Places for People appoints former Crest director as first ever COO

Places for People’s group executive director for development Scott Black has been promoted to chief operating officer at the 220,000-home housing association. 

Black, who has 25 years’ experience in the development industry, including 10 years at Crest Nicholson, will retain his existing development responsibilities but will also take over the association’s £420m-turnover affordable housing business. 

Black from 2015 to 2020 served as managing director of Crest Nicholson Regeneration, with responsibility for about 200 staff with an annual turnover of between £250m - £300m a year.

Greg Reed, group chief executive at Places for People, said: “Scott joined Places for People two years ago as group executive director for development and in that time, he has delivered considerable success for the development business. 

“Bringing the two business areas together with Scott gives us the opportunity to create one team focused on delivering a better and more integrated service to our customers.”

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At Places for People Scott is responsible for delivering around 2,000 homes per year across six regional businesses, from Scotland to Cornwall.  

The new PfP COO also leads on the Homes England strategic partnership, which will see around 6,000 homes delivered in the next 10 years. 

PfP, which has a total group turnover of £816m, appointed its first ever group partnerships director, Steve Ashton, to lead strategy on mergers, acquisitions, contract negotiations and group-level partnerships last month. 

Black’s appointment follows the departure of Debi Marriott-Lavery as the group’s executive director for affordable housing. A role she held for just over three years.   

Marriott-Lavery was described in a statement as being “an incredible advocate for our customers, including being instrumental in establishing our National Customer Forum”.