Business networking body BPS Birmingham Future has appointed its new chairman and deputy chairman for the coming year.
Tara Tomes, founder of PR agency East Village, takes over the chair while Kathryn Small, business development manager at law firm Gowling WLG, steps into the deputy chair's role.
Ms Tomes succeeds Rebecca Simkiss, co-founder of recruitment agency SimkissGuy, after a year as chairman.
The appointments will be officially announced at a dinner in Birmingham tonight along with the news of a new initiative to be run in partnership with Aston Business School called Birmingham Future Leadership Development Programme.
It will aim to offer members of BPS Birmingham Future the chance to develop their leadership skills and applications will open in September.
During its first year, the initiative is looking to recruit up to 30 young professionals to take part in the nine-month programme.
Looking back at her time in post, Ms Simkiss will say: "This summer saw the first Professional Services Week.
"An initiative created to specifically find effective ways in which to engage with young people residing in the city’s schools and provide them with an opportunity to sample what we called the three Ds - demystify our sector, demonstrate the wealth of opportunities available and discover.
"It is already clear that Professional Services Week was a huge success. It delivered on all our core objectives and schools who participated are already talking to us about how they can be part of next year."
Ms Tomes will set out her ambitions and objectives for the year ahead and talk about the importance of keeping up the momentum of the group's mentoring activity.
She will add: "Being a member of Birmingham Future has played an integral part in my career progression during the past eight years so I know, first hand, how important membership is to young professionals, their employers and the sector as a whole.
"I have a wide ranging set of objectives to achieve during my year, not least ensuring that our newly launched Leadership Development Programme is a great success.
"I will add to Birmingham Future's existing offering with new opportunities for our more experienced members, in addition to building upon our activity in schools."
