• About Us
  • The Team
    • David Docherty
    • Richard Greenhalgh
  • Associates
    • Dr Cathy Garner
    • Madeleine King
    • Peter Forbes, Associate Director, CIHE
    • Philip Ternouth, Associate Director, CIHE
  • Council Members
    • Alan Jenkins, Managing Director, Kaplan Open Learning
    • Alberto de Benedictis, Chief Executive, Finmeccanica UK
    • Andrew McNaughton, Deputy Chief Executive, Balfour Beatty Plc
    • Antonio Simoes, Deputy Chief Executive, HSBC Bank PLC
    • Arnold Longboy, Managing Director, Executive Education and External Relations, EMEA, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
    • Christopher Saul, Slaughter and May
    • David Abraham, Channel 4
    • David Eyton, BP
    • Dominic Casserley, McKinsey & Company
    • Dr David Grant, Vice-Chancellor, Cardiff University
    • Eric Thomas, University of Bristol
    • Gavin Patterson, BT Retail
    • Geoff Mulgan, Chief Executive, NESTA
    • Harvey McGrath, Prudential plc
    • Iain Gray, Chief Executive, Technology Strategy Board
    • Ian Sarson, Compass Group
    • Jeremy Darroch, Sky
    • Joe Greenwell CBE, Chairman, Ford of Britain
    • John Stewart, Legal & General
    • John Widdowson CBE, New College Durham
    • Kevin Sneader, Director and Managing Partner, McKinsey & Company
    • Marianne Fallon, Partner, Executive Board Member, UK Head of Corporate Affairs, UK Head of Charities, KPMG LLP
    • Michael Stevenson, Cisco
    • Nick Winser, National Grid
    • Nicola Dandridge, Chief Executive, Universities UK
    • Oliver Benzecry, Managing Director – UK & Ireland, Accenture
    • Patrick Hynes, UK Managing Director, Spencer Stuart
    • Phil Smith, Cisco
    • Professor Andrew Hamilton, Vice-Chancellor, University of Oxford
    • Professor Anton Muscatelli, University of Glasgow
    • Professor Antony J Chapman, Vice Chancellor, Cardiff Metropolitan University
    • Professor Colin Riordan, Vice-Chancellor, Cardiff University
    • Professor Dame Julia King, Aston University
    • Professor Don Nutbeam PhD FFPH, Vice Chancellor, University of Southampton
    • Professor Geneviève Berger, Chief Research & Development Officer, Unilever
    • Professor Graham Henderson, Teesside University
    • Professor Ian Diamond FBA FRSE AcSS, Vice-Chancellor, University of Aberdeen
    • Professor Julian M Crampton, University of Brighton
    • Professor Keith Burnett CBE, FRS, Vice-Chancellor, The University of Sheffield
    • Professor Madeleine Atkins, CBE, Vice-Chancellor, Coventry University
    • Professor Malcolm Grant, University College London
    • Professor Mark Smith, Vice-Chancellor, Lancaster University
    • Professor Michael Arthur, Vice-Chancellor, University of Leeds
    • Professor Pat Loughrey, Goldsmiths
    • Professor Patrick Vallance, President, Pharmaceuticals R&D, GSK
    • Professor Peter Downes, University of Dundee
    • Professor Quintin McKellar CBE, University of Hertfordshire
    • Professor Robert Allison, University of Loughborough
    • Professor Sir Adrian Smith, FRS, Vice-Chancellor, University of London
    • Professor Sir Christopher Snowden, University of Surrey
    • Rona Fairhead, Financial Times Group
    • Sam Laidlaw, Centrica Plc
    • Simon Bradley, EADS
    • Simon Lowth, AstraZeneca
    • Sir Alan Langlands, Chief Executive, HEFCE
    • Sir John Parker, Anglo American
    • Sir Martin Sorrell, Chief Executive, WPP
    • Sir Philip Hampton, RBS Group
    • Sir Rodney Brooke CBE, Chairman, QAA
    • Sir Roger Bone, President, Boeing UK Ltd
    • Steve Pateman, Executive Director, Head of UK Banking, Santander UK plc
    • Tim Melville-Ross CBE, HEFCE
    • Tracy Clarke, Standard Chartered Bank
    • Wendy Purcell, University of Plymouth
    • William Archer, Chief Executive Officer, i-graduate
    • William Macpherson, Chief Executive, QA
  • Funding Organisations
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    • Dr Martin Read, non-executive director of Invensys, Aegis Group, Lloyd’s
    • Professor Nigel Thrift, Vice-Chancellor, University of Warwick
    • Sir Richard Lambert
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William Macpherson, Chief Executive, QA

William has been Chief Executive of QA since June 2008 which is one of the UK’s largest learning businesses focused on IT, Project Management and Professional Development. In 2011, QA entered into a ground-breaking university/private partnership with the University of Ulster to open and operate campuses on a joint basis in London and Birmingham.

Before joining QA, William was Chief Executive of Kaplan International, and a member of Kaplan’s executive board, the education division of The Washington Post Company. At Kaplan, alongside responsibility for the training companies, William led and pioneered collaboration between Kaplan units and Universities in UK, Ireland, Singapore, Hong Kong and China, including pathway programmes, remote campuses, and new delivery methods to enable outreach to new pools of potential students. Prior to his 4 years at Kaplan, William ran The Financial Training Company, then the UK’s largest professional trainer of accountants.

William is a trustee of Care International, and chairs the Finance & Audit Committee. In his early career, he worked for Bain & Co. William has a law degree from Cambridge University and an MBA from INSEAD, where he was a Louis Franck Scholar.