Helping HE shape its future

Professor Mark E. Smith is the President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Southampton.  As President and Vice-Chancellor he is the Chief Executive of the University and has overall responsibility for its operations.  He took up this role on 1 October 2019. Professor Smith was Vice-Chancellor at Lancaster University from January 2012 until September 2019.  He was previously Deputy Vice-Chancellor of the University of Warwick.

Throughout his academic career, he has published more than 380 papers about advanced magnetic resonance techniques, helping to understand a range of problems in the field of materials physics.  He is currently a member of the executive group overseeing the National High Field Solid-State NMR Facility at the University of Warwick.

In addition to his role as President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Southampton, he holds a number of external appointments including Senior Independent Member of UKRI EPSRC’s Council; and board member of the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales, chairing their Research Wales Committee. He also chairs UKRI’s Financial Sustainability of Research Group and was the former Chair of the University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) 2016-2022. He has also served on the Boards of Jisc, HESA and HESCU.

He was awarded a CBE for Services to Research and Higher Education in the 2019 Queen’s Birthday Honours.

Alison Johns was appointed chief executive of Advance HE in autumn 2017.



Prior to that she was the chief executive of the Leadership Foundation. She has worked in higher education for 25 years. 

Before becoming chief executive, she was head of policy for leadership, governance and management at the Hefce (now the Office for Students), where she established both the Leadership Foundation and the Equality Challenge Unit. 



She is a past president of the Association of University Administrators (AUA) and represents the UK on the Association of Commonwealth Universities Human Resources Management Network and has recently joined the British Council’s planning committee for Going Global, the major international higher education conference. 



Alison has extensive international experience of higher education including leading the review of teaching and learning for the Australian government. This led to the establishment of the Office for Learning and Teaching to enhance teaching quality across the Australian higher education sector. Alison regularly takes part in conferences and events, both nationally and internationally, speaking on all aspects of university leadership, governance and management.