Mike is an independent labour market expert, working in the UK and internationally, with extensive experience in research, policy analysis and strategy. His work in the last two years includes: a guide to European Employment Policy for The European Commission; a review of member countries' skillls strategies for the OECD; a course in skills policy for the ILO; the European 'Urbact' report ‘More Jobs, Better Cities’; expert members of the European Commission/Australia Policy Dialogue on Education and Training; Member of the Leeds City Region Employment and Skills Board.

Until 2011, Mike was Director of Research and Policy at the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES). He is co-author of Ambition 2020: World Class Skills and Jobs for the UK (2009 and 2010), UKCES’s landmark reports on the UK’s progress towards world class skills and jobs, and of Skills for Jobs (2010), the highly regarded Skills Audit for England.

He was the Adviser to the Leitch Review of UK Skill Needs; a member of the European Commission’s Expert Group on ‘New Skills for New Jobs’; on the OECD’s Skill Strategy Advisory Group ; the Northern Ireland Employment and Skills Advisory Board; and the Migration Advisory Committee. He has been British Council Distinguished Visiting Fellow to Japan and Visiting Professor of Economics at the University of Hiroshima. He currently holds a Visiting Professorship in Economics at Durham Business School and was awarded the OBE for services to economic development in the 2004 New Year Honours List. Before working for Government Mike was Director of the Policy Research Institute, which he founded in 1988 and built into a 25 person business.