Meet the Team
Chair & Social Director
Lindsay Garvey-Jones
Lindsay has a 36 year career in the travel industry and 11 years with Holiday Extras as National Retail Manager. She has been on the Board of Directors for AWTE since 2014 ensuring that women in the travel industry are able to reach their full potential, build confidence and develop skills.
Lindsay is a positive disruptor and influencer in the industry having won many awards for Pride Champion LGBTQIA+ with TTG Media, and in 2022 she joined the Northern Power Women - Power List for keeping gender on the agenda and always seeking equality and equity, diversity and inclusion in our industry by working on independent committees and working alongside individual businesses to establish best practices and effective frameworks to push ahead with creating a positive and thriving culture.
She is a self confessed feminist and activist championing equality across our business and industry whilst continuing to empower our male role models and create a positive allyship using expertise, knowledge and empathy to support the valuable contribution of women supporting a thriving and productive place to work.
Lindsay is also co Founder of Travel Talks Menopause which supports our industry in the learning and understanding of menopause, its symptoms and what businesses can do to protect and support those experiencing symptoms and create effective workplace policies to retain our talented female workforce.
Vice-Chair PR & Marketing Director
Michelle Laverick
Michelle has been an AWTE Board member since 2018 and has spent a lifetime in travel working in and leading, award-winning marketing teams across the sector including HF Holidays, Collette Travel, Wendy Wu Tours, Explore, Inghams, First Choice and Direct Holidays. She is passionate about the AWTE and its values, and strives to support women throughout their working careers, offering guidance on opportunities for development and mentorship, and support for whatever challenges are encountered.
Outside of work, she spends much of her time running around after her two daughters. Although she’s never happier than when she is either swimming, hiking up mountains, out on her bike or planning her next big challenge. Open water swimming helps Michelle cope with the challenges that life throws at her, and competing helps maintain her overall fitness and enables her to challenge herself further. In 2022 she embarked on a new adventure and completed a skydive in support of the AWTE charity for 2022/3 Papyrus. More recently, the latest challenge was completing the 100mile RideLondon cycle - completely out of her comfort zone!
Finance Director
Helen Tustin
Helen joined the AWTE Board in August 2021. Her travel career began in January 1982, when she became a YTS trainee at a family-owned independent travel agency, where she was fortunate enough to be mentored by the owner. By the age of 21, she was appointed Branch Manager. Over the next 36 years, the company expanded into a robust award-winning independent business with four offices. When the proprietor retired, Tailormade Travel acquired the business. After overseeing the merger of the two businesses, Helen sought a new challenge and launched Wellbeing Travel just before the pandemic in December 2019.
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Helen also sits on the South Wales CoR for ABTA as well as sitting as Chair of the ACC at Cardiff Airport.
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In her spare time Helen likes to spend time with family at the gym which is her down time and social time. She also enjoys cooking and loves to make a good sourdough loaf.
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Membership Director
Lynette Dungey
Lynette joined the AWTE Board in November 2021. With 18 years in the leisure, travel & tourism industry, she has a history in managing successful Sales and Account Management Teams as well as Commercial and Strategic Partnerships across tour operator, airline, and airport sectors.
She has held roles at Cardiff Airport, Thomas Cook, Avis Budget Group, The Travel Chapter and Holiday Cottages.
In her own words, her success in the travel industry, comes not only from sheer hard work and determination, but has been facilitated and accelerated by strong and successful female leaders who have supported her professional development and motivated her to succeed.
She loves to travel and take long walks with her beloved German Shepherd, Zac. Now a Menopause Ambassador in her place of work she is passionate about supporting and educating women in the workplace.
Membership Director
Jessica Simpson
Jess is delighted to join the AWTE as Membership Director as she is extremely passionate about women supporting women in both their careers and personal development.
In her treasured role of Head of Partnerships at Travel Gossip she gets to meet an array of people across the travel industry including tourism boards, cruise lines, hotel chains, and travel agents, to name just a few, and is excited to be able to spread the word about the great AWTE network and offering.
Outside of work Jess is extremely interested in fitness and nutrition, so much so that she is currently studying to qualify as a fitness instructor. Fresh air and exploring new places also bring her a lot of joy, whether it’s making sure to stretch her legs on her lunch break or day trips with her boyfriend at the weekend! So, if you have a favourite walking route (and if it has a great café to stop at even better) make sure to share it with Jess the next time you see her!
Partnerships and Sponsorship Director
Gail Kenny
In May 2022, Gail was appointed on the Board of Directors at AWTE, which supports and promotes the careers of women in travel, tourism, and hospitality. She is responsible for driving revenue and growth, through partnerships and sponsorships.
