London agency makes bank and retail supremo its new COO

Marsh & Parsons - which opens another new branch in east London this month - has appointed a former bank mergers and acquisitions expert to be its Chief Operating Officer.

Helen Sachdev joins from Barclays where she spent eight years, most recently as managing director of UK strategy, mergers and acquisitions. She was also responsible for the rebranding overhaul of its 1,700 branches.

Prior to that Sachdev spent five years as planning and design director at Tesco - throughout the strongest period of the supermarket's growth, Marsh & Parsons is keen to stress - and at the supermarket firm she worked on the growth of formats such as Tesco Express and Tesco Extra as well as diversification into non-food areas.

Before that she worked at Sainbury's on the development of the convenience store format in the shape of Sainsbury's Local.

We have ambitious plans to keep growing our branch network. [Helen] brings extensive experience of managing and overhauling some of the UK's most well-known retail giants and I am confident that she can help take Marsh & Parsons to the next level, and further our high street recognition says Marsh & Parsons chief executive, Peter Rollings.