Leading with James Ashton

S2 Episode 8 - Pharmacy2U and Metropolitan Thames Valley

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Episode notes

Mark Livingstone and Geeta Nanda join James Ashton to discuss their biggest challenges, merger tactics, building a team and getting lucky.

Mark Livingstone is chief executive of Pharmacy2U, the online prescription delivery company that despatches 1.2m medicines direct to patients every month. Livingstone has led the Leeds-based company since 2016 when it merged with ChemistDirect.co.uk, his previous venture.

In a career spent growing start-ups, he was chief executive of the Scoot business directory, a founding investor in snacks-by-mail firm Graze and involved in DVD delivery start-up LoveFilm. Earlier on, Livingstone was head of buying for Woolworths and managing director for Lego Interactive.

Geeta Nanda is chief executive of Metropolitan Thames Valley, one of the UK’s largest housing associations that traces its roots back to providing affordable homes for the Windrush generation. Created through a merger last year, the group is landlord to 57,000 homes, adding 2,000 new properties a year. It employs 1800 staff.

Nanda previously ran the Thames Valley housing association for a decade and before that was operations director at the Notting Hill Housing Trust. Her career began on the graduate training programme at Wandsworth Council in south London.

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