Meet the Team

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Manchester Met Conference and Events team pride ourselves on providing excellent customer service and an enjoyable, inclusive experience for everyone.

We’re really proud of our sustainability credentials and commitment to the community we are part of. We hold the highest possible accreditation under the Green Tourism Business Scheme and hope our approach to corporate social responsibility attracts companies to work with us who care as much about Manchester’s future as we do.

For further information on our customer commitment, please download our customer service standards and policy documents.

We are a single point of contact for conferences, events and residential summer group bookings across the University, so you can be assured of a seamless relationship with your conference coordinator, and hopefully a long lasting relationship with our team.

‘Organising the British Association of Applied Linguistics Conference at MMU was a great experience – the building is a fabulous venue and the catering was top-quality. Everything from beginning to end of the whole process was suberbly well organised and nothing was too much trouble’. 

Dr Gee Macrory, Baal Conference, September 2019

Meet the Team

Gemma Hill

Conference and Events Manager

I’m Gemma Hill, Conference and Events Manager at Manchester Met University.

I have been working at the University for 2 years now and I have worked in the Events Industry for over 13 years. The University is a new and exciting challenge for me as I have always worked in Arts venues. I moved to MMU from The Bridgewater Hall, after 8 wonderful years, and worked at The Lowry Arts and Entertainment centre for 2 years prior to that.

Watching the new Arts and Humanities building (Grosvenor) open its doors has been very exciting. The theatres are wonderful, versatile spaces with state-of-the-art equipment and the foyers, with huge digital screens and mini grand pianos, create a sense of creativity as soon as you walk in, plus there’s the new, trendy, Grove restaurant and bar making the Arts and Humanities building a truly unique space on campus. I’m really looking forward to organising and delivering some more artistic events here!

 

Louise Milne

Conference and Events Coordinator

Hi I’m Lou! I moved to Manchester in 2017, but I am originally from Newcastle upon Tyne.

I completed my Event Management degree in 2016, then worked for a large hotel chain, before moving to Manchester and getting a job at a large sports stadium;  I planned many conferences, exhibitions, Asian weddings, and I was even able to get involved in concerts and international sporting events. After 4 years, I started my role at Manchester Metropolitan University in April 2020, in the middle of a global pandemic!

My favourite space within the Uni is the GROW café, within the Business School. GROW is a meat-free café in the heart of our All Saints campus. It serves a range of tasty vegetarian/vegan alternatives, including salad boxes that have been created by our Nutritional Science students to be healthy and sustainable. Our GROW buffet is a popular choice for many of our clients, particularly for those that are planning an event with sustainability in mind.

James Charnock

Sales and Marketing Officer

Hello, I’m James – I’ve worked at the University for 12 years and for the last 3 have been working as Conference Office Sales and Marketing Officer.

I have run hundreds of events whilst I’ve been at the Uni, but took the opportunity two years ago to move into the Sales and Marketing world, which has been a huge learning curve, but also a really exciting time. I get to tell people about the sustainability and CSR work we do here at Manchester Met and also attract bigger and better events to the University – what could be better!

At the moment I’m really excited about our halls of residence. We’ve recently had another 500 en-suite rooms added to our portfolio, and this has meant our ability to run larger residential conferences, summer schools and travel groups has grown massively.

Archway Hall is also the location of our new office. This has meant we’ve got to watch students using the space from the word go, and will also mean we’re right there during the summer when our clients need us!

 

Awards

Awards for Conference and Events Team at Manchester Met

More about our industry accreditations

MMU Awards