Norman Murray CBE

Norman Murray is the senior partner of the Grant Woodlands Partnership which owns and manages the family’s sustainable forest and conservation enterprise in Perthshire. He is also Chairman of the ICAS Foundation which provides financial and mentoring support for academically talented young people from family backgrounds with limited resources who wish to attend university and study for a degree in finance.

Norman is a chartered accountant who qualified in Edinburgh before working and living in the far east based in Hong Kong. He then spent much of his career in the private equity industry and was a founder and later chairman of Morgan Grenfell Private Equity. He was also Chairman of the British Venture Capital Association and is a past president of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland.

The second half of his career was as a non executive director and chairman of a range of international public and private companies including chairing two FTSE 100 companies – Cairn Energy plc and Petrofac Limited – as well as being the senior independent director at Greene King plc and Robert Wiseman Dairies plc. He was also chairman of The Edrington Group Limited which produces and sells The Macallan, Highland Park and Glenrothes whiskies amongst other well known spirits brands.

He has completed a number of high profile governance reviews including the Audit Firm Governance Code published by the Financial Reporting Council as well as the Gammell, Murray governance review for the Scottish Rugby Union.

He has also held a number of pro bono roles including being a Trustee and chairman of the investment committee at St Columba’s Hospice, Chairman of the Governing Council at George Watson’s College, a Trustee of Scottish Ballet Endowment Fund and chairman of Scottish Ballet. He is also a Patron of National Museums Scotland and of Pitlochry Festival Theatre.

Norman is a graduate of both Heriot-Watt University where he was also appointed an Honorary Professor and of the Harvard Business School.

He was awarded a CBE for services to the arts in the 2022 New Year’s Honours list and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2015.