Bernard Donoghue took up the position of Director of ALVA in September 2011 following a career in advocacy, communications and lobbying, latterly at a senior level in the tourism and heritage sector.

He was Head of Government and Public Affairs for VisitBritain, the national tourist board between 1997 and 2010. He was a Board Director of Marketing Manchester, 2001 - 2010, and Chairman of VisitManchester, the Manchester tourist board, 2008 - 2010. He was Co-Chair of British Tourism Week, 2008 - 2010. He is an appointed member of the Cathedral Council of St Paul's Cathedral, London; a Trustee and Fellow of the Tourism Society; a Director of the Tourism Alliance, which ALVA was instrumental in founding; and is a Trustee of 'Kids in Museums'.

He is a founder Trustee and Director of the Kaleidoscope Trust. He was a Trustee of Centrepoint, the youth homelessness charity, for 17 years until 2012 and was variously Chair of Centrepoint's Marketing, Communications and Policy Committee and it's 40th anniversary committee in 2009. He is a Fellow of the World-Wide Fund for Nature UK, Chair of WWF-UK's 50th Anniversary Taskforce 2010 - 2012 and Chair of WWF-UK's Council of Ambassadors since 2011. He was an Ambassador of WWF-UK between 1999 - 2004 and a Trustee between 2004 - 2010. He is Chairman of the London International Festival of Theatre (LIFT), having been a Board member since 2005 and Deputy Chair since 2007.

Prior to VisitBritain Bernard held lobbying, policy, campaigning and communications roles for the National AIDS Trust; Sense - the National Deafblind and Rubella organisation; and Disability Daily, a national campaigning consortium of disability and carers' organisations, which he founded. Bernard has worked as a policy and communications advisor in the House of Lords and Commons for various MPs and Peers; for the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe, based in Strasbourg; and for the late Diana, Princess of Wales. He was a member of the Prime Minister's Communications Advisory Group between 2007 - 2009. He is the author of the 'British Tourism Framework Review', published in 2009 and commissioned by the then Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

He is a former Chair of the British Youth Council; London Youth Matters; the Commonwealth Youth Forum; and was the first Chair of the Youth Forum of the United Nations. He is a former Trustee of the National Youth Agency. Bernard has been a judge of the British Environment and Media Awards (BEMAs) and the Museums and Heritage Excellence Awards for several years. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts (FRSA), a Fellow of the Tourism Society (FTS), Fellow of WWF-UK, a Member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (MCIPR) and lives in London.