Icas, the Scottish accountancy body which now has as many members across the rest of the UK and overseas as it does in its home country, has appointed Aberdonian Ken McHattie, chairman of Granite City companies Aurora Petroleum and Aurora Energy Resources, as its new president.
Mr McHattie is the chairman of Granite City companies Aurora Petroleum and Aurora Energy Resources.
He said yesterday he was looking forward to the challenge of helping Icas, which now has around 21,000 members in total, adapt to its increasingly global profile.
The organisation’s members are also getting younger, while rapid advances in digital communications are changing the way they communicate with each other and hear from Icas’s head office.
Gone are the days when they would get the occasional newsletter by post and an annual bill for fees, Mr McHattie said, adding: “Technology is changing and modern digital communications are enabling us to keep in touch much better than before.
“The demographics of our membership have also changed a lot, with a quarter of our members now aged under 35.”
He takes over the Icas presidency from Jim Pettigrew and will serve a year in office.
Mr McHattie qualified as a chartered accountant with Thomson McLintock in Aberdeen in 1978, and as a solicitor in 1985.
He worked for venture capitalists 3i before becoming a partner in Aberdeen law firm Ledingham Chalmers.
Other career highlights include him co-founding North Sea operator Tuscan Energy and a spell as finance director of oil and gas investment fund Energy Development Partners.