The experience and expertise of some of the Triaster Consulting Team

Michael Cousins

Founder and Managing Director

Michael has spent 32 years helping organisations understand and improve how work actually happens, and leads Triaster's QMS Consulting practice. He holds a PhD in Mathematics and is a Fellow of the Chartered Quality Institute (FCQI).

Kiryl Tsitsiankou

Founding Service Lead

Kiryl is the Founding Service Lead and has led Triaster's expansion into the EU from day one. He is the driving force behind the development of Triaster's consulting service catalogue, and as well as overseeing and assisting with delivery, he is focused on ensuring every Triaster client receives full value from their investment with us.

Matt Burrowes

Service Lead

Matt has worked for over ten years on the Triaster team and is expert in the customer facing processes such as fulfilment, support and customer success.

Paul Elson-Vining

Principal Consultant

Otherwise known as "Process Paul", Paul has worked in process consultancy for 15 years and is a true expert in all aspects of process management, a clearly essential discipline for the Process Approach. He has personally been involved in over 100 Process Approach initiatives globally. With a logical approach, he can understand the key elements that customers require in their business process.

Linda Spinks

Principal Consultant

Linda has worked at the University of Cambridge since 2004, first as a Business Analyst and more recently as Continuous Improvement Lead. A Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, she has been delivering Lean and Continuous Improvement training to staff across the collegiate University since 2017, and works with teams to improve their processes. She is an active member of the LeanHE Global community, as a member of the England and Wales, European and Global steering groups and by presenting at conferences. She has contributed to two books in collaboration with colleagues in the community. Her strength is connecting with people without blinding them with buzzwords and methodologies.

Stanislas Julien

Principal Consultant

Stan began his career working with IBM, and then spent 27 years at Microsoft as a process and quality evangelist in the various partner programmes. Like many people in the quality world, Stan is a true believer that the Process Approach is a core component for any QMS to succeed at enterprise scale. Stan's special interest now is in the application of AI in the Enterprise QMS space. How can AI be brought on efficiently and at the same time with the data and information integrity required at Enterprise scale? And what benefits can the new breed of QMS systems deliver when virtually all end-user interaction becomes conversational?

Phil Chater

Principal Consultant

Phil has over three decades of senior executive and quality-governance experience across manufacturing, service, telecommunications and public sector organisations. He has built and developed effective but agile quality management systems throughout his career, including for Jaguar Cars, AP Lockheed, Delphi's European aftermarket division and Fujitsu Telecommunications. In consultancy roles he has helped a global aerospace manufacturer and a University recover from quality crises and assessed quality management across wind-turbine manufacturing sites in the US, Europe and China, identifying systemic issues and solutions. He builds integrated management systems that put boards and executive teams at the centre of governance, quality and operational transformation.

Dr Capt. François Laffoucrière

Principal Consultant

François started his marine career in 1986 and is a Master Mariner and a Chief Engineer. He started to read law in 2003, and obtained a PhD in Law from Sorbonne University in 2012. He qualified as an Avocat (French lawyer) in 2016 and is now registered at the Bars of Paris and Malta. He is a Marine Consultant, a Maritime Arbitrator at the 'Chambre Arbitrale Maritime de Paris', and a member of the Malta Maritime Law Association. For many years, François has been an active member and is a Fellow of The Nautical Institute. He has been the Vice-chairman of The Nautical Institute Technical Committee and has been a delegate at the IMO. His marine experience and knowledge coupled with his legal expertise means François is perfectly and almost uniquely positioned to assist any organisation with marine assets or at-sea operational processes to create fully compliant management systems.

Eve van Dijk

Analyst

Eve joined the Triaster team in 2025 following her legal training. She believes QMS disciplines can add massive value to the legal profession and sees it as a sector that is ripe for change, especially with the emergence of conversational AI. She holds a Master of Law.

Kate Walker

Analyst

Trained as a GP, Kate has deep operational experience of public and private health care processes and management. She holds an MD.

Claire Louise Bliss

Analyst

Claire has 15+ years work experience as a Quality Engineer and Manager, adding skills including but not limited to understanding and implementing quality management systems, complying to domestic and international regulations, auditing, problem solving, investigating, root cause analysis and green-belt six-sigma. She brings Quality Control to every role and company she works for. Alongside her Quality experience and professionalism, Claire is also a Certified Scrum Master and particularly enjoys the agile methodologies for achieving results.

Carma Cooper-Evans

Principal Consultant

Carma is a Principal Consultant with a career spent helping organisations turn strategy into operational reality. She combines commercial leadership with hands on process and quality improvement, working with teams to make management systems practical, adopted and genuinely useful day to day. She holds an MBA and brings a structured, business focused approach to QMS adoption, change management and continuous improvement.

Steve Skerrett

Principal Consultant

Steven brings 40 years of experience in manufacturing, quality management systems and business improvement across the aerospace, defence and automotive sectors. He develops quality strategies that turn business goals into practical site-level initiatives, improving organisational performance, customer satisfaction and execution across complex operations. He views quality as more than compliance; it is a driver of growth and efficiency, built on talented people and effective processes. His approach combines structured process development with a strong focus on developing local expertise, talent pipelines and confident teams through coaching, training and mentoring. He has implemented process-based management systems that streamline operations, improve consistency of application through training and an employee focused interface accessible to multilingual workforces. As a certified Lean Event Facilitator, Event Consultant and Trainer, he has led many Lean Kaizen events and delivered training that achieved measurable improvements, including reduced process waste and stronger team efficiency.