their learning, and are best prepared for their future life and work. An excellent educational experience isn’t just about learning knowledge, but about testing that knowledge in practice, developing new knowledge through experience, and providing authentic ways to assess learning. So being able to support our universities to create those authentic and meaningful experiences for their students, using digital to truly enhance how we do things, has been at the core of my work with Jisc. I’m now looking forward to helping deliver a digital solution that can truly enable the practices we have been advocating for many years.
Outside of work, I love windswept coastal walks, cycling and horse riding in our beautiful (if blustery!) countryside. And as well as love of a good book, I am attempting to create beautiful things in my new pottery class!
A few weeks in, and I’m absolutely delighted to now be working with the PebblePad team in my new role. I’m looking forward to seeing yet more examples of learning, teaching and assessment transformation in practice, but this time as part of the team!
A few words from Sallie
Supporting people to be their best selves at work has always been what’s driven me.
From recruiting staff at large scale events like Open Golf championships at the start of my career, to coaching one-to-one using Virtual Reality experiences most recently, I am passionate about people engaging with every part of their employment journey at work.
I’ve had the warmest of welcomes from the PebblePad team. As well as the planned onboarding, it’s been the little things that have made the difference; people just saying hi, checking in and a fabulous welcome pack! I’m incredibly excited about working with the team in what is already a great place to work, exploring even more innovative ways that we can attract, grow and retain talent. PebblePad is a fast-growing business, so I’ll be looking to listen and learn from PebblePaddlers and my fellow People professionals as to how we best attract new talent and further engage people at work.
Outside of work I am a member of a speakers’ club, which is all about having fun whilst listening and storytelling. I also enjoy volunteering. During the pandemic when I was unable to train people face to face, I started volunteering at a foodbank. At a time when I missed the buzz of workshops so very much, it was both great for my mental health and fulfilling. It’s great to see that at PebblePad we are offering so much flexibility around working arrangements, personalised L&D, and volunteering. Many roles enjoy Friday afternoons off!
