Yvonne Coghill OBE, JP, MSc, DMS, RGN, RMN, HV, CPT, Dip Exec Coaching.

Yvonne commenced nurse training at Central Middlesex Hospital in 1977, qualified as a general nurse in 1980 and then went on to qualify in mental health nursing and health visiting. In 1986 she secured her first NHS management job and has since held a number of operational and strategic leadership posts.

In 2004, she had the unique opportunity to work at the Department of Health as Private Secretary to the Chief Executive of the NHS, Sir Nigel Crisp. In her three years at the Department, Yvonne held several strategic posts, including Programme Director for the Cleaner Hospitals Programme and External Relations Nursing Officer to the Chief Nursing Officer of England.

Yvonne is currently the Director – WRES Implementation in NHS England, and is a member of the equality and diversity council at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) in the United States where she has helped develop their inclusion strategy, delivered workshops and was co-chair at their national forum in Orlando 2015. She has also been keynote speaker at the National Association of Health Service Executives (NAHSE) annual conference in New Orleans. She continues to work closely with world expert on health and race Professor D. Williams, of Harvard University School of Public Health.

Recently Yvonne has used her knowledge and experience of mental health to act as a commissioner on a report commissioned by the Royal college of Psychiatrists and chaired by Lord Crisp on ‘Adult mental health in patient services’ which fed into the NHS England task force review on mental health services in England.

In 2013 Yvonne was voted by colleagues in the NHS as one of the top 50 most inspirational women, one of the top 50 most inspirational nurse leaders and one of the top 50 BME pioneers, two years in a row. Yvonne was awarded an OBE for services to healthcare in 2010 and was appointed as Director for WRES Implementation in June 2015.