Hans Michels is a seasoned commercial leader with a very broad range of skills, experiences and insights developed during a 30‐year, international career with the Shell Group, having joined them after graduating with a degree in Chemical Engineering from Imperial College London. He has worked in and on, or in very close co‐operation with, businesses all along the downstream oil supply chain including Retail, B2B Sales and Marketing, Trading, Supply and Manufacturing, and in different market environments around the world.

Hans is an expansive, strategic thinker and problem solver who gains a sound, high level perspective on both internal and external business issues quickly. He has a track record of consistently creating and implementing innovative and practical solutions that make the most of opportunities to develop or transform a business across a variety of operational, project management, business development, strategic advisory and governance roles. He is an authentic, supportive team player and an effective relationship manager with a history of building and maintaining capable, motivated and highly performing teams in a range of different contexts.

Based on his experiences in Shell, Hans is convinced the potential exists to further improve and develop the activities of any business to grow its value significantly, even if it is already well managed and successful. He also believes that one of the most critical leadership success factors for sustained business performance is the ability to encourage, facilitate and empower staff to look continuously for new opportunities to grow value themselves and to collaborate proactively in taking controlled risks to pursue these within established boundaries, rather than waiting for managers to tell them what to do or give them explicit permission to do so.

Having taken a career break following a decision to return to the UK after more 20 years overseas, Hans is driven by the challenge and satisfaction of leveraging the benefits of his career with Shell to enable Tinderbox to help more SME owners to meet their objectives and make their businesses more and sustainably successful.

Hans and his family live in Haslemere, he is a rugby enthusiast and is chairman of the club he used to play for.