Meet Our Team

Introducing the Talent Innovations team...

Elva Ainsworth
Founder

What are you passionate about? 
Empowering people in their jobs and careers, particularly women and their need to integrate all the areas of life
What are your outside interests? 
Singing, church bell-ringing and homeopathy plus enjoying my 3 children of course
What do you love most about work?
Partnering inspiring clients in their quest to make a difference in their organisation and for their people
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for? 
Being enthusiastic and visionary – and “loud” so I gather!
What are you accountable for at TI?
The strategic direction, the team and our consultancy practice, everything really
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI? 
Degree in Psychology, Masters in HR, 11 years in HR, 6 years in SHL managing the 360 business followed by 10 years of running the business and personal transformation training and coaching.  I’ve been involved in over a hundred 360 projects and given over a thousand 360/personality coaching feedback sessions.
 

Read Elva’s biography here

Mark Ainsworth
Technical Consultant
 

What are you passionate about?
Using science and technology to make sense of the world. I love creating tools that enable people to just ’see’ patterns and understand the truth of this messy world we live in so they don’t make stupid decisions!
What are your outside interests?
Taking photos of my lovely family, with the odd bit of church bellringing when I get time from the kids! I also love watching films.
What do you love most about work?
Making a difference to people, creating things that keep doing clever things long after I’ve gone home.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Knowing how to do something whizzy in Excel, running down our supply of Diet Cokes
What are you accountable for at TI?
Delivering analytical and technical things - resident ’boffin’.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
1st class degree in Experimental Psychology from Oxford University, MSc in Operational Research, experience creating tools and analyses that provide insights from complex data in British Airways, McLaren F1 team, Tesco and The Whole Story Ltd.
 

Read Mark’s biography here

Sarah O’Reilly
Managing Director

What are you passionate about?
Life, making a difference and gardening.
What are your outside interests?
Spending time with my family, gardening and travelling.
What do you love most about work?
Everything, great values, fantastic people, making a difference to people/organisations and seeing individuals and organisations transform and grow.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Delivering what I say I will and supporting the team to be the best they can.
What are you accountable for at TI?
Implementing the vision and strategy of Talent Innovations which offers brilliant online tools to empower and enable employee development and talent management. Managing the delivery and overseeing the team to ensure that clients have the best possible experience when using the tools and services that we are so passionate about.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
CIPD qualified and worked in HR for a blue chip company for 9 years.

Kim Black-Totham
Commercial Director

What are you passionate about?
Team, Transformation and making a difference
What are your outside interests?
Great wine, organic food, cooking, travelling, my family and home.
What do you love most about work?
I get to work with a great team and for a company that makes a real difference
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
To operate with integrity and produce extraordinary results. I can also be counted on to think creatively and for my interesting sense of humour.
What are you accountable for at TI?
Sales and Marketing strategy development - expansion and revenue growth.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
25 years sales and management experience- I have been particularly successful at revenue growth, developing strong client relationships and managing extraordinary teams.

Stephanie Warnes

Client Liaison Manager

What are you passionate about?
Psychology especially team work and relationships at work. I love seeing everyones style of working and how they relate to each other.
What are your outside interests?
Reading, travelling - Hamburg is one of my favourite places to visit after living there for a few years, live music (especially Kitty, Daisy and Lewis, my favourite band!) and my ultimate passion in life.... shoes!
What do you love most about work?
The variety and getting to see/help out in every department of the organisation. I especially like making things look exciting and interesting.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Reliability and sticking to deadlines/promises.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
MSc in Occupational Psychology with Level A and Intermediate B certificates in psychometric testing. A degree in Counselling and Therapeutic Studies and a Diploma in Psychology.

