Suzanne Wise
Group General Counsel and Company Secretary, Network Rail
Suzanne is Group General Counsel and Company Secretary at Network Rail, having joined in January 2012. She is responsible for leadership of the in house legal team of 30 lawyers, the Company Secretarial team and Transparency and Business Ethics teams. She sits on the Group Executive Committee and chairs the Risk Review Group.
Prior to joining Network Rail Suzanne was General Counsel and Company Secretary at Premier Foods Plc for 4 years. At the time Premier was the UK’s leading food producer and manufacturer of some of the nation’s favourite foods including Hovis, Mr Kipling, Sharwoods, Brantson, Bisto and OXO. Suzanne was responsible for the Group’s Legal, Company Secretarial and Trade Mark functions and also sat on the Group Executive Committee. In addition to her Legal and Company Secretarial role Suzanne also had responsibility for the Internal Communications team and Group Internal Audit function.
Prior to Premier Foods Suzanne was Group Head of Legal at Gallaher Group Plc, the world’s fifth largest tobacco company and was responsible for the Group’s legal and trade-mark functions of c30 lawyers who were based across eight countries.
In her early her career, Suzanne worked in private practice, undertaking her training contract at Lewis Silken followed by two years at Crossman Block & Keith (now Crossman Block) as an IP specialist, focusing mainly on trade marks.