Directors' declaration of interests
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Liz Nicholl CBE
Chief Executive
Having joined UK Sport in 1999, Liz Nicholl has played a pioneering role in the development of the elite sport system in the UK. For ten years, Liz led the work of UK Sport’s Performance Directorate through the Sydney, Athens and Beijing Olympic and Paralympic cycles as the Director of Elite Sport. Liz became the Chief Operating Officer in 2009 and was then appointed to the CEO role in September 2010. During her tenure as CEO, GB achieved record performances at London 2012, Sochi 2014 and Rio 2016. Liz is also a former international netball player and was CEO of England Netball for 16 years, including a period as Championship Director of a World Netball Championship. Liz received an MBE for services to netball in 2000, an OBE for services to sport in 2005 and a CBE for services to sport in 2015.
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Simon Morton
Chief Operating Officer
Simon Morton joined UK Sport in 2005, and was appointed Chief Operating Officer in 2015 to support the Chief Executive and lead UK Sport’s Major Events, Governance and International Relations responsibilities. UK Sport is the government agency responsible for co-ordinating and supporting the hosting of major international sporting events across the UK, and works with its partners to provide strategic, financial and technical support so that events are delivered to a world-leading standard. Simon has sat on the Organising Committees of many World and European Championships, and is currently a Board Member of London 2017 Ltd. Through its Governance Team, UK Sport drives and supports world-leading standards of professional, organisational and ethical conduct in the National Governing Bodies of Sport. Simon co-chairs the project board that is responsible for developing and implementing a new Governance Code for Sport in the UK. Simon also leads UK Sport’s International Relations Team, which ensures that the UK has a strong, respected and supportive voice in international sport, and supports National Governing Bodies to develop their International Relations strategies. Prior to joining UK Sport, Simon worked for the International Badminton Federation (IBF) for six years, fulfilling a number of roles including Head of Marketing, where he was responsible for overseeing the sport’s event bidding processes, and its global television and sponsorship operations and rights distribution.
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Chelsea Warr
Director of Performance
Chelsea joined UK Sport in 2005, and was promoted to Head of Performance Pathways where she led the transformation of the GB High Performance system approach to talent identification and development. This led to the discovery of Olympic medallists such as Helen Glover, Tom Daley and Lizzy Yarnold. Chelsea was promoted to Deputy Director of Performance in 2013 and then Director of Performance in October 2016 following her key role in enabling GB’s historic success at the Rio 2016 Olympics and Paralympics. As Director of Performance, Chelsea is responsible for the Performance Directorate’s mission to drive medal winning success through World Class Programmes. She oversees delivery teams for areas including performance pathways and talent ID, leadership development, coaching and sport intelligence. Chelsea’s early career was spent with the Australian Institute of Sport and the Queensland Academy of Sport, after which she moved to the UK and spent several years establishing GB’s first High Performance Programmes in Diving and Swimming.
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Vanessa Wilson
Director of Commercial and Communications
Vanessa joined UK Sport in 2011 from central government, where she held roles including Head of Strategic Communications, Campaigns and Marketing at DEFRA and Head of the Strategic Communications Unit at the Department of Education. She now leads the Commercial, Communications, Public Affairs and Stakeholder Engagement Teams at UK Sport, with responsibility for leveraging commercial opportunities and managing UK Sport’s relationship with staff, stakeholders, the media and the public.
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Sophie du Sautoy
Director of Finance, Investment and Business Services
Sophie is the strategic financial lead for UK Sport, responsible for the financial review and control of funding. Working closely with the Performance directorate, the Investment function of her team direct the funding, and carry out the financial monitoring, of the grants to the World Class Programme and some 1400 elite athletes. She also leads the teams in charge of key areas of the business including Information Technology, Facilities, Legal, Risk and Operational Planning. Sophie is a qualified chartered accountant (FCA). Prior to joining UK Sport in 2011 she spent ten years working with a wide variety of bodies in public sector audit.