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Career civil servant gets top OTS job

Governance | Tania Mason | 3 Dec 2009

The Office of the Third Sector has announced that Rolande Anderson is to join as its new director general, succeeding Campbell Robb who is leaving to join Shelter as chief executive.

She will also be director general of the Social Exclusion Taskforce.

Once a Cabinet Office official, Anderson joins the OTS from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) where she was director general for transformation and corporate services and acting director general. 
 
Before joining ONS, Anderson was regional director of the Government Office for the South East, England’s largest region, a post she had held since January 2006. In this role she was a key player in the transformation of the Government Office network, where she championed new strategies for developing people and communications.

She was also the network’s Whitehall-facing lead on housing and planning, building close links between policy and delivery on the ground.

Her early career included stints at the Department of Trade and Industry, where she was deputy director general of the Innovation Group; the Radiocommunications Agency where she was chief executive and led the Agency’s merger with Ofcom; and a secondment to Tesco, where she led a change management project.

Anderson has two family members with hearing disabilities and is a member of RNID. Throughout her career she has championed diversity, and she has mentored on various schemes for BME and disabled civil servants.

She is a non-executive director of Genesis Housing Group, an Associate of Newnham College, Cambridge, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Anderson said: “I have seen at first hand the huge contribution the third sector makes through its work in regional and local partnerships, and the understanding it brings of the impact of policies on people, particularly the most vulnerable.

"As a champion of diversity throughout my career in government, I have also valued the expert help of the sector on issues such as disability awareness and overcoming cultural barriers.

“I am thrilled to have the opportunity to succeed Campbell at the Office of the Third Sector; I look forward to working with the sector to innovate and build capability to meet the challenges ahead.”

Acevo CEO Stephen Bubb was the first sector umbrella chief to respond, saying: “We congratulate Rolande on her appointment and look forward to working closely with her going forwards.”

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Directory: Office of the Third Sector
Who's Who: Campbell Robb