Christopher Cole has over 40 years of experience in the engineering and consulting services fields. He is a Chartered Engineer who joined WSP as a partner at its inception, becoming Managing Director in 1987. Under his leadership, WSP was the first engineering consultant firm to become a fully-listed public company in 1990, growing organically and through acquisitions from a single-discipline U.K. consultant firm of 200 people to a 9,000-strong multi-disciplinary global player with two-thirds of its business outside the U.K. prior to the historic 2012 merger with the Corporation.  He has chaired the Board of the Corporation since that merger. He was non-executive Chairman of Redcentric plc until he stepped down in September 2019. He also served as non-executive Chairman of Ashtead Group plc from March 2007, stepping down in September 2018 after 11 successful years. In 2014, he became non-executive Chairman of Applus Services SA and is also currently the non-executive Chairman of Tracsis plc and an independent non-executive director of Safe Harbour Holdings plc.