Biographies

Gordon White 

Gordon White started Design Matters in 1986 offering traditional design and marketing services to a wide range of public and private sector organisations throughout the UK.  The arrival of the internet saw Design Matters move into web design, web strategy and online marketing then, with the arrival of Web 2.0 Design Matters became involved in social media and assisting their portfolio of clients to engage and communicate using new media. The Design Matters business also offers extensive event management services to a range of organisations throughout the UK.
 
In 2006, in response to the growing demand for new and social media production, Gordon founded Podcastmatters Ltd, a new media production company specialising in audio and video podcast production, niche networking and social media consulting.   In June 2010 Podcastmatters and Design Matters merged and rebranded as fatBuzz Ltd. FatBuzz Ltd hosts the monthly New Media Breakfast series of seminars in Glasgow and Edinburgh with bi-monthly events in Aberdeen and Inverness. These events attract around 80 attendees and are growing every month in reputation and popularity.  Gordon regularly delivers seminars, presentations and workshops to organisations throughout the UK such as recent engagements with the Institute of Directors, The Chartered Institute of Public Relations and, the Institute of Investor Relations. Gordon is a past chairman of Links of Scotland, a consortium of 26 golf related businesses formed to market their goods and services in the USA and the Far East. Gordon acquired John Letters of Scotland in 1999 and was chairman of the company until he sold it to Direct Golf in 2005.

Gordon also hosts a twice-monthly podcast called “Social Media Podcast” with commentary about social media and interviews from World leaders in the field; 3 times this year the Social Media Podcast has been the No.1 audio podcast in the iTunes Podcasting category. Gordon is married with three children and enjoys drawing, painting and golf.  He is an accomplished golf artist selling prints of his work via the internet all around the world.   

Murray Strachan

Murray is Managing Director of Strachan & Partners, a specialist business advisory consultancy, and Chief Executive of Albyn Ventures, a business investment group. He also holds a number of non-executive chairman & director positions in a diverse range of companies throughout the UK, many of which he is a shareholder in, including  outsourced payroll, employment law / hr consultancy, local radio, specialist landscape planning & property reports, men's fashion accessories, golf practice products, retail & oil/gas services. 

Prior to February 2007, he was a Director and Chief of Staff of the Petrofac Operations Services Division, a major international oil services business. Until May 2006, Murray was the Chief Executive of the Petrofac Training Group, the leading training & consultancy business to the international oil and gas industry. Petrofac Training was created in February 2004, when Petrofac acquired the RGIT Montrose Group, which had been acquired in April 2003 by a MBO Team led by him. Prior to RGIT Montrose, he worked for divisions of Liberty Mutual and the AP Moller / Maersk Group in a number of senior management or strategic change management roles.

Murray is also a non executive director of &/or holds board positions with a number of charitable causes &/or organisations in Scotland and was a top 3 finalist for the Scottish Director of the Year in 2004.  RGIT Montrose, under his leadership, was the winner of the Small/Mid-Size Company Deal of the Year 2003/4 and was runner up of overall Deal of the Year 2003/4.  In 2007, Murray was appointed Honorary Professor of the Robert Gordon University, joined the Board of the Entrepreneurial Exchange in Scotland and joined the Development Board of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.  Murray is also Vice Chairman of the NE of Scotland cancer charity CLAN with whom he has been a director since 2001.