Air Control Industries strengthens senior leadership team through internal career development

Matthew Shelley, Mat Ayres and Dexter Neesam now lead the company's Commercial, Innovation and Operations divisions respectively. Between them, they represent around 40 years of experience at Air Control Industries.

Matthew Shelley, now Head of Commercial, began his career with ACI in 2004 as a trainee in the design office. ACI was his first-ever employer. After moving into sales, he went on to become Business Development Manager, Channel Sales Manager and Commercial Manager before taking on his current role leading the company's commercial division.

Mat Ayres, now Head of Innovation, joined ACI in 2016 as a Trainee Design Engineer after training as a landscape architect at Falmouth University. His career at ACI has since moved through Project Management, Innovation and Engineering leadership before he joined the Senior Leadership Team and progressed into his current role.

Dexter Neesam, now Head of Operations, joined the company in 2017 as a Trainee Applications Engineer. He progressed through the commercial side of the business, becoming Technical Sales Manager in 2023. Recognising his wider leadership potential, ACI later moved him into Operations, where he now leads the division as Head of Operations.

The appointments reflect ACI's wider focus on organisational development, internal progression, leadership training and long-term succession planning.

"Movement is central to what we do at ACI," said Lucy Cockerill, Managing Director of Air Control Industries. "Usually, we are talking about the movement of air. But the movement of people within our business matters just as much.

"Matthew, Mat and Dexter are excellent examples of what can happen when people are given the opportunity to learn, move and grow within an organisation. None of their careers has followed a perfectly straight line, and that is something we actively encourage. They have moved between teams, taken on unfamiliar challenges and stepped into roles that looked very different from where they started."

Over recent years, ACI has placed increased focus on organisational design, leadership development, executive coaching and formal training, with the aim of creating a learning organisation where employees are supported to develop long-term careers.

"People should not be limited by the role they first walked into," added Cockerill. "We want ACI to be a place where talent is recognised, developed and given room to move. The future of the business will not be built by products, processes or systems alone. It will be built by people."

Cockerill said the development of the Senior Leadership Team forms part of a broader commitment to building future leaders from within the organisation.

"Their development will not stop here," she said. "These roles are the next stage of their careers, not the end point. We are actively working with them so that, when future opportunities arise, they are ready for them."

Air Control Industries says the appointments demonstrate the value of creating career pathways that allow employees to move across departments, broaden their experience and contribute to the business in new ways.