“You never really know a man until you understand things from his point of view, until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. J.B. Lippincott & Co
Well, Expat Academy have done exactly that, which is what makes us so uniquely different to any other network for Global Mobility professionals.
We have an amazing team who bring many years of both in-house and consulting experience and our focus is on making your Global Mobility function better and helping you develop your Global Mobility skills and expertise.
Our aim is quite simple – to advance global mobility by setting standards, promoting best practice and facilitating a supportive community for international members to learn, connect and share.
If you want to get in contact to learn more about us then email tony@expat-academy.com.
Our team

Emma Holder
Emma trained as a consultant at both Arthur Andersen and PwC and then moved to work in-house for Goldman Sachs and Diageo plc. She facilitates many cross-industry Global Mobility forums and is at the cutting edge of the latest trends and news in the Global Mobility Industry. For fun, she loves the theatre, dancing and travelling.

James Holder
James has over 25 years of Global Mobility experience gained from both in-house and consultancy roles. He started his career with Arthur Andersen, specialising in international tax and HR. His in-house roles include EMEA lead at Goldman Sachs and Global Head of Mobility at both Diageo and BP.
James co-founded Expat Academy in 2010. He has a real passion for training and development.

Sharon Thorpe
Sharon has more than 20 years of broad HR experience. She has worked at JCDecaux and Williams Lea, where her client base was within the Financial Services Sector. Expat Academy partner with best-in class training partners and Sharon works with Expat Academy to ensure that we are always partnering with organisations who can add the most value to our members.

Laura Mayo
Laura brings with her more than 20 years’ account management experience. Over the last eight years she has worked closely with global mobility specialists from a wide range of industries. In particular, her work has focussed on intercultural training and broader corporate training for HR professionals. Laura manages all aspects of Expat Academy’s Corporate Membership.

Greg Smith
Greg has in-house Global Mobility experience spanning aerospace and defence, education, and tobacco sectors. His most recent role was leading the European region for Lockheed Martin's Global Mobility activities, designing and implementing their EU Posted Worker compliance. Outside of work Greg is married with two crazy kids and a cat who turned out to be the biggest breed of domestic cat in the world. Greg likes wine, watches, cars, and supports Southampton FC.

Chris Blair
Chris is an experienced Global Mobility professional. His most recent in-house role was at Aviva where he managed intra UK, EMEA, APAC and Americas moves as being responsible for fundamental change and development of the team and it’s processes. Prior to that Chris held roles as a HR generalist, following 8 Years of being a Youth Worker with The Salvation Army. He has a wonderful family of 5 Kids (4 girls and a boy) and a cockapoo called Oreo. In his spare time he enjoys playing in a band, supporting Liverpool FC and completing house DIY projects.

Tony Miller
Tony brings with him more than 25 years of experience within Global Mobility from a supplier perspective. His previous consultative approach to business development allows him to understand both the GM requirement of the corporate as well as the capabilities of the available supply options.

Lynda Brennam
Lynda has more than 25 years international HR experience in both not for profit and commercial environments. Her experience includes insurance, airlines, and consultancy. Most recently, Lynda worked in the charity sector for Marie Stopes International and the Lumos Foundation providing support to staff working in challenging, and sometimes dangerous, environments.

Astrid Hunton
Astrid has over 15 years of experience in marketing. She has worked in a variety of marketing and communication positions covering a broad range of industries such as retail, financial services and design agency. Astrid supports the Expat Academy team in an administration and marketing role.

Sugi Thatcroos
Sugi has 5 years experience of Account Management in the Cyber Security Sector. As Client Relationships Manager, he focusses on driving engagement to help Global Mobility professionals stay on top of the latest mobility trends. In his spare time, Sugi enjoys trying new foods and creating music with friends.

Rachel Mynott
Rachel has a background in project and product management, with a love for learning and organisation! As Virtual Learning Advisor, she is here to help MyGMPD members on their learning journey and support them in achieving accreditation. Behind the scenes, she updates the Learning Hub with the latest content and administers all the learning logs. Rachel has a passion for art & design, and in her spare time enjoys painting and visiting exhibitions.

Doris
A very wise and valued member of the Expat Academy team, who will give you her full and frank opinion on any quandary you may have.
She lives by the mantra "if you don't want my opinion don't ask for it"
Membership feedback
"It’s great to share ideas and have a brainstorm with peers about what’s happening in the industry without any pressure. Hearing in practice how people get things done and what work arounds they’ve found is always useful." Victoria Christofides, Thomson Reuters
"Expat Academy is an extremely useful resource for GM professionals. It’s great to have the facility to pass questions across which members will respond to. Lots of different networking and knowledge sharing events – plenty of opportunity to discuss relevant topics which are important to you and your GM programme." Wendy Maynard, IHG
"I have been a member of the Expat Academy for a number of years and have always found it an invaluable source for information, assistance and networking in the global mobility field. Their events are a great opportunity to meet GM professionals from other industries and companies and will often be a sounding board for the ideas and work which I am applying in my day to day job. Their training courses are a great resource for those new to the field and they are extremely proactive in helping you stay on top of quickly moving trends and compliance issues." Ed Sides, Equinor
"Our Expat Academy membership has been invaluable in helping to update and refine our internal mobility policies. The roundtable benchmarking facility helps us to “sense check” our approach on specific issues very quickly and the process is always efficiently undertaken by the team. We are very pleased to be a part of the Club 100 Network!"
Suzzette Vidal, MBDA Systems
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