Brigadier Brigadier is a military rank, the seniority of which depends on the country. In some countries, it is a senior rank above colonel, equivalent to a brigadier general or commodore, typically commanding a brigade of several thousand soldiers. In ...

Stephen John Tetlow (born June 1954) is a chartered engineer and former senior

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

officer.

Biography

Tetlow was born in

Basford, Nottingham Basford is a northerly suburb of Nottingham, England, incorporated into the city in 1877. It gave its name to Basford Rural District, which existed from 1894 to 1974. The ward population at the 2011 census was 16,207, estimated at 16,779 in 2 ...

, and was educated at Burton Joyce Primary School, where he wanted to become a

train driver A train driver, engine driver, engineman or locomotive driver, commonly known as an engineer or railroad engineer in the United States and Canada, and also as a locomotive handler, locomotive operator, train operator, or motorman, is a pers ...

and Carlton le Willows Grammar School. He read Mechanical Engineering at

City, University of London City, University of London, is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, and a member institution of the federal University of London. It was founded in 1894 as the Northampton Institute, and became a university when The City Univ ...

, and gained an MSc in Design of Information Systems from Cranfield University and an MBA from The

Open University The Open University (OU) is a British public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study off- ...

. He was appointed an Honorary Doctor of Engineering at

University of Plymouth The University of Plymouth is a public research university based predominantly in Plymouth, England, where the main campus is located, but the university has campuses and affiliated colleges across South West England. With students, it is the ...

in 2019 for his work to inspire young people into engineering. Tetlow had been promoted to Major by 1991, when he had received his MBE. He was then promoted to Colonel by 2011, when he qualified claims put forward by author Tim Blackmore that emerging technology would revolutionize

battlespace Battlespace or battle-space is a term used to signify a unified military strategy to integrate and combine armed forces for the military theatre of operations, including air, information, land, sea, cyber and outer space to achieve military ...

in the near future - commenting that "conflict is, and will remain, essentially a human activity". Later promoted to Brigadier, he was gazetted to Director of the

Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers The Corps of Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME ) is a corps of the British Army that maintains the equipment that the Army uses. The corps is described as the "British Army's Professional Engineers". History Prior to REME's for ...

. He was Director of Operations at the Defence Logistics Organisation from 2001 to 2002 and Director of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering of the British Army from 2002 to 2005. After military service, Tetlow became Chief Executive of

VOSA Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (VOSA) was an executive agency granted trading fund status in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Transport of the Departments of the United Kingdom Government, United Kingdom Government. It w ...

(formerly the Vehicle Inspectorate) in December 2004 following the retirement of Maurice Newey. Newey had been appointed chief executive of the Vehicle Inspectorate in 1998 and became the first chief executive of VOSA in 2003. At VOSA, Tetlow led the computerisation of the MoT System which was awarded the British Computer Society Industry Award for Business to Business in 2007. He was a Group Director of the Driver and Vehicle Operator Group of agencies of the Department for Transport and an advisor to the Department for Transport on Road User Charging. Tetlow left VOSA in 2008 to become the Chief Executive of the

Institution of Mechanical Engineers The Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) is an independent professional association and learned society headquartered in London, United Kingdom, that represents mechanical engineers and the engineering profession. With over 120,000 member ...

. He resigned from the IMechE after some members tabled a motion expressing a motion of no confidence in him and the trustees to manage the affairs of the Institution and the operation of its trading subsidiaries. The motion was defeated, but Tetlow, the President and some of the trustees resigned stating it was impractical for him to continue whilst some members did not agree his views for the future of the profession which he shared with other Institutions. He was a founder Non Executive Director of the National Skills Academy for Rail and Non Executive Director of Engineering UK. He currently lives in the

Blackdown Hills The Blackdown Hills are a range of hills along the Somerset-Devon border in south-western England, which were designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) in 1991. The plateau is dominated by hard chert bands of Upper Greensand wit ...

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...

in a house featured on

Grand Designs ''Grand Designs'' is a British television series produced by Boundless and broadcast on Channel 4 which features unusual and often elaborate architectural homebuilding projects. The programme has been presented by Kevin McCloud since it first ...

. He has since led an expedition to

South Georgia South Georgia ( es, Isla San Pedro) is an island in the South Atlantic Ocean that is part of the British Overseas Territory of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. It lies around east of the Falkland Islands. Stretching in the east� ...

in order to retrace the steps of

Ernest Shackleton Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of ...

to highlight the impact of global warming. Tetlow is currently a Non Executive Director of The Student Loans Company and of The Planning Inspectorate. He is a fellow of The Institution of Engineering and Technology.

References

Bibliography

* 1954 births Living people Fellows of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers Members of the Order of the British Empire People educated at Carlton le Willows Academy People from Basford, Nottinghamshire Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers officers {{UK-army-bio-stub