Advisory Group

The advisory group for IWMW events aims to identify key themes and subject areas of relevance to members of institutional web and digital team, to suggest possible speakers and to advise on the format of the event. Members of the advisory group are usually experienced members of institutional web teams, although we also try to ensure that there are new members of the group every year in order to provide fresh insights. We seek to ensure that the advisory group membership provides a geographical spread, with a range of areas of particular interest.

Developments To This Year’s Advisory Group

Following the success of last year’s event (in which Claire Gibbons, the IWMW 2017 event co-chair provided additional dedicated support) we have implemented a number of developments to the advisory group in order to help make next year’s event even more successful.

  • The Advisory Group had its first online meeting in September 2017 (about 4 month’s earlier than last year).
  • In order to provide fresh insights into the planning for the IWMW 2018 event we have appointed four new members to this year’s Advisory  Group.
  • We have introduced project-oriented working, with advisory group members taking responsibility for working on or managing projects related to the planning and delivery of the event or supporting the community.
  • We are making use of additional project management and other tools to support our work.

Members of the IWMW 2018 Advisory Group

The nine members of the IWMW 2018 Advisory Group are:


Brian Kelly

UK Web Focus, founder of IWMW event and co-chair of IWMW 2018

Brian Kelly helped establish the first institutional web site at the University of Leeds in January 1993 and then spent several years promoting use of web technologies. In 1996 he was appointed as UK Web Focus, a national web coordination role based at UKOLN, University of Bath. In this role he established the first Institutional Web Management Workshop in 1997 and continued managing the event until 2013 when, due to Jisc’s cessation of core funding of UKOLN, the organisation was shut down. In 2014 Brian set up a company to continue delivering the IWMW event.

I’m looking forward to working with the IWMW 2018 Advisory Group in helping to deliver next year’s event. In particular I’m pleased to welcome several new members to this year’s Advisory group.

Contact details:


Claire Gibbons

Independent consultant and co-chair of IWMW 2018

Claire Gibbons is a freelance consultant, working mainly across the HE and charity sectors on content marketing, web and digital improvement projects, and digital governance audits and strategies.

Prior to going freelance in the summer of 2016, Claire headed up the Web and Print teams at the University of Bradford, and was responsible for the University’s website and printed materials, leading two small teams of web and print specialists for many years, and through many a change.

Claire’s general mantra in life is ‘user first’ especially across all aspects of the student journey, and is always on the look-out for new collaborations and initiatives to enable teams, and individuals to work better together to improve the user journey.

Claire has been involved in IWMW events since attending her first IWMW event in 2000, where the millennium bug failed to bite, and has been a regular speaker and workshop leader at many IWMW events since. Last year Claire ran a masterclass on Leadership, Governance and Change – a topic that is working its way up the agendas of many a HE institution. Claire became co-chair of the IWMW Advisory Group and event in 2017 in order to help support the long-term sustainability of the IWMW event.

As part of the IWMW 2018 Advisory Group Claire is keen to get sponsors and supporters on board to assist with the sustainability and affordability of the event, and to ensure that IWMW is welcoming and supportive to all.

Contact details:


Dan Wiggle

Head of Marketing Services, University of York

Dan Wiggle leads the content, digital and creative functions within the central Marketing team. Our team has been in place since February 2017 following a significant restructure and a core part of my role is managing the flow of work into and out of our expanded team. Prior to our restructure Dan was Digital Communications Manager and has worked in web and digital things in HE for about 15 years.

Dan’s first IWMW was in 2007, which was the previous time the event was held in York and just a few months after he joined the organisation. Dan has been a regular attendee since and have found it to be an invaluable opportunity to learn from such a brilliant community of like-minded folk. “I’m hoping this year to help us run a slick operation on our amazing campus at York to meet the high bar set at all the recent events elsewhere!

