Expert on Digital Disruption, Transformational Change & Leadership
Europe
United Kingdom
Roger is passionate about transforming organisations, markets and business models and the Leadership required to deliver the Vision. He has driven transformational change in highly recognised global businesses and invests in media and travel businesses that have the potential to disrupt their markets.
Roger is a recognised CEO and leader in transformation change having driven change in global organisations including Virgin, British Airways, Prudential and the BBC.
Roger started his career at Virgin working directly for Sir Richard Branson on deals and new business ideas. He then became Commercial Director of Virgin Communications, the media arm of Virgin Group, working on the launch of Virgin Radio, the development of its’ global post-production business and the rapid growth and sale of Virgin Interactive Entertainment.
Roger was General Manager World Sales & Distribution at British Airways where he transformed the £1.2 billion distribution system for BA and subsequently the industry, launched electronic ticketing and created ba.com with a simultaneous launch in 72 countries across the world.
Roger was Managing Director of Prudential Retail, the retail distribution arm of Prudential Plc, with £2 billion in revenue and 6 million customers. Joining immediately after the pensions mis-selling scandal, he drove a major business transformation including the launch of new products, new distribution channels, a £200m CRM programme and an innovative new sales process. As part of this transformation he led an exhilarating and exhausting culture change for the 6,500 staff.
Roger was Chief Executive of BBC Ventures Group created with 4,500 staff from the back-office service functions of the BBC and running the media services for the BBC and other broadcast/IT customers around the world. Roger’s transformation and subsequent sale of these businesses created over £1 billion of value for the BBC. Roger was also on the Main Board of the BBC and an integral part of the BBC-wide transformational change programme.
“Roger achieved a remarkable turnaround
and created real value in the Ventures businesses”.
Greg Dyke, BBC Director General
Following a successful MBO with Warburg Pincus, Roger ran SDI Media Group, a global film and television business with operations in 32 countries and completed a series of acquisitions and eventual sale of the business.
Roger is now Chairman and investor in media, travel and technology businesses; he is Chairman of Luxtripper, a disruptive luxury travel agency, Chairman of Olive Communications, a company offering cloud communications solutions and Vodafone’s 2nd largest channel partner, Chairman of Masstech Innovations Inc., an international software business for broadcasters and Chairman of Clearvac Group, an international Cruise Ship and Superyacht maintenance services business.
He was for 7 years until May 2018 Chairman of and an investor in loveholidays.com, the UK’s fastest growing online travel agency which disrupted the UK travel industry in six years from launch in January 2012 growing to over £400m in revenues. It is now the sixth largest travel agency in the UK and the UK’s 2nd fastest growing company in the Sunday Times Fasttrack 100 in 2016. The business was successfully sold in May 2018 for £190m.
Roger has a wealth of experience as a driver of transformational change and investor in disruptive businesses. His insights, experiences and stories have proven invaluable to organisations around the world. Roger seeks to understand the strategic, business and cultural challenges facing your organisation and tailors his presentation to have maximum relevance to and impact on the audience.
As a speaker Roger Flynn is a proven expert on implementing, managing strategic change and running global business transformation programmes. This involves all elements from handling redundancy, to dealing with negative media coverage, putting your customers at the forefront of your strategy and more.
Roger Flynn is an accomplished businessman and keynote speaker with unique experience as CEO/Director in five global companies. He gives the following keynotes tailored to a clients corporate requirements:
“A triumph. Roger presented at our Annual Leadership Event and the feedback from our guests has been incredible. Because he has actually been there and done it, he makes a convincing and entertaining speaker. His content is compelling and he presents in an elegant, thought-provoking way, with great humour. Our guests were seasoned business leaders and they found his talk both insightful and inspiring.“
“Your talk in Belfast was exceptional, inspirational and made a big difference to many in the room.”
“Thank you so much for the outstanding job you did for us in setting our annual meeting off in the right direction. It was a critical meeting for us to get all delegates on board and pulling in the same direction. Your insights and stories really helped people connect the challenges they face on a day-to-day basis to the world outside Oxford Instruments and really captured the imagination of the delegates. The team was galvanised by your session into challenging themselves to think differently and we made huge progress in the remainder of the meeting to hone in on the things we all committed to do differently to take our Company to the next level.”
“Hi Roger, Thanks again for coming out to speak to RBS. Everyone spoke very highly of you. Your talk was spot on for what the group needed”
“Your talk at the Waterfront for the MLN Event was exceptional, inspirational and I am sure you made a difference to many in that room”
“Thank you so much for all your efforts to make the conference such a resounding success. The 850 delegates were really impressed with both the substance and significance of your presentation and achievements. Thank you for a terrific job!”
“Roger was clear, concise, and had an easy and open style. He reflected his considerable change management experience and told a compelling story which gave practical insights on how leaders needed to change their behaviour to drive change in the business”