Heledd Jones: Glas Cymru Member

Heledd Jones , joined as Glas Cymru member in November 2023. Outside of Glas, Heledd worked in FTSE100 Admiral Group as a Senior Marketing Manager for 15 years and is now a self-employed marketing consultant.

Why did you want to become a Glas Member?

I wasn’t aware of the Glas Cymru Membership until fellow member Dr Rhian Thomas suggested that I apply.

From a professional point of view, I thought it would give me great experience to work alongside a Board and Senior Management team of such an important Welsh company.

From a personal point of view, our local environment is really important to us as a family, so I was keen to learn more about, and perhaps influence, the work that D?r Cymru does to ensure we have affordable, clean drinking water and are able to swim in the sea and nearby rivers.

What does being a Glas Member entail?

You’re expected to attend a few meetings per year, a mix of real-life and online. At the meetings, Board members and/or Senior Management team report on progress against KPIs from across the business (e.g. from pollution incidences to customer service ratings). As Members, we’re given an opportunity to ask questions and challenge any aspects of the presentations. For example, at the last regional meeting, I was able to apply my experience of customer communications to make some suggestions to their customer strategy.

Many of the meetings offer a trip to one of their facilities e.g. waste water treatment works, which have also been really useful.

How are you finding the experience of being a Glas Member?

I joined at a fascinating time - climate change has caused a couple of tough years from drought to flooding, they’re under huge scrutiny on water quality, and more recently, the upcoming Ofwat price review. It’s been overwhelming to see some of the work that goes on behind the scenes, D?r Cymru is a huge operation - from all the planned (and unplanned!) engineering work to improve water quality to managing multiple stakeholders across Governments, regulators, and the media.?

While the Members form part of a formal governance structure, the Board and Team are very open and approachable, and Members are made to feel really welcome. An unexpected bonus has been meeting the other Members - there are over 60 of us from a wide cross-section of society, so I’ve met people I wouldn’t typically meet within my usual bubbles!

What advice would you give people considering applying to become a Glas Member?

Go for it! It’s a really interesting opportunity to play a small part in influencing a hugely important Welsh institution, while developing yourself. The interview process itself is robust, so I’d recommend you do plenty of research to give yourself the best chance of success.

Interested in becoming a member?

For more information and to apply, please head to our site be clicking here.