Our team of salaried staff and volunteers are often drawn from those that have been through our programmes and activities.

Tony Wright, Founder & Chief Executive of Forward Assist joined the Royal Marines in 1978 and was medically discharged in 1981 after seriously injuring his shoulder during basic training.

Tony Wright is a registered Social Worker, Probation Officer and former Home Office Adviser. He established Forward Assist(2013) & Salute Her UK (2021) He originally started work in the service charity sector when he set up About Turn CIC in 2009 to assist veterans involved with the CJS make a successful transition from Prison to the community. Following a Winston Churchill Memorial Trust Travelling Fellowship in 2011, which involved a six week research trip to the USA, he changed his direction of travel and began to focus on combat veterans that had difficulty accessing trauma informed care and services. He is particularly supportive of combat veterans who struggle to ask for help and/or those that have survived Military Sexual Assault (MSA) and now suffer from Moral Injury, Post Traumatic Stress and Military Sexual Trauma(MST). A Qualified and Registered Social Worker, Former Probation Officer and Home Office Adviser with over 40 years experience of working in a variety of senior management positions within the social welfare sector and voluntary sector, Tony describes himself as a political activist, campaigner and agent of change. The work of Forward Assist to research and then design ‘needs led’ services for previously invisible populations has led to significant policy change within the UK Military and increased understanding and awareness of the unmet intersectional needs of minority groups. He lives a life driven by compassion and being of service to others and a never ending desire to become the best version of himself–both personally and professionally.

 

STEVE DOGGETT (Operations Lead)

Steve is a Qualified Probation Officer and Social Worker with over 20 years’ experience in the sector. He has had an interest in veterans involved in the CJS, even before his early career began as a Probation Officer in North Tyneside and Northumberland before moving into Organisational Development and Training roles. He has worked as a Practice Tutor Assessor (TAQA VQ Award & PTLLS) supporting new staff to attain their VQ qualifications and training. He won Probation Service Awards for Work on Equality & Diversity, Skills for Effective Engagement Development (SEEDS) & devised a new desistance, strength-based Positive Pathways Programme for the Probation service.

Steve also trained as a qualified Mental Health Social Worker, and he is an advocate for improving mental health and wellbeing in society. He latterly worked in a policy role at HMPPS as a Quality and Effective Practice Manager leading on some key national projects (MOJ). Since leaving to work on digital projects Steve remains a passionate advocate for the work of the Probation Service, Veterans, Mental Health & ADHD, featuring regularly on social media channels as @ProbationSteve.

Steve has been involved in some notable system design for Probation Service applications showcasing some vital contributions to:

  • Development of Omnia, a fully integrated, intuitive dashboard driven case management and risk assessment/sentence planning tool for London & Thames Valley Probation.

  • Re-development of existing Case Management System (CMS) in Jersey & Guernsey to a new modern browser-based web application. 

  • Design work on the AIM application which helps identify prisoners who are potentially at risk of self-injurious or suicidal behaviours. 

  • Product design for a new highly intuitive mobile application and microsite that has been designed to better engage and support service currently being piloted in the UK Probation Service.

"I'm delighted to be joining Forward Assist in a volunteer capacity and look forward to working with Tony Wright CEO to develop more needs led and person centered interventions for veterans and their families."

 

SALLY WALKER

Sally_Walker_Forward_Assist.

Sally has a background in organisational development. She started out her career advising and assessing organisations against the Investors in People standards and developing credible relationships with anyone from senior leaders in the RAF through to cleaners in food factories. Her work on Investors in People (IiP) projects led Sally to become a leadership training specialist and she went on to run a successful consultancy business for 10 years.

She then brought her unique skillset to Northumbria Probation Trust where she managed many initiatives including some key leadership projects such as an aspiring manager's programme, an organisation-wide reflective supervision programme, and leadership coaching.  Sally has deep knowledge and experience in change management which led to successful assessment, creation and implementation of organisational culture change and employee engagement strategies at the probation service, culminating in the award of the prestigious Investors in People Champion & Gold status. She is an expert facilitator and has worked with many charities on IiP projects. Sally is expert in design, development and delivery of engaging training programmes specialising in leadership and management which provide teh optimum level of learning transfer. Sally is an analytical thinker with the ability to build rapport and understanding across organisations. Outside of work, she is a mum to her 9-year-old daughter, a partner in her hubby's courier business. When she Sally gets a spare minute, she enjoys getting her sewing machine out and has crafted memory blankets and cushions for friends and family. 

 

SHARON STEPHENSON

Sharon_Stephenson_Forward_Assist

Sharon's studies and career path have been heavily influenced by an underpinning interest in wanting to understand and support people to help themselves and each other. She worked in a variety of roles motivating people through change and promoting learning & development within the Probation Service for 15 years before leaving to pursue independent training and consultancy projects.

She has especially loved working on the design & evaluation of a range of award-winning programmes and is a big supporter of evidence-led, person centred approaches. She co-founded a creative, well-being business within the north east  for 4 years which delivered workshops and events and also crafted a small product line & exhibition pieces. This provided a good opportunity to refine fresh skills in budget management, website development, marketing and content creation. All of her previous roles have involved multi-organisation work including a variety of charities, partnership development and relationship building. Most recently, she has tipped the work-life balance in favour of spending more time with her family. She is keen to offer creative energy, an analytic sensibility and listening ear to new projects.

 

DAVE KNOWLES (Safeguarding Consultant)

David qualified as a social worker in 1995, since then he has worked as an approved social worker, managed social work teams, established a community interest company providing drug and alcohol treatment across the North East and in London. More recently he was the National Safeguarding lead for the largest provider of retirement properties in the country. David was born in Catterick Garrison, the largest military base in the UK. Throughout his career in social care he has been involved in developing services for underserved groups, including former service personnel. He was a Trustee of a regional substance misuse charity, as well as a Governor for a primary school. He brings a great deal of knowledge and experience around mental health, substance misuse, governance, and safeguarding to all Forward Assist projects and operations.

 

CHRIS PRETTY (Veteran Researcher)

Chris Pretty

Born in West Africa and educated in Suffolk. I joined the Royal Marines in 1978 in the same Troop as Tony Wright and fought in the Falklands War of 1982 and in Northern Ireland. Many skills were gained during my service, of which many were irrelevant to civilian life unless severely adapted before use. Leaving the Corps was a peculiar moment and required some considerable effort to get things right in the world.

Working in the outdoors as a climbing instructor and then a General Manager of an Outdoor Centre gave me good people and management skills but little money. This led to a calculated move into the teaching profession and fulltime work in colleges of further education for two decades which culminated in becoming the Programme Manager and Lecturer of a Degree course. I also completed a variety of research projects with Essex University during my academic career. All through my career in education I continued to climb and develop my skills as a professional mountaineer. On completion of an Honours Degree, a Teaching Degree and then a Masters Degree I found life to be significantly better and over the last ten years 10 years I began work with several UK veterans’ charities by delivering Climbing and Mountaineering training for their beneficiaries. This was especially so for those veterans accessing the support of Forward Assist and their families. I also took part in a Forward Assist Veterans exchange in America and for the last two years have worked with Tony to organise and facilitate veteran respite/retreats for combat veterans in France. I look forward to working with Tony on future veteran retreats and innovative lived experience research projects. In my spare time I enjoy facilitating battlefield tours in Europe and I am also a soon to be published author with Pen and Sword Publishers.