Contact details:


Mike McConnell

Business Applications Manager, University of Aberdeen

Mike McConnell is the Business Applications Manager for IT Services at the University of Aberdeen. His role involves working with systems, processes and people to provide continuous service improvement for the institution.

Mike manages analysts and developers responsible for digital, web, library and corporate applications. He has 18 years’ experience of staff, customer, supplier and project management.

Contact details:


Andrew Millar

Head of Web Services, University of Dundee

Andrew Millar has responsibility for the overall web estate and underlying strategy for web within our institution. Over the past two years we have completed over 80,000 edits of the corporate site alone, but we are embarking on a massive project to completely rip out our entire corporate site and build it from the ground up. Our main problems are not primarily technical in nature, but cultural. So a large part of my role is trying to bring people together from across the institution and encouraging them to think differently about how we “do web” at the University of Dundee.

IWMW 2018 will be Andrew’s seventh time attending this conference, and every year I love it more. “I came looking for tips and tricks, but I’ve stayed for the community! For the past two years I’ve been on the Advisory Group that helps to make the conference a reality. I love generating conversations around change and culture and hope to try and do more of that this year“.

Contact details:


Kevin Mears

Senior Designer, University of South Wales

Kevin Mears works as a part of a cross departmental team producing websites for a wide variety of stakeholders. He is especially interested in style guides, workflows and standards that drive better products. Kevin would be very happy to talk to anyone thinking of presenting how they work, especially new voices to this community.

Contact details:


Carley Hollis

Head of Digital Communications, University of St Andrews

Carley Hollis is the head of the digital communications team at the University of St Andrews. Her background is in content strategy and marketing, but she now focuses on digital governance, strategy and the education of colleagues across the University. She is the spokesperson for the diversely skilled ten-person digital communications team, and communicates the vision for the future of digital at St Andrews. Recent years have seen St Andrews undertake a large-scale programme of projects to completely overhaul the external facing webpages whilst also (slowly) changing the perception of the team, their projects and products. Next steps involve thinking about how they can continue to carry the digital transformation agenda into the future.

Carley first attended IWMW in 2015, and was a first-time plenary speaker at IWMW 2017, giving a talk titled ‘High Sights, High Standards‘. She’s interested in ensuring that the IWMW 2018 programme is as diverse as the sector is, and would like to ensure that senior management across institutions are made aware of IWMW. She’s also thinking about how we can encourage more networking – not just during the conference, but in the weeks leading up to and after it. Despite generally eschewing organised fun, she’s already started to think of questions for the conference dinner quiz!

Contact details:


Kat Husbands

Digital Content Officer, University of Glasgow

Based in Information Services, Kat Husbands is the main architect and designer of ‘MyGlasgow’, the university’s internally-facing website for staff and current students. Building on its successful launch in August 2017, Kat now guides the site’s distributed community of editors to shape internal content and support internal communications. She’s also developing a framework for user research, and is determined to spread the joys of UX to all aspects of university life.

Kat first attended IWMW in 2017, so brings to the Advisory Group the perspective of a gleefully enthused newbie! She looks forward to hearing more inspiring and/or cautionary tales of culture change and grassroots tactics, and to making 2018’s newcomers feel as welcome as she felt.

Contact details:


Gareth Edwards

Digital Manager and Strategist, University of Greenwich

Gareth Edwards is a Digital Manager and Strategist at the University of Greenwich. In 2015 he was recruited to lead a complete rebuild of the University’s digital properties and to help embed a digital-first culture within the institution. Still a relative newcomer to the Higher Education sector, Gareth has spent most of his career in the publishing industry. There he was responsible for helping a number of major publishers in Britain and the US build successful websites and the cultures and teams required for them to prosper.

Gareth has spoken extensively on the subject of digital change to a variety of technical and non-technical audiences at conferences and events. He is also Editor of London Reconnections, one of the UK’s leading transport magazines. In this capacity he has made appearances on both radio and TV talking about design, change and user management on the railways.

Contact details: