Sheila Hoile is a Director of Hoile Associates, an independent consultancy.  Her work draws on the networks, skills and experience gathered from a career spent working at the interface between education, training and business at all levels from primary schools through to postgraduate studies.

For 5 years up to December 2006 Sheila was the Director of Skills Strategy at ConstructionSkills, the Sector Skills Council for the construction sector. In that role she was responsible for building strategic relationships that positioned the organisation as expert in the provision of authoritative capacity, productivity and skills research and intelligence.  She also successfully led the ConstructionSkills into becoming one of four Pathfinder Sector Skills Councils, from a base of 25 SSCs, charged by Government with developing Sector Skills Agreements involving a wide range of key influential stakeholders with the objective of meeting the construction industry's current and future skill needs. In 2005 she won the opportunity for ConstructionSkills to create one of the first four sector specific National Skills Academies.  The construction project based model which she developed, and its associated Business Plan, was recognised by government and industry as being innovative and pragmatic.  The projection is for there to be 30 Academy construction projects in place across the UK by 2010 totalling some 1.75 billion pounds of construction build with an employer investment in the Academy in excess of 7.5milion pounds.

Prior to this appointment Sheila was the Director of Education and Professional Development at the Construction Industry Council where she worked with the professional institutions to deliver an Education Manifesto and a Memorandum of Understanding in which the Professional Institutions agreed to include a set common learning outcomes in their criteria for the accreditation of degrees. She successfully initiated and drove through the Making Connections campaign.  One outcome was the development of ACBEE with over 50 cases of best practice which demonstrate that good relationships between higher education and construction companies create graduates that join the industry with the right skills, knowledge and understanding. Sheila was awarded the MBE in 2001 New Year¿¿¿s Honours List for contribution to construction education and training.

Over the last 10 years Sheila has served on a number of Government Task Forces including the Movement for Innovation Board, the Task Force which developed the Academy for Sustainable Communities and the Foundation Degree Task Force.  She is also a Board member of the East Midlands Centre for the Built Environment.

Sheila graduated as an aeronautical engineer and spent her early career teaching Physics.  She has a Masters Degree in Education and Industry from University of Warwick.  Her experience also includes working at British Aerospace (now BAeSystems) and the Hertfordshire Training and Enterprise Council.

In her role as a visiting professor Sheila is looking forward to using her experience, working at the interface between education and business, to support the development of innovative and mutually beneficial relationships and programmes.