Graham John Beale (born 19 October 1958) and former Chief executive of the

Nationwide Building Society Nationwide Building Society is a British mutual financial institution and the largest building society in the world. As of 2024, it serves over 16 million members and operates entirely for their benefit, without shareholders. The society was e ...

Early life

Beale's father was a former coal miner, who became a maintenance engineer at British Steel and his mother was a nurse. He has a brother, David, and grew up in

Scunthorpe Scunthorpe () is an industrial town in Lincolnshire, England, and the county's third most populous settlement after Lincoln, England, Lincoln and Grimsby, with a population of 81,286 in 2021. It is the administrative centre and largest settleme ...

Education and training

He attended the High Ridge School in Scunthorpe, which had been Scunthorpe Grammar School two years earlier. After the

John Leggott College John Leggott College is a sixth form college on West Common Lane, in Old Brumby, Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire, England. History Technical school Scunthorpe Central Technical School began around 1923. In the late 1930s, it was called the Scun ...

from 1975-77, Beale went to

Leicester University The University of Leicester ( ) is a public research university based in Leicester, England. The main campus is south of the city centre, adjacent to Victoria Park. The university's predecessor, University College, Leicester, gained university ...

to read psychology. He said, "I was interested in marketing and advertising and thought psychology would take me in the right direction". However, he began training as an accountant at Thomson McLintock, now part of KPMG. Thomson McLintock's biggest client was Leicester Building Society (which merged with Alliance in 1987 to form

Alliance & Leicester Alliance & Leicester plc was a British bank and former building society, formed by the merger in 1985 of the Alliance Building Society and the Leicester Building Society. The business Demutualisation, demutualised in the middle of 1997, when ...

and then acquired by Santander in 2010) and gave Beale an insight into mutuals. He said, "My time at Leicester was quite influential. I liked what mutuals stood for".

Career

Beale joined

Anglia Building Society The Anglia Building Society in the United Kingdom was originally formed by the merger of the Northampton Town and County and Leicestershire building societies in 1966. In 1987, it merged with Nationwide Building Society, becoming Nationwide Angl ...

in 1985, as a chartered accountant in the internal audit function. Anglia Building Society merged with Nationwide Building Society in 1987. At Nationwide Building Society, he was involved in a number of major transactions, including the buying and selling of subsidiary businesses. This included the sale of Nationwide Estate Agents in 1994 and the acquisition of UCB Home Loans in 1995. Beale was appointed managing director of a Glasgow subsidiary in 1997. In 2002, he became Divisional Director, Commercial and then joined the Board in 2003 as Group Finance Director. He was appointed Chief executive on 1 April 2007. In his first year as Chief executive, Beale oversaw the successful merger of the

Portman Building Society The Portman Building Society was a mutual building society in the United Kingdom, providing mortgages and savings accounts to consumers and offering loans to commercial enterprises. Its head office was in Bournemouth and its administration cen ...

– the largest merger the mutual sector had ever seen. During the financial crisis, Beale also oversaw mergers with three smaller building societies; the Derbyshire Building Society and

Cheshire Building Society The Cheshire Building Society was a building society based in Macclesfield, Cheshire, England. It was the 11th largest building society in the United Kingdom based on total assets of £5 billion on 31 December 2007, prior to merging with the Nat ...

in 2008 and the

Dunfermline Building Society The Dunfermline Building Society was a building society and later a trading division of Nationwide Building Society, based in Dunfermline, Scotland. Before its 2009 merger with Nationwide, it was the largest building society in Scotland and the ...

in 2009. In 2012, plans were announced to integrate these three brand names into one 'Nationwide' brand. Beale has been a member of the FCA Practitioner Panel – representing Building Societies – since 1 August 2011. He was appointed Chairman of the FCA Practitioner Panel from 1 April 2013. He was appointed

Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

(CBE) in the

2016 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 2016 were appointments by some of the 16 Commonwealth realms to various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by citizens of those countries. The New Year Honours are awarded as part of the New Year celebrati ...

for services to the financial services sector. On 22 May 2015, it was announced that Graham Beale intended to retire as CEO of Nationwide. He stepped down as Chief executive on 4 April 2016. Joe Garner, formerly CEO of

Openreach Openreach Limited is a company wholly owned by BT Group plc, that maintain telephone cables, ducts, cabinets and exchanges that connect nearly all homes and businesses in the United Kingdom to various national broadband and telephone networks. T ...

, joined the Society as Chief executive on 5 April 2016.

Interests

He is interested in wildlife photography, renovating his Georgian townhouse in Bath, travel and walking the dog.

Personal life

Beale met his wife at the university at Leicester and married her on graduating; they have two children. He lives in the

Vale of White Horse The Vale of White Horse is a Non-metropolitan district, local government district of Oxfordshire in England. It Historic counties of England, was historically part of Berkshire. The area is commonly referred to as the 'Vale of ''the'' White Hors ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Beale, Graham Living people 1958 births Place of birth missing (living people) Alumni of the University of Leicester British chief executives of financial services companies Commanders of the Order of the British Empire People from Scunthorpe People from Vale of White Horse (district)