Our Team
Nick DeLuca – Chairman
Nick was a founding director of Open Road. He has over 20 years of experience in the corporate affairs world.
Nick began his career in the United States Senate as an aide to the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
He then moved to the UK and joined Westminster Strategy where he was a Board Director until 1995 when he left to be a founding Director at APCO UK. Nick helped build the European and then Global network of APCO Worldwide while developing specialised expertise in cross border, international communications and issues management, with a particular focus on the aviation, aerospace and entertainment industries.
He left in 2003 to operate independently before joining Open Road for its launch in January 2007.
Outside: Sinatra, Springsteen, Sicily
Martin Le Jeune – Director
Martin was a founding director of Open Road, joining the consultancy after three years as director of public affairs at Sky.
Martin’s career began as a fast-stream civil servant in the Cabinet Office where he served as a ministerial private secretary and was on the staff of the Committee on Standards in Public Life. He then moved to communications consultancy Fishburn Hedges and became a board director and head of the consultancy’s corporate responsibility work.
Martin is deputy chairman of the Institute of Business Ethics and a trustee of whistleblowers’ charity Public Concern at Work. He is a fellow of the Centre for Policy Studies.
Outside: singing, running, mowing.
Graham McMillan – Chief Executive
Graham helped to found Open Road in 2007. He was previously head of public affairs and a board director at Fishburn Hedges. While there he won consultant of the year and consultancy of the year in 2005 at the Public Affairs News Awards.
Graham has over 20 years of experience in corporate communications, public affairs, issue and crisis management and corporate responsibility in the UK, the EU and globally.
He is a trustee of two charities in the early years sector.
Outside: theatre, cinema and ferrying small children around.
Rebecca Reilly – Director
Rebecca joined Open Road from freud communications where she ran a number of retained corporate accounts and campaigns for some of the UK’s biggest companies.
Rebecca previously worked in the corporate practice at Weber Shandwick as well as at a number of smaller agencies.
She loves getting under the skin of big businesses and big issues and the pace of crisis and issues management. Used to working with Chief Execs and marketing teams alike, Rebecca likes working on meaty reputation management briefs and making her clients famous.
Outside: travel and being outdoors.
Andrew Hobson – Associate Director
Andrew joined Open Road in November 2011.
He was previously Associate Director at Insight Public Affairs where he specialised in health and social care policy, helping to build and grow the healthcare client portfolio with a range of healthcare and not for profit clients, including: Lloydspharmacy, Sanofi-aventis, Amgen, Skills for Care and the Anchor Trust.
He joins Open Road after a year studying at New York University for a Masters Degree in Public Administration.
Before Insight Andrew worked for the Labour Party and had roles with Ivor Caplin MP, Jack Straw MP and at the Greater London Assembly.
Outside: Climbing, cycling, dancing like Mick Jagger.
Emma Haselhurst – Associate Director
Emma joined Open Road in March 2010.
Emma began her career in BT’s public affairs team, after which she moved to Weber Shandwick for four years, working primarily for healthcare, food and drink, and education clients before joining Open Road. She has continued to specialise in the healthcare and food and drink sectors.
Emma has worked on Capitol Hill, and has spent time campaigning for congressional races in Illinois (Republican) and South Carolina (Democrat).
She is an alumna of the Becket Chimney Corners YMCA, an outdoor education facility in the Berkshires, Massachusetts.
Outside: baking, bees and Agatha Christie.
Simon Taylor – Associate
Simon is a senior corporate communications and public affairs practitioner, particularly in the fields of reputation protection, crisis and issue management.
He has most recently held senior communications roles at Visa Europe, leading their 2012 Olympic and Paralympic communications programme and Cadbury, where he was Corporate Affairs Director for Britain and Ireland as well as Global Director of Crisis Management. At Cadbury, Simon handled the company’s response to the salmonella outbreak and recall in 2006, going on to manage the company’s worldwide crisis preparedness and response programme.
His background brings a wide range of international experience from working for leading communications consultancies, as Head of Press and Public Affairs for UNHCR based in London, as well as work with the not-for-profit and NGO sectors.
Outside: Friends, Cornwall and Scandic Noir
Nicolas Lehmann – Senior Consultant
Nick joined Open Road in April 2007. He works on corporate communications and public affairs accounts on behalf of private sector and trade body clients in the UK, EU and US.
He established the company’s research and monitoring function, and now advises on and delivers stakeholder engagement and issues management programmes.
His clients span the transport, environmental, manufacturing and leisure sectors.
Nick began his career at BSkyB, as a member of the public affairs team. He is involved in the Friends of Grammar Schools campaign and coordinates the Open Road intern alumni network.
He is also Chair of the Association of Professional Political Consultants’ Young Consultants’ Committee.
Outside: exercise, promoting Anglo-French relations.
