Employment & education mentors
- All
Jeremy Gibbs
Jeremy Gibbs
Forces Farming
First and foremost, Jeremy is a farmer who understands the agricultural industry. With a lifetime spent working on farms and for global companies, Jeremy’s credibility in the industry supports the growing network of Forces Farming Partner farms and businesses.
Jeremy enjoyed a 9 year career in training, adult learning behaviour, curriculum development, sales and marketing. This experience and passion for agriculture means the support Forces Farming delivers is reliable and trustworthy. Agricultural careers in the rural sector offer an extremely special life for people who want to work outside and be passionate about what they do while seeing their family settle in a rural location.
Jeremy also farms day to day and owns a small herd of beef cattle and a flock of sheep as a new entrant and first-generation farmer. This provides real life opportunities to engage with the agricultural industry and the careers it offers.
Jeremy didn’t serve in the armed forces but has close friends who are veterans and still serving. This input was vital in building a sustainable process that fits the person. Forces Farming represents the link between agriculture and the armed forces.
Sarah Knight
Sarah Knight
Recruitment Director, Exmouth
As the Co-Founder and Director of Tribus People and Founder of Sarah West Recruitment, Sarah has extensive experience in helping individuals find a job they truly love and help companies find, align and develop their senior leadership team.
With her knowledge and experience in talent acquisition and development, Sarah can help individuals identify their skills, strengths, and career goals, and provide guidance on how to effectively communicate these to potential employers or clients. This could include practical guidance on CVs/applications, coaching around interview style, access to vacancies and the practicalities of transitioning from the Royal Marines into a second career, whether that’s at a trainee or senior leadership level or setting up a business.
For those interested in starting their own business, Sarah can offer advice on developing a business plan, identifying funding sources, and building a team. Additionally, as a Goldman Sachs 10KSB graduate and one of the top 100 Influential Women in Exeter, Sarah can provide mentoring and networking opportunities to help former Royal Marines build their professional network and gain access to valuable resources.
John Sheeran - Need Photo
Roy Grassie
Roy Grassie
Hire a Hero
Link to Met Police
Joined the Royal Marines at 16 years old, enjoyed some unforgettable experiences and made friends for life.
Joined the Police in the 1990s and quickly moved onto the Specialist Firearms Unit where I remained for the next 26 years.
Working alongside many like minded ex-servicemen and women over the years, it was clear that the experience gained from the military was a significant advantage creating extremely competent and capable Police Firearms Officers regularly deploying to exteremely challenging high threat and risk Firearms Operations.
The teamwork, support and regular banter I experienced in Police Frearms is so familiar that it’s difficult to separate from working in military teams. Police Firearms kit, weapons, vehicles and equipment are the best available and the training is intense but extremely rewarding.
Following retirement from the police in 2017, I joined National Armed Policing as a Senior Project Manager and introduced the recruitment support pathway for military service leavers into Armed Policing Roles and have since continued this work through the Hire a Hero Charity.
Through an extensive network of Armed Policing contacts, I support Open Days, individual visits and can put service leavers in touch with Armed Policing Units in any force in the UK. The introduction of a ‘mentor’ programme has provided support to many service leavers into the Police who are currently on Firearms Units and developing their skills working towards Counter Terrorist Specialist Firearms Officer (CTSFO).
Hire a Hero charity provides individual advice and support and with my previous experience I am the lead for the Police Service and continue to give up my personal time to provide support and advice to service leavers into Police Firearms roles.
If the Police Firearms sounds like it might be of interest, please get in touch!
Keith Breslauer
Keith Breslauer
Patron Capital
Founder & Managing Partner
Mr. Breslauer founded Patron Capital in 1999 and is the Managing Partner of the Patron Capital Funds (Patron Capital Captive Fund, Funds I–VI). Total capital under management represents approximately €5.0 billon from leading U.S. and European institutions, endowments, pension funds and family offices. The Patron Funds primarily focus on investments in companies and assets associated with property and property related activities in the United Kingdom and Western Europe. Patron, with 70 people is based in London with offices in Barcelona and Luxembourg with asset management platforms across Europe. Patron’s portfolios now include over 70 million square feet of different types of properties and investment in various companies, both public and private.
