Phil McNaull is a strategic finance consultant and executive coach.
He was Finance Director at the University of Edinburgh from 2012-2018 having joined the Higher Education Sector in 2005 as FD at Heriot-Watt University. Prior to this he undertook a range of finance roles at Scottish & Newcastle plc in leased pubs, international beer, brands marketing, contract management, strategy, finance, corporate development and audit. At the time of his retirement from UoE the Group had annual turnover of circa £1bn, net assets of over £2bn and an annual capital programme of some £150m. The University had over 40,000 students and over 12,000 staff.
During his period as FD at UoE, Phil led a finance transformation project to improve the performance and impact of the Finance team. The benefits of this programme included; external recognition through an Investors in People silver award in 2014; a Business Finance award in 2015; Business Insider / Scottish Accountancy & Finance FD of The Year award in 2015; the team won the Times Higher Education Innovative Finance award in 2108; the team was shortlisted for Finance Team of the Year in the 2018 British Accountancy Awards and Phil won FD of the Year in the same awards. Phil has a particular interest in strategic finance, sustainable investments and in effective communication of business performance.
Phil has been convenor of the Scottish Universities Finance Directors Group, and Chair of the British Universities Finance Directors Group where he led a drive to improve financial reporting through the Integrated Reporting initiative. During his career in Higher Education he has been a member of the Universities Scotland Efficiency Taskforce, the UK wide Financial Sustainability Strategy Group and a Director of Advanced Procurement Universities and Colleges Ltd.
He established his own company, Luca’s Legacy Ltd. in 2019 and is now a certified coach; he is currently completing a further Diploma course on Executive Coaching.
In his role as consultant, Phil has worked for universities in the UK and overseas, carried out Executive Coaching assignments, provided training on communicating TRAC, run leadership development programmes as well as providing pro bono work for certain projects related to investing for sustainability.
Phil is currently a Director of Advanced Procurement Universities & Colleges Ltd., and provides consultancy services as a Client Relationship Director of Invisible Grail and an associate of Taylor Clarke. He will start in November 2021 as Interim Director of Finance at the University of Aberdeen.
He is a chartered accountant (Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland) and has an MBA from the University of Edinburgh and a BA from Strathclyde University.
Telephone: 07836 667701
Email: pmcnaull1@gmail.com