Plenary and Panel Speakers

Ravi Chand CBE CBE QPM Chartered Fellow CIPD

Director, Places for Growth
Office of Government Property. Cabinet Office

Ravi Chand is the Director for Civil Service People and Places Directorate in The Cabinet Office where he leads the government’s Places for Growth Portfolio. Before the Cabinet Office, Ravi was the Chief People Officer at the Department for International Development (DFID), holding responsibility for people, operations, IT and systems, estates and change.

He was previously the HR director at HM Revenue and Customs with responsibility for workforce management of its 69,000 staff. He led the work on reforming the workforce to deliver the department’s blueprint ambitions for the future. He also worked as the director responsible for capability, talent and diversity at the Home Office, Managing Consultant in a FTSE 100 company and as a serving Police Officer with Bedfordshire Police.

He was awarded a CBE in 2011 and QPM in 2002 for distinguished service..

Ravi is a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

Mark Chivers

Government Chief Property Officer
Cabinet Office

Mark joined the Cabinet Office as Government Chief Property Officer in January 2022.

Mark is responsible for providing senior, strategic leadership for the whole cross-government property function. He works with a wide range of senior stakeholders within government and in the wider public sector promoting the intelligent use of property to deliver better public services at lower cost to the taxpayer.

Mark provides strategic leadership for the Government Property Function, and holds senior leaders accountable to the Government Functional Standard. He leads on major change programmes, supporting the delivery of better and more integrated public services, overseeing – among others – the Places for Growth programme and supporting the Levelling Up agenda.

Mark has 20 years’ experience at Board level in both the private and public sectors, most recently as Director of Estates Engineering and Energy at Boots UK, but has led teams across Property, Marketing, Procurement, Operations and Transformation in Walgreens Boots Alliance businesses.

Lynda Rawsthorne FRICS

Government Head of Property Profession
Cabinet Office

Lynda Rawsthorne was appointed Government Head of Property Profession and Director, Property Capability, Sponsorship & Standards, in August 2023.

Lynda is head of the Government Property Profession, the community of property professionals across government. She provides professional leadership across a diverse range of government departments and arms-length bodies which deliver the government’s property ambitions.

Lynda has over 25 years’ professional experience across the property lifecycle including valuation, managing estates as well as delivering transformational and construction-based programmes. A Fellow of both the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Association of Project Management, Lynda is a graduate of the Major Project Leadership Academy at the University of Oxford.

Saurabh Bhandari

Director, Property Delivery and Transformation
Office of Government Property, Cabinet Office

Saurabh Bhandari was appointed Director, Property Delivery and Transformation, within the Office of Government Property (Cabinet Office), in May 2024.

Saurabh leads strategic initiatives to modernise and optimise the Government Property Portfolio, with a particular focus on transforming property investments and assets into catalysts for  innovation & growth, that create public value.

Saurabh leads the drive to improve the condition of the government estate. He is responsible for the ongoing improvement of facilities management in government buildings,  including modernising infrastructure to enhance safety, energy efficiency and operational effectiveness across the public sector.  As a precursor to transforming assets and investments, he will also provide leadership in using data and analytics to enable decisions across the government estate.

Having trained as a Chartered Architect  and a Programme manager he brings multi-sector experience across real estate, social and economic infrastructure. Saurabh has extensive experience at senior positions on high-profile, national and international property programmes in a career spanning across multiple market sectors and both public and private investment led development programmes.

He is a Fellow of the Association of Project Management and a graduate of the Major Project Leadership Academy at Oxford University.

A keen reader and amateur runner, Saurabh lives in Manchester with his wife and two children.

More speakers here soon

Session Speakers

Photo here soon…

Speakers here soon

Speakers, agenda and times may be subject to change