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GreenSquareAccord appoints new permanent finance boss
GreenSquareAccord has appointed a new finance boss to start in the new year, six months after the last permanent incumbent left.
The 25,000-home landlord, which was formed in April this year through a merger, has announced that Jo Makinson will join the organisation as chief financial officer early next month.
Ms Makinson, who is currently director of finance and digital transformation at Bristol-based retirement home specialist St Monica Trust, will take over from interim chief financial officer Tom Willis.
Mr Willis has been in the role since September after GreensquareAccord’s last permanent finance chief, Stuart Fisher, left the landlord in July.
Mr Fisher was also deputy chief executive of the newly formed organisation and spent around a decade before that at Accord.
Inside Housing has asked GreenSquareAccord to confirm why Mr Fisher stepped down and where he moved to.
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Ms Makinson’s appointment comes two months after it emerged that GreenSquareAccord had breached the English regulator’s Home Standard. It was found that hundreds of the landlord’s homes do not have a current fire risk assessment and more than 10,000 have never had an electrical inspection.
Following the breach, Elisabeth Buggins, chair of GreenSquareAccord, who only took up the role in January, stepped down.
Ms Makinson is also a senior independent director at 35,000-home association Abri.
She began her career in London working at a social development consultancy, before moving to Bristol in 2006 where she spent six years working for accountancy giant PwC.
In the past 10 years, Ms Makinson has been boss of Bristol Community Health and finance director at Bristol-based housing association United Communities.
Ruth Cooke, chief executive at GreenSquareAccord, said: “Jo brings a wealth of experience to the role and will be a strong addition to our team as we build better lives by investing in local communities to deliver affordable homes.”
Ms Cooke is the former boss of Midland Heart and spent a brief spell as chief executive of Clarion Housing Group in 2018.
She took over at GreenSquare in May 2019 and was appointed as chief executive of the enlarged organisation after the merger of 12,000-home GreenSquare and 13,000-home Accord in April this year.
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