Executive Director, Employee Ownership Association.

Patrick Burns has been executive director of the Employee Ownership Association since 2004 and has led its transformation from campaign group to the acknowledged business association for the co-owned company sector – companies with significant employee ownership - with more than a hundred member companies including the John Lewis Partnership, Arup and Unipart.

Under Patrick’s leadership the Association has become a respected source of advice for Government and other policy makers on extending employee ownership in the private and public sector. Patrick is a member of the Cabinet Office’s Mutuals Taskforce.

Before joining EOA, Patrick was policy director with The Work Foundation and communications director for its predecessor body, The Industrial Society, where he wrote ‘The Silent Stakeholders’ report on employee involvement and led research projects for the Treasury, the then DTI and Department of Health.

Patrick was formerly editor of a fortnightly management journal, and a senior economic adviser to the TUC.

He is on the Government’s Employee Engagement Task Force, a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a member of the Institute of Directors and a board member of Mutuo, the umbrella body for the wider UK mutual sector.