John Burnett
Senior Developer

What are you passionate about?
I just love making things that work. I’ve always been a techie and have never lost my enthusiasm for creating systems, especially when driven by new ideas.
What are your outside interests?
Family comes first: My wife Christine and I have 2 grown up sons. We now have a grandson for me to play with.
Others include: listening to rock music; watching sci-fi/horror films; reading sci-fi novels; playing with new technology, time & funds permitting.
What do you love most about work?
I enjoy the 100% concentration required for each project/task, whether large or small, with the opportunities to learn new and improve upon existing techniques for developing software systems.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
I am committed to delivering good quality robust and usable new and/or improved facilities to MyTalents, on time.
What are you accountable for at TI?
Senior IT developer responsible for the ongoing development of the MyTalent application and database.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
BSc (Hons) Electronics; Many, many, many.... years developing initially electronic but mainly software based systems and applications, including (most recent first):
3 years as both freelance and as a contractor developing web applications, most recently related to Enterprise Content Management systems for HM Govt.;
18 years at BT as a senior software engineer developing a wide range of systems from Billing to web-applications using various technologies and databases;
Have previously developed web-sites/applications using object oriented PHP and MySQL, which is the same technology underlying My Talent.

Adebola Olowofela
PHP Developer

What are you passionate about?
Just writing lines of codes that makes the web interesting... I love anything and everything about web application development.
What are your outside interests?
My family comes first and then football (Chelsea!!!), I love politics and I love music. I am super addicted to my headphones.
What do you love most about work?
The fact that every project/task is usually a new learning curve, web technologies evolves fast and been at work helps you keep tab on them because you are always solving new issues.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Being happy to take on new challenges anytime and applying new technologies to solve issues.
What are you accountable for at TI?
Usability of the MyTalent application and database, also creation of new features for the MyTalent application
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
1st class degree in Computer Science, Msc in IT Security from University of Westminster, I started developing at age 15 in 2004 and I have since gathered extensive knowledge of the use of PHP, JavaScript and JavaScript Frameworks most notably the jQuery Framework and also Coffeescript.  I love creating secure data-driven web apps using Object Oriented PHP and MYSQL. I am a Zend Certified PHP Developer and I have a great love for Relational Database Management Systems such as MySql, MSSQL, SqlLite and Oracle also my new found love "NoSQL" CouchDB and MongoDB. I am an Oracle 10g Certified Administrator and Professional, also an Oracle Certified MySql Administrator and Developer. I have in the past developed series of data-driven web applications using PHP, MySql and JavaScript(JQuery).

Dina Dasani

What are you passionate about?
Learning new things and developing myself. I enjoy taking on new challenges and get a real buzz when I can complete them. I am also passionate about my family and ensuring I spend time with them.
What are your outside interests?
Keeping fit, beauty therapy, cooking, reading and travelling. I enjoy visiting new places and learning about their language and culture. I experiment with new recipes and enjoy creating different dishes.
What do you love most about work?
I love the variety provided by my work-there are always new things to learn and develop.I enjoy being part of the team and finding out how the business can make a difference for our customers.
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Being reliable and accurate in my work. I seek to process all the business transactions on a timely basis and provide good information and analysis on the performance of the business
What are you accountable for at TI?
At TI, I have responsibility for all aspects of accounting, including:
Processing of supplier invoices and expenses
Maintaining the cash book
Helping manage the cash flow of the business;
Raising customer invoices and checking that they have  been paid on time; and
Providing reports on the business performance.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?
I am a qualified Accounting Technician and a Member of the Association of Accounting Technicians (MAAT). I graduated in 1983 and have a wide variety of accounting experience at all levels in different companies, both local businesses and International Firms. I also had the opportunity to work overseas in Chile where I learnt Spanish and did voluntary work for local charities.

Sarah Keane

Bureau and Team Administrator

What are you passionate about?
Transformation and development. I love learning new things and joining Talent Innovations has certainly helped with that!
What are your outside interests?
I enjoy travelling and reading. I love spending time with my family and friends, meeting new people and learning about other cultures.
What do you love most about work?
The team! They are all fantastic and so welcoming. The office is always buzzing and something is always happening, it really keeps me on my toes. Also being part of the social committee!
What can your colleagues and clients count on you for?
Accuracy and support.
What background and training do you have that is relevant to your work at TI?

My degree in History doesn’t sound like it would be too relevant but it has helped me understand people and their interactions with each other and the environment. I have also worked in various roles gaining a huge variety of skills from all types of departments.