Simon is a trainer and board evaluation and governance consultant. He stepped down as CEO of ICSA: The Chartered Governance Institute (CGI) on 30 June 2019, having held the role since 1 October 2011. That appointment followed eight years as Joint Head of ICSA Board Evaluation, a role to which he has returned. Simon is a Fellow of the CGI, having qualified first as a solicitor. He worked as in-house counsel for 30 years in the railway industry, latterly as Company Secretary and General Counsel and then as a main board executive director of the former Railtrack Group PLC.

Simon is now an Executive Fellow with the London Business School Leadership Institute. In addition to his board evaluation practice, he delivers training programmes for company directors. Simon is a member of the International Corporate Governance Network (he is immediate past chair of ICGN’s Bylaws & Procedures Committee and was a founder member of its Business Ethics Committee). He is a vice-president of a charity, the Railway Benefit Fund of which he was previously the deputy chair. He has served also as a NED of a boutique media and events company, as the chair of the ICSA Company Secretaries Forum, as a member and chair of the audit committee of The Law Society of England and Wales and as a member of the audit committee of a major City of London law firm.