Barclays names relationship banking chief

She has joined from NatWest and will hold responsibility for the small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector and Premier Banking in her new role.

Meanwhile, the Sheffield office of law firm, Irwin Mitchell, has boosted its business legal services team with the appointment of Yorkshire-based dealmaker, Matt Ainsworth. He specialises in M&A, private equity, joint ventures, corporate finance and general corporate advisory, and moves to Irwin Mitchell as a partner from DLA Piper in Sheffield where he was a legal director.

Also in the legal sector, solicitor Rachael Davis has joined the Hull firm of Williamsons Solicitors, having completed her two-year training contract elsewhere.

Specialist financial outsourcer HML, which is headquartered at Skipton, has appointed John Grimbaldeston as director of strategy and product development. Mr Grimbaldeston has previously worked for Bradford & Bingley, RBS, Abbey and Provident Financial. For the past two years he has been running his own management consultancy.

ASK4, the Sheffield-based fibre optic broadband provider, has taken on a new business sales manager. George Powell has previously worked with companies such as Octi-Tech, Plusnet and Wandisco.

IT company Claritas, which has its head office in Bramham, has made five new appointments. Pat Genn joins to take over the role of HR consultant, Adam Burgess joins as a first line technical consultant, Daniel Sheldon joins as support developer, Simon Fogg joins as operational support and Sophie Ingram joins the company as an account handler.

Leeds-based Principles Agency has made three new appointments within its account management and production teams. Neil Starkey joins as production manager, Victoria Reddington and Natalie Barry joins as account executive.