Lord Black of Brentwood is Deputy Chairman of the Telegraph Media Group (publisher of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Telegraph). Previously he was Director of Communications for Conservative Central Office and Press Secretary to Rt Hon Michael Howard QC, and Director of the UK Press Complaints Commission. Additionally, he is Chairman of the Press Standards Board of Finance, Chairman of the Royal College of Music, Vice-President, News Media Europe and Patron of the Rory Peck Trust.

Sir Robert is the chair of Albany Associates. He completed a full military career that included posts as Commandant General of the Royal Marines and Director of Operations in the MoD, advising successive Prime Ministers on the response to 9/11. After leaving military service in 2007 he became CEO of Hewlett Packard’s defence and security business and was appointed chair of Albany Associates in 2011. He is a member of the executive council of the Royal United Services Institute and a visiting professor at King’s College, London. He writes occasionally for a number of periodicals and is a regular contributor to Prospect Magazine.

Dieter co-founded Albany after a career in the Royal Marines, running a niche regional PR agency, holding several senior positions in Bosnia’s media and communications regulatory authority and working in Iraq as a communications consultant for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. He has garnered over 20 years of experience in strategic communications, institution building and media and communications regulatory development, helping to establish and advising more than twenty media and press councils across South East Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Dieter is on the board of trustees for the Commonwealth Press Union Media Trust.

Simon is an early innovator in media interventions in countries emerging from violent conflict. Since co-founding Albany, he has directed strategic communications, CVE and media development projects across Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe. He is a frequent speaker on information operations and counter radicalisation and propaganda issues. He also served for 23 years as an officer in the UK Royal Marines. In the Balkans, from 1996 to 2003, he was the NATO Spokesman in Sarajevo, Deputy High Representative for Media Affairs in the High Representative’s office in Bosnia, Temporary Media Commissioner in Kosovo and then Director of Public Information for UN mission there. He then went on to head the UK FCO’s media development team in Iraq.

Doug is a lawyer specialising in media and communications strategy and policy.  He has advised government and civil society, drafted legislation and regulation, and developed and implemented programmes for a number of communications projects across Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.  His expertise includes ICT law, broadband, digitalisation, broadcast and internet policy.  Prior to joining Albany, Doug was in private practice with an international law firm in New York, Moscow and Paris.  Doug also speaks French.

Jem leads Albany’s training in media relations, media literacy and strategic communications with a specific interest in communication aspects of foreign policy and post-conflict reconstruction. He has delivered courses across Africa, the Middle East and Asia and has developed and implemented instruction for UK ambassadors and senior UN management. Prior to joining Albany, he had a long career in the Royal Navy, where he was spokesperson for the EU in Bosnia-Hercegovina and Chief Instructor at the UK MoD's Defence Media Operations Centre.

Kerry is Albany's Head of Finance and oversees the finance function in all aspects, including working on projects, managing accounts and business development. Kerry started her career off in the private sector, working for a diving company as a finance manager, looking after entities in the Middle East, Europe and the head office in UK. Before joining Albany, she worked for a global company on compliance and finance projects, implementing new ways of workings to non-finance members, and looking after the Western Europe Credit control.

Piers leads on Albany’s inbound and outbound business development activity. He has 15 years of experience in procurement, pursuit management and bid writing. Prior to his career in international development, he worked in the transport and health sectors, including on successful, multi-billion-pound public procurement contracts. He has extensive experience of managing applications and securing funds from donors including FCDO, USAID, World Bank and UN agencies. He has delivered pursuits across a wide range of technical subject areas including stabilisation, peacebuilding, crisis response, governance, and global health.

Joe joined Albany in March 2022 as Project Accountant, having previously worked for 5 years as an Accounts Manager & Finance Assistant within his family's Essex based marketing company, Green Square, where his role was also that of IT and Web Assistant. Joe studied Accounting and Business Studies at college, and discovered a natural passion for problem solving and objective, analytical thinking. Away from work, Joe is a fully qualified, CAA licenced, commercial drone pilot and a former semi-professional gamer. Albany's industry sector compliments Joe's interest in domestic and global news and current affairs.

Yusra is Albany’s MEL Manager and possesses both a depth and breadth of experience in a wide variety of monitoring, evaluation and learning systems from within the research, NGO and private sectors. She currently leads the MEL of FCDO-funded ‘Early Recovery Initiative’ and ‘Women to Women’ programmes in Somalia. Prior to joining Albany, she managed the implementation and MEL systems for IDS’s CREID programme in Iraq, focusing on Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB), curricula development, participatory research methods, and training of teachers. With a background in journalism and media production, Yusra also developed in-depth knowledge about problems on the ground pertaining ethnic and sectarian conflicts, press freedoms, displacement, and poverty. She is bilingual English and Arabic and has MA Human Rights and International Relations from Roehampton University.

Gaia is Albany's Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning Executive. She has used her specialism in digital monitoring tools to support programmes based in the Middle East, West and East Africa. Gaia has recently graduated from King's College London War Studies Department. Her area of interest focuses on perceptions of nuclear terrorism, as well as the integration of new technologies within counter-terrorism measures. Gaia can speak French, Italian, English, and Russian.

Joe is Albany’s Strategy and Innovation Researcher, responsible for monitoring international developments in information operations and extremist messaging and liaising with experts in those fields. Before joining Albany in 2021, Joe studied International Security and Terrorism at the University of Nottingham. Since graduating in 2020, he has been involved in research projects tracking the rise of antisemitic conspiracy theories online for the National Holocaust Museum and profiling VEOs for Janes Intelligence.

Drawing on his experience in Media Communications, Adam currently works to deliver a number of comms-focused programmes, aimed at eradicating Violent Extremism across East and West Africa. Some deliverable themes of Adam’s current programmes at Albany centre on VEO defection, regional capacity building, conflict resolution and community resilience. Adam holds a Bachelor’s in International Studies and Japanese Language from the University of Leiden, Netherlands, where he built upon his knowledge and experience in areas of Intercultural Communication, Global Politics, Ethnic & Religious Conflict and Gender Relations.

Coming soon!

Coming soon!