Meet the Customer Experience Committee

Karen Rispin

Customer Experience Committee Member

As a social housing customer herself, Karen is passionate about customer experience. She is eager to share her knowledge and is committed to making a positive impact on social housing tenants and leaseholders. Karen has been involved in delivering front line services to customers with over 15 years' experience in social housing. She has supported families and individuals facing challenges such as domestic violence, homelessness, at-risk situations, and refugees; and has received Hate Crime Incident training as part of her work with Stop Hate UK. 

Karen is an active member of various community hubs and charities across Kirklees and is currently working within Kirklees Council, working to support Climate actions across all parts of Kirklees where she lives. 

Lara Oyedele

Customer Experience Committee Member

Lara wanted to join our customer committee because she is passionate about the provision of social and affordable housing in Bradford and wants to make a positive contribution to how Incommunities looks after tenants and residents. Lara is an Incommunities leaseholder and wants to be the voice for other leaseholders who may not have the time or the ability to comment directly on their experiences. Lara has 25 years experience in a wide range of housing related roles and is a non-executive director of a number of other housing and charitable organisations.

Nasar Haq

Customer Experience Committee Member

Nasar believes that having real voices from customers influencing the decision-making process will benefit everyone involved with Incommunities. With 30 years’ experience in marketing and communications (eleven of which have been in housing), Nasar has a strong understanding of customers’ needs and how to communicate with customers. As an active member of the West Yorkshire Strategic Race Equality Network since the group was established and co-designer of the award-winning Root-Out Racism Movement, he is passionate about ensuring that services are delivered in an inclusive way and that issues of EDI (Equality, Diversity & Inclusion) are considered as part of every decision. 

Zia Ur-Rahman

Customer Experience Committee Member

Zia has seen firsthand the amazing difference that social housing can make to people’s lives. However, whilst living on a social housing estate, Zia has seen examples of vulnerable individuals being let down by social landlords because of service deliveries being tailored without first gauging customer needs fully. 

Having worked in customer service for local authorities for over a decade and currently working with civil services helping vulnerable customers maximize their income, Zia has lots of experience and knowledge understanding the needs of social housing customers. In addition to this work, Zia has been a Charity trustee and Non-executive Director for a non-profit organisation for the last 5 years and is now looking forward to using his understanding and experiences, helping to make a difference to lives of families and individuals in the district and beyond. 

Cath Owston

CEC Chair

Cath has worked in the housing sector for over thirty years holding a variety of senior leadership positions across the North-West and Yorkshire. Most recently, she was Executive Director of Customer Experience at Yorkshire Housing where she was responsible for a wide portfolio of customer service teams.

She is passionate to ensure that a strong leadership vision is combined with effective customer engagement and insight to improve the customer experience. She is an experienced Non-Executive Director, and a qualified leadership coach and NLP practitioner.

Steve Close

CEC Board Member

Steve is currently chair of Incommunities Board and has worked in housing for over 40 years, including 30 years as Chief Executive. 

He is committed to the provision of affordable housing and support for people in need and has a range of experience including leadership, strategic planning, change management, team building, delivering results, and innovation.  He is a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Housing and has an MBA from Leeds University Business School. 

Steve recently retired as Chief Executive of Together Housing which manages over 38,000 homes across the North of England and the Midlands. 

He has experience of board membership at a number of organisations including a BME association and has been an appointee of a mainstream association and supported housing provider. He also Chairs an educational charity.

Steve is Chair of the Incommunities Board