Ffion Hague spent six years in the Civil Service Fast Stream and began conducting board appraisals when working on evaluating the performance of NDPBs and Next Step Agencies. Since leaving the public sector in 1997 she has worked as a director of Arts & Business, a national business charity, and has sat on many major non-profit boards including The British Council, Action on Addiction, The Voices Foundation, the London Symphony Orchestra Advisory Board and she is a former trustee of the Outward Bound Trust.
In 2000 Ffion became a headhunter, working at board level across all sectors and specialising in non-executive appointments. Between 2003 and 2008 she was a director and shareholder at Hanson Green, a top-level non-executive search company, where she built up the board evaluation practice alongside her search activities. Since 2008, Ffion has focused exclusively on board evaluation in the UK corporate market, running her own practice, Independent Board Evaluation.
Ffion has been a trustee of English National Opera. In 2008 Ffion published her first major book, “The Pain and the Privilege”, a biography of the women in David Lloyd George’s life which has given rise to many broadcasting projects, including the BAFTA Wales-winning documentary “The Two Wives of Lloyd George” (2009). In 2010, Ffion was elected an Honorary Fellow of Harris Manchester College, Oxford.
THE PAIN AND THE PRIVILEGE: WOMEN IN THE LIFE OF LLOYD GEORGE — Buy it here
“Men’s lives are a perpetual conflict. The life that I have mapped out will be so especially – as lawyer and politician. Woman’s function is to pour oil on the wounds – to heal the bruises of spirit…and to stimulate to renewed exertion.” Lloyd George was a man who loved women and the tale of his intertwined relationships contains many mysteries and a few unsolved intrigues. He was cited in two divorce cases, was rumoured to have fought a duel over a woman in Argentina, and had persuaded the prettiest girl in Criccieth to be his wife. Lloyd George’s life was indeed a ‘perpetual conflict’. He was a habitual womaniser and despite his early, enduring attachement to Margaret Owen, marriage did not curb his behaviour. There were many private scandals in a life devoted to public duty. Ffion Hague illuminates his complex attitude to women. Her own interest stems from the many parallels in her own life.
PUBLISHER: HarperCollins
PUBLICATION DATE: June 2008