Helen Davison – Senior Consultant
Helen provides public affairs and corporate communications support to clients in sectors ranging from healthcare, media, technology and not for profit.
She joined Open Road in January 2011, having spent two years at Luther Pendragon where she provided media relations for the Diocese of London and worked on a range of energy and climate, chemicals, telecoms and retail briefs. Prior to this she was a senior researcher at pan-European think tank the Stockholm Network, where she specialised in healthcare, energy markets and intellectual property.
Outside: Spinning, charity shops, hummus.
Hannah Marwood – Senior Consultant
Hannah joined Open Road in January 2011, after over four years in PR and stakeholder communications.
Her career began at Weber Shandwick, where she gained experience in public affairs, media relations and financial communications. She has worked with clients in the energy, healthcare, legal and government sectors.
At Open Road, Hannah is continuing to work across communications disciplines with financial services and healthcare clients.
Outside: reading, cooking, and constantly planning the next overseas adventure.
India Knight – Senior Consultant
India began her career as a consultant at DJH Associates, working for clients across public affairs, political campaigning, community engagement and media relations. She then worked for the Institution of Mechanical Engineers where she led its public affairs engagement with a focus on energy, manufacturing, education and transport policy.
India joined Open Road in May 2011 and was promoted to senior consultant in October last year. She currently advises clients including National Grid, Genting Casinos, Think Money and Airwave, on public affairs, political strategy, corporate reputation and thought leadership.
Outside: gardening, period dramas, drum and bass.
Isobel Bradshaw – Senior Consultant
Isobel joined Open Road in October 2010. She works for clients in a number of different sectors, such as telecoms, media and technology, healthcare and retail, specialising in corporate communications, crisis communications and stakeholder relations.
She started her career as a press officer at O2, covering both reactive media relations and proactive consumer PR, before moving to Hanover, where she worked for a variety of technology, healthcare and public sector clients.
Outside: reading, travelling, eating.
Louise Phillips – Consultant
Louise specialises in public relations and corporate communications. She was previously a Senior Press Officer for the Liberal Democrats, leading the party’s broadcast team during the 2010 General Election.
Louise uses her extensive media experience, working with global brands such VEVO, Coca-Cola and Fortune Magazine and charity-sector clients such as Bowel Cancer UK and the Women’s Sport and Fitness Foundation to create proactive news stories and react to external events. Offering strategic advice, CEO profiling, CSR, internal communications and crisis communications support, Louise has broad experience working on high-profile media campaigns with clients including Coca-Cola, VEVO, Sony, the Women’s Sport and Fitness Foundation, RBS, BAE Systems, SPMSD, Asda and Airwave.
Outside: music, travel and the British Museum
Andrew May – Consultant
Andy joined Open Road in September 2011 as a consultant.
He began his career five years ago working for the Liberal Democrats, scoring success in a number of local election campaigns before moving to the marketing department at Amnesty International UK.
In the last 18 months he worked on several high profile not-for-profit campaigns including Power2010 and Yes to Fairer Votes where he was responsible for a team of staff delivering the ‘Yes2AV’ regional activism and media effort.
He has a broad range of experience covering digital communications, advocacy, media and direct marketing.
Outside: politics, football, blogging.
Catriona Filmer-Bennett – Office Manager
Catriona joined Open Road in January 2012 as Office Manager. She previously worked as the office manager for an executive search firm and graduated from the University of Birmingham in 2010.
Catriona is responsible for the running of the office and her role includes finance and event management.
Outside: bunting, yoga, picnics in the park.
Alex Savage – Consultant
Alex joined Open Road as a researcher in July 2011. Before this he worked at Lansons Communications for a year, where he worked on public affairs and public relations accounts in the financial services sector, including work with the Isle of Man Government.
Before joining Lansons, Alex interned at Labour North West on the 2010 general election, where he assisted the regional head of press. He graduated from Newcastle University in 2009 with a degree in Politics and Sociology
Outside: Liverpool FC, Radiohead, swimming.
Alex Rawle – Researcher
Alex joined Open Road as a researcher in May 2012.
He previously worked on a series of online media projects for the campaign group Unlock Democracy. Before this, Alex interned in the Washington D.C. office of a Congressman.
Alex graduated from the University of Bristol in 2010, with a degree in Politics. He spent the 2008 election cycle studying in Los Angeles, where he was involved in a number of political campaigns.
Outside: street food, American politics and running in Victoria Park.
Donald Wallace – Researcher
Don joined Open Road as a researcher in February 2013.
He previously worked as a policy officer for South West Councils, working primarily on projects for the Home Office and the Department for Communities and Local Government.
Don has also spent time in Parliament interning for Liberal Democrat MP Andrew George. He graduated from the University of Bristol in 2009 with a Masters with Distinction in Public Policy.
Outside: Persian food, late nights and the Isle of Iona.
