Health Shield Friendly Society has announced the appointment of Jacqui Carr as its new chief executive, subject to regulatory approval.

Carr (pictured) has been at the Society for a number of years, having entirely re-engineered its approach to culture, staff and member engagement, and introduced effective business procedures.

Her previous career roles have included significant change management centred upon driving business success and improvement through well implemented people initiatives. This has been achieved within financial services as well as other industries.

In her new role as chief executive, Carr will lead the Society through the next period of its business-wide transformation.

She said: “It’s an honour to be appointed CEO of Health Shield; a Society with a long and enviable history, grounded in its strong mutual ethos; an ethos that is arguably more relevant than ever to our members.

“I’m really excited to be given the opportunity to lead the business, particularly to help engage our amazing workforce in our strategic plans, that will help to meet the ever-evolving needs of the Society’s members, guided by our promise to keep businesses and their employees in the best of health.”

Health Shield also recently appointed Paul Shires as its new commercial director. He has over 30 years of financial services experience to the society, with previous roles spanning managing director of UK Healthcare at Westfield Health to head of partnerships at Cigna.

Julie Hansen, chair of Health Shield, said: “The board is thrilled with the appointment of Jacqui as its new chief executive and Paul as commercial director. They will both bring superb leadership skills to Health Shield, helping the Society further shape and steer its vision and business plan.

“In a challenging post-pandemic world, and one where our regulators expect diversity and inclusion to be key to achieving sustainable business success, Health Shield believes Jacqui will be an outstanding leader.

“I’d like to also take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to Geoff Spencer, our interim CEO, for taking the reins over the last few months while we underwent a rigorous recruitment process. We’re hugely grateful for Geoff’s direction and for helping with Jacqui’s induction to the role while we await regulatory approval.”