New editor recognises the vital role of business in city

That was the motivation behind Nancy Fielder’s first ‘meet the editor’ event at our offices in the city centre.

Six weeks into the job, she asked me to invite 10 people in for a chat over lunch.

The agenda? One of Nancy’s first actions was to launch the Pride in Sheffield campaign to shout about its strengths, from enterprise to heritage and from real ale to retail.

And business plays a part in all of them.

Nancy said: “The Pride in Sheffield campaign covers so many areas, there’s something for everyone to get involved in.”

The event also gave people the chance to tell us about their plans, ambitions and successes.

And they got to meet new people and make connections, since no-one in the room had met everyone else in the room.

So who was there?

Nancy, business editor David Walsh and managing editor Rob Hollingworth welcomed Craig McKay, Master Cutler and director of Evenort, a Dinnington engineering firm, who kindly attended despite one of the busiest diaries in business.

We also hosted Richard Wright, Sheffield Chamber executive director, Nigel Brewster of recruitment firm Brewster Pratap and vice chair of Sheffield City Region Local Enterprise Partnership, Craig Gray, NatWest director of commercial banking South Yorkshire, Mark Serby, partner at Sheffield law firm Wake Smith, Petra Billing, Sheffield office managing partner at law firm DLA Piper and PR manager Linzi Goldthorpe, Andy Baker, chief executive of Plusnet, with PR officer Emma Bull, and Hayley Gillbard, founder of Sheffield firm Crystal Clean Service, which has 73 employees.

Recognising the vital role business plays, Nancy has scheduled ‘meet the editor’ sessions all year.

To register an interest in attending, email [email protected]