Mr. Breslauer is active in many charities with current and previous roles including acting as Chairman and Trustee of the PTI (formerly the Prince’s Teaching Institute), Vice Patron, former Trustee and lead Corporate Donor for the Royal Marines Charity, Director on the Advisory Board for the Rustandy Centre/Social Enterprise Initiative of Chicago Booth, Member of the Chicago Booth Global Leaders Group, and Senior Patron to CST, AWIS, The Erez Foundation, and many other charities throughout the Jewish community in the United Kingdom, Israel and the United States.
Mr Breslauer is also a Senior Patron to many educational interests tied to the Property and Fund Management Industry include as one of the Founders for Center for Real Estate Finance Research at NYU Stern, member of the Real Estate Forum of the Paul Milstein Center for Real Estate at Columbia University Business School and various others. He is a guest lecturer at Chicago Booth, Harvard Business School, Oxford University Said School of Business, Tuck, and Imperial College.
He holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from the University of Chicago and a Bachelor of Science (BSc) degree from the New York University School of Business.
Mr. Breslauer has resided in London for the past thirty years with his wife and four children Arianna (27), Sophia (25), Samantha (22) and Aaron (19). Mr. Breslauer is an accomplished alpinist, mountaineer and skier and particularly likes climbing and off-piste adventures with his children.
Stephen Gilkes
Stephen Gilkes
RMA City of London Branch
Former RM
Stephen Gilkes has a long association with the Royal Marines.
His grandfather and father served as Royals in both world wars. His grandfather William served with the 4th Battalion RMLI and saw action in the St George’s Day Raid on Zeebrugge in 1918. His father Bernard served with the Corps from 1938 to 1954 and saw action while serving on board HMS Warspite (Salerno) and HMS London (Yangtze) and also during his time in Malta. He was awarded his “green lid” in 1944.
Stephen took over the role of branch treasurer in 2013. Following a wholesale review and overhaul of the branch’s membership function he formally took over the role of membership secretary in 2016.
Stephen has spent his career in the financial services industry and is a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Plaisterers and a Freeman of the City of London.
In his spare time he also provides support and assistance to other military charities such as the Not Forgotten.
Gary Paterson
Gary Paterson
Ops Training, Liverpool
Former RM
We are OPS-Training and I am Gary Paterson the training centre manager a 22 year Army veteran. We are passionate about transitioning Military, Ex-Military and their Families in to the rapidly increasing Wind Sector.
OPS Training is an iso9001 and iso14001 accredited Health and Safety / Technical Training company being one part of the OPS group which includes OPS Wind, OPS industrial services and Offshore Painting Services catering to the Oil, Gas, Renewable Energy and Construction Industries.
We provide an extensive range of courses to a wide variety of clientele from industry leaders, to people looking for a career in the growing onshore and offshore sectors. We use our real-life training environments to give you the skills and knowledge to ensure we deliver a like for like training. Delivering an extensive range of accredited courses as well as bespoke training packages to suit your own needs including but not limited to: Site induction training, Recruitment drives, First Aid, Working at Height, Rope Access, Fire Safety and Industrial painting, OPS Training work with you to provide the best training with the best trainers.
Sean Foley
Sean Foley
EQ Commando and BNi2B, Portsmouth
Former RM
Sean ‘The EQ Commando’ is a dedicated coach and trainer with 30 years of real-world experience forged from Combat Operations with The Royal Marine Commandos, a successful small business owner, 3rd world Leadership Development Expeditions to Management and Executive Training and Development for multi-million-dollar companies, and SMEs alike.
His breadth and depth of experience coupled with his passion for helping others succeed in extreme environments underpins his proven ability to understand, engage and empower teams, managers and leaders to get the results they need.
