Stephen Hester

Stephen A. M. Hester (born 14 December 1960) is an British businessman and former banker, the chief executive officer (CEO) of RSA Insurance Group and former CEO of the RBS Group.

Early life

Hester is the eldest son of Ronald, a chemistry professor at the University of York, and Dr Bridget Hester, a psychotherapist. He grew up in the village of Crayke in North Yorkshire. He was educated at Easingwold School in North Yorkshire a rural comprehensive school, and at Oxford where he studied at Lady Margaret Hall, and after chairing the Tory Reform Group, graduated with a first class honours degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.

Career

Hester began his career in 1982 with Credit Suisse, where he started as the chairman's assistant. In 1996 he was appointed to the executive board. Hester held the position of chief financial officer and Head of Support Division, until May 2000. From May 2000 to September 2001, he was Head of the Fixed Income Division.

In May 2002, he joined Abbey National as Finance Director. He then went on to become chief operating officer, a position he held until November 2004, when he was appointed Chief Executive of British Land. In early 2007, eight months before British Land and other REITs were caught in the commercial property slump, he said: "I don't believe we are about to see a market decline, but the period of sharp growth is over."

Stephen Hester (professor)

Stephen Hester is Professor of Sociology at the Bangor University in north Wales. He currently teaches sociology. He has written broadly on sociology and is known as a key contributor to the sociological issues in Canada. He is the author of A Sociology of Crime (Routledge, 1992) with Peter Eglin, presenting new theoretical approach to study sociology (the sociology of crime) from three sociological perspectives in submerging an alternative to corpus of sociology and social policy studies that are from mainstream sociology; critically engaging an integrative and comprehensive way on the field of sociology and sociology of crime with the three hitherto dominant perspectives, and thereby clarifies the key differences between these theoretical points of view of (1) symbolic interactionism, (2) structural conflict, (3) and ethnomethodology.

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