Meet our Team

  • James Derrick

    Director of Finance and Company Secretary

    James joined Dame Hannahs in 2008 as Trust Resources Manager and has been a key player during periods of rapid growth, restructures, difficulties and change.

    After gaining a History degree from Cardiff University in 2000 James commenced his accountancy career within a medium sized accounting practice in Winchester and gained his initial experience in accountancy, audit and tax. In 2003 James relocated back to Plymouth and continued his ACCA professional qualification, which he was awarded in 2006 whilst also working for a medium sized accountancy practice. This role enabled James to work with a wide variety of local and regional businesses. During 2007 James was appointed Directorate Accountant for the NHS working for a large local Hospital where he was responsible for the Corporate Directorates.

  • Wayne Fulton

    Director of Services

    Wayne started at Dame Hannahs in 2014 as Deputy Manager of Adult Services progressing to Registered Manager then Nominated Individual. He is now Director of Services. Before he joined Dame Hannahs he worked for another provider that specialised in supported living. He worked there for seven years and had a number of different managerial roles within that time.

    “What I enjoy most about working at Dame Hannahs is seeing the young people we support living fulfilled and meaningful lives because of the care and support we provide. I have seen many changes over the last ten years including changes within the structure of the organisation, changes in social care practice, changes in regulation/legislation, the challenges of a pandemic. I have also seen the growth of Adult Services which has doubled in size since I have been in post, and most importantly seeing the people we support develop over the years with the support from the Trust. Looking to the future, we are implementing a new structure for the regulated services, we are looking at areas of investment to improve the site and the services we offer and as part of that, we are looking to develop/grow our regulatory provision for the benefit of the young people that require our support.”

  • Daniel Burke

    Head of Fundraising and Retail Operations

    Daniel joined Dame Hannahs in September 2011 as Head of Retail and then in 2018 he was appointed Head of Fundraising as well. Prior to working at Dame Hannahs he spent 10 years as a Director at a flooring company which supplied and fitted flooring to new build houses, where his main role was to oversee their build contracts.

    “I first started at Dame Hannahs on a six month contract to reopen and establish our Devonport charity shop which had been closed for a period of time due to lack of volunteer support. After the initial six months I started to look at what improvements could be made to our other existing stores and took on the role as Head of Retail looking after all of the stores, its volunteer base and how we could look to expand this much needed income source.
    During this initial couple of years I managed to increase the revenue that each store was achieving as well as the surplus it provided back to the Trust to support our services by changing existing processes, growing the volunteer support network and reducing costs. I then opened a further three stores and started the process of employing a part time manager within each store to create consistency and a point of contact for each store. In 2014 I introduced Dame Hannahs to Retail Gift Aid, a much needed income stream which also increases our interaction with our donors. To date this has generated us an extra £142,000 in free money to support our services in Ivybridge. I also moved our small Transit Way store into much bigger premises and opened our Transit way superstore as well as our own storage and distribution hub which services all of our store network. This was a thriving enterprise, which was massively supported by the local community and shoppers who would travel from much further afield until its enforced closure due to the termination of our lease by Tesco in 2023. Since then we have established a new thriving warehouse in Plymouth as well as a busy new shop in South Brent with more growth plans in the pipeline.
    In 2018 I amalgamated the Trust’s fundraising and communications departments into my retail role and become the Head of Fundraising and Retail Operations where I now oversee all of our fundraising streams and communications to our supporter base either through printed or digital formats. This has also enabled me to become further involved with our Dame Hannahs Supporter Group whom I used to help at events but I am now involved with all year round."

  • Sam Bryant

    Clinical Lead

    Sam started at Dame Hannahs in August 2022 as our Clinical Lead, managing our Therapies and Nursing teams.

    Sam qualified as a nurse in 2007 and worked as a paediatric nurse for ten years at Derriford Hospital in Plymouth. She then moved into Complex Care in the community for Devon and Cornwall and took on managerial roles. It was then her nursing bank shifts in Children’s Services at Dame Hannahs that inspired her to take on her next job as Registered Manager of a children’s home in Tavistock. Following a change of ownership at the children’s home she decided to go back into Complex Care and became Nurse Manager for Devon, Cornwall and Somerset. This job involved a lot of travel so she then decided to look for a more regular job closer to her home in Plymouth. Sam has four children and in her spare time she can be found touring in her caravan or on a paddleboard.

    “Everyone at Dame Hannahs has been so warm and welcoming. The care we provide is phenomenal and it really feels like home for everybody”.