Chantal Wilson: Chair
Chantal joined the CMS Board as Chair in early 2024 having served as a volunteer mentor since our inception. She runs an architectural design business with her husband and has several voluntary roles, including being a Deputy Lieutenant of East Sussex. She is chairman of Crowborough Community Association and the Friends of Crowborough Hospital which has earned the Queen’s award for voluntary service. Chantal has previously been a trustee of the Friends of Sussex Hospices and has served as a parish, town & district councillor for many years. She is the recent past chairman of Action in Rural Sussex.
Tim Hancock: Trustee & Treasurer
Tim spent his career in the City of London and was previously a Partner of Rothschild, the global investment bank, enjoying an extensive career with experience in banking and corporate advisory work, specialising in mergers and acquisitions. He is both a volunteer mentor and serves as our Treasurer at Charity Mentors, having been a trustee since the beginning in late 2019. Tim is currently a non-executive director of two private companies and an adviser to a private equity ‘value-for-control fund’.
Chris Gebbie: Trustee
Chris was a dentist by profession and ran his own practice locally in East Sussex for almost 40 years. He has held various voluntary, chairman roles both while he was working and since retirement, including Chair of Sussex Heritage Trust between 1996-2013. Chris also served as a magistrate on the Brighton / Hove bench between 1988-2013 and was appointed High Sheriff, East Sussex in 2014-15. A deputy lieutenant for several years, Chris has been Chair of Charity Mentors since the formation of the trustee board in 2019 and was instrumental in the development of the charity from the beginning.
Jane Roberts: Trustee
Jane worked in marketing on the client side and then as a strategic brand development consultant for a wide range of international clients. After moving to Sussex, she swapped her career for a position on the Chailey Heritage Foundation Trustee Board where she was instrumental in setting up, monitoring, and overseeing the fundraising department through capital appeals and ongoing fundraising, including auditing for compliance with Charity Commission requirements, until recent retirement. Jane also volunteers as a mentor with Charity Mentors.
Lauren Lloyd: Trustee
Lauren has held a few leadership roles within the charitable sector, most recently with Richard Place Dobson Foundation in Crawley. She was instrumental in helping Charity Mentors move into West Sussex while CEO at Mid-Sussex Voluntary Action and experienced our mentoring first hand as a mentee, while in that role during 2020. Joined the trustee board as recently as July 2022.
Caroline Peat: Project Co-ordinator
Caroline is a semi-retired business consultant, with experience of developing and delivering community investment programmes for the Home Office to supporting grass root charities during set-up and expansion. She has been an advisor to Young Enterprise, Member of Partners in Leadership and Chair of Association of Payroll Giving Organisations. Caroline is also credited with printed articles in ‘Making More Than Money’, and Change the World for a Fiver – We are What we do.
Richard Pearson
Richard is an economist and was Director of the Institute of Employment Studies for 12 years working across the private and public sectors.
He has extensive charity expertise. He set up the Lewes Fund to help fund local community groups and has had Chairing and Trustee roles at Care for the Carers, Sussex Oakleaf, Lewes and District Citizens Advice, and the Lewes Community Land Trust, with mentoring roles in the Arts sector.
Derek Stevens
Derek has a background in public finance and prior to retirement was Chief Executive of Rother District Council. He has a wide range of interests including membership of the De la Warr Pavilons’ Capital Appeals Committee, is Treasurer of the Rural Rother Trust and as a former G.B. International marathon runner, has been pleased to return to his old club as a Trustee of Hastings A.C. An active Deputy Lieutenant in East Sussex he has been extremely pleased to see Charity Mentors develop from humble beginnings into a much valued Sussex wide organisation.