In January 2022, Gail launched Best Workplaces in Travel, a unique employee survey and recognition awards, when there was a heightened focus on people, purpose and culture.
Gail is also an ambassador for the NFP social enterprise, Working with Cancer. Through her own experience, coupled with HR and recruitment knowledge, she adds significant value to others that have been affected by cancer and returning to work.
Co-Founded Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment in 2004 to become the now "go to" executive travel recruitment consultancy.
As a result of 20+ years in the travel industry, Gail has developed an extensive network of connections.
Events Director
Andrea Stafford
Andrea is new to the AWTE board and is passionate about travel and was drawn to working with the AWTE because of its values and support for working women in the Travel Industry . This year she celebrates 37 years in travel having started as a trainee travel agent back in 1986. She has worked for some brilliant companies including First Choice, Tui, Thomas Cook, Amex, The Royal Caribbean Group, MSC Cruises and now is enjoying her work life at Scenic and Emerald Cruises. Her expertise is in leading sales teams to develop and grow business within the travel trade.
Outside of work Andrea is married to Jon and they have a lovely life in the country in Somerset –although they both travel for work so enjoy coming home. Andrea is a keen runner, loves cooking and organising social activities for friends and family hence throwing herself into the role of Events Director at AWTE. She is a born organiser (her parents say she is bossy!) and loves a plan!
She also has a pet rabbit called Milo who follows her everywhere like a little dog! Very cute!
She is really looking forward to meeting everyone at upcoming events and is looking forward to supporting colleagues and women in travel in her new role.
Development Director
Debbie O'Neill
Debbie is the Managing Director for Jules Verne, a qualified NLP practitioner and a Women’s Empowerment Coach. Having worked in the travel industry for over 30 years, she has successfully worked her way to the most senior position within the organisation through a series of change ideas and cultural change initiatives.
More recently, she has completely reimagined the way she looks at corporate life and is determined to change the workplace as we know it. Coaching, connection, and authenticity sit at the centre of her vision and this ‘people focussed’ management ethos is creating a workspace where people can flourish and thrive.
A Mum to Max and Wife to David, all of whom share a passion for travel; in the spare time she has, Debbie enjoys practicing Reiki & Tai Chi, taking long dog walks, and indulging in the occasional pamper treatment.
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Secretary and Special Projects Director
Linzi Barber
Linzi has been in the travel industry for over 20 years starting her career with Jersey European Airways in ops planning and scheduled planning. From the start of her aviation career, she was hooked and remains a self confessed plane geek today. After seeing Jersey European transform to British European and onto lead the way with many low cost initiatives as Flybe and being part of the teams leading both the acquisition of BA connect and also Finncomm it was time for a move. During her latter years as a senior member of the sales team with Flybe Linzi was responsible for leisure, sales, charter sales and the groups department. A natural move was into the world of charter broking and Linzi enjoyed 6 years in a slightly different side of the industry working for Air Partner, one of her largest clients back in her Flybe days.
In 2019 an opportunity of a lifetime arose to work with AirlinePros a former supplier to Flybe and support the management team to expand globally into 42 new markets. Linzi will always be grateful for the opportunities she has been given. In her own words “working for possibly not the biggest players has given me an amazing opportunity to learn and get involved in areas of the business which would otherwise not have been possible. It is these skillsets and mindsets that have set me up for where I am today.
Her role has offered her ample opportunities to travel over the years but even in her spare time Linzi cannot get enough of travelling, planes remain her favourite way to get away but when she can’t convince her other half to leave the country for the weekend then she’ll settle on the campervan!
Benevolent Director
Barbro McAusland
Barbro’s career in the travel industry has spanned over 40 years. For the first 30 years, Barbro worked tirelessly for the Swedish Tourist Board, now known as Visit Sweden, and based in London, ultimately becoming Director. It was a lovely time, building the awareness of Sweden and all that the fabulous country offers: launching campaigns, producing brochures and running a renowned PR department, making Sweden available for so many journalists and TV crews. The last 10 years of Barbro’s career was spent as Director of the US office for Visit Sweden as well as for major market Germany and The Netherlands. Such a lot of travelling but always good fun!
Barbro joined AWTE in 1973 – specifically for the purpose of networking with the travel trade – and she became Chair of AWTE from 2012-2015 and then joined the AWTE Benevolent Board.
Barbro reflects that the Travel Industry has changed so much over these years and she can only say, “What joy and friendships it has given me!”