He brings together a unique blend of military experience, business management understanding, personality & behavioural profiling and extreme experiential learning to develop high emotional intelligence, resilience and compassion in leaders and managers. He helps to develop you into the kind of leader that high performing teams would follow into battle.
Sean is an experienced Coach, Certified Behavioural Profiler, The Enneagram in Business Trainer and an NLP practitioner working across a range of businesses such as O&G, Finance, Hospitality, Heritage, Defence and Education.
He believes that:
“The Most Important Assets In Any Venture Are You, Your People, Your Influence.
Emotional Intelligence IS Your Influence!
When You Develop Your EQ You Can Engage, Influence and Inspire Your People To Achieve More Than Ever Before”
Whether your team is under fire or under-performing The EQ Commando helps you turn the team around and win.
Rob Kelly
Rob Kelly
Jacobs, Bristol/London
Former RM
Rob left the Corps in 2019 as a Sgt. Since leaving he has worked at Jacobs a 60,000 strong global company. His role sees him grow the talent pool for Jacobs via the employment of service leavers, veterans and spouses.
He is tasked with internal growth and business development for the company. He also has the ability to advise, and connect RM’s to wider industry via a closed book supply chain.
Marcus Peters CFIOSH FEI
Marcus Peters CFIOSH FEI
VP of HSE Offshore (Global), RWE Offshore
Former RN
Marcus Peters is a key figure in the global offshore wind HSE profession within the global Renewables industry. He Works for RWE offshore as the VP of HSE Offshore with global responsibility for a team of International HSE professionals supporting projects in Development and construction in multiple countries in APAC and EU as well as the emerging USA market. Marcus has over 25 years’ experience in the energy sector with over 15 years’ experience in offshore wind development construction and operations.
Marcus started his career in the Royal Navy in HM Submarines as a Weapons Engineering technician. During his 10 year career in Submarines he also worked in the Nuclear Emergency Response organisation within the Royal Navy.
He is a Fellow of IOSH and the Energy Institute and provides external representation within organisations such as G+, Wind Europe, VGB and Renewable UK.
Marcus also is the current chair of the Military Working Group for the Offshore Wind Industry Council in the UK and supports service leavers, veterans and service families in understanding the Renewables Industry, in particular offshore wind and the type of roles that are available as second career options. Marcus is also a mentor for HSE professionals and those anting a second career in the HSE profession
Jamie Gibbs
Jamie Gibbs
Retain Limited, Plymouth
Former RM
Having been medically discharged from the corps back in 2004, I went on to start my own business and for the next 4 years thought I was the next Alan Sugar. This all came crashing down around my ears when I invested in the wrong business and my world imploded with both me and my businesses going bankrupt, upon reflection it is the best thing to happen to me even though it was the worst time of my life at the time with a wife and two young kids to support.
We set up a new business the next day and have managed to create a very nice group of multi-million-pound turnover businesses over the last 15 years. I have gained industry-related accreditations and managed to do a law degree through Open University while running the business and proudly offer to mentor for both the RMA and Heroprenuers to help those who need a steer to get their own business back on track. I would like to offer my help to anyone that wishes me to talk through my experiences or will offer advice if wanted, I’m also happy to listen if you need to vent.
Tom Tripp
Tom Tripp
Atkins Ferris, Cornwall
RMA-TRMC Board Member
Tom is a qualified chartered accountant with a wealth of experience in both advising clients on commercial and tax matters and running a variety of businesses in sectors such as accountancy, financial advising, construction, composite engineering, and the luxury yacht/boat sectors.
Tom advises both individuals and companies on start-ups, tax planning, strategic growth, mergers and acquisitions and turnaround solutions. A Trustee, a member of the West Country 100 and a long standing supporter of the charity Tom received the 2019 West Country 100 “Transition Award” from Lord Mountbatten for his support to Royal Marines transition programme.