Rector

The Rector of City, University of London is The Lord Mayor of London and appointed each year in November.

Nicholas Lyons was elected as the 694^th Lord Mayor of the City of London for the 2022-23 term.

Nicholas was born in Ireland, the son of Dr FSL Lyons, the Irish historian and Provost of Trinity College, Dublin. When his parents moved to Kent in 1964, he went to school in Canterbury, attending the King’s School and then Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he read history.

After time as a political research assistant in London and with the Directorate General for External Relations at the EEC Commission in Brussels, Nicholas joined Morgan Guaranty Trust Company of New York in London in 1982 where he worked for 12 years, then at Salomon Brothers from 1994 to 1995 and then moved with a team to Lehman Brothers where he worked from 1995 until 2003.

He specialised in advising banks and insurance companies on mergers and acquisitions and raising capital. He held a series of global leadership roles at Lehman Brothers, retiring in 2003 to begin a plural career, sitting on the boards of many financial institutions and numerous charities. His City career has spanned over 40 years.

He is currently taking a sabbatical from being Chairman of Phoenix Group Holdings, the largest player in the UK retirement and long-term savings industry and a FTSE 100 company. Phoenix is the largest asset-owner signatory to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment in the UK. Last year when he became Sheriff, he stepped down from the group board of BUPA where he had chaired their new Sustainability Committee exploring the link between human health and bio-diversity.

He sits on the boards of Convex Group, a specialty insurance underwriter and Miller Insurance Services, a London market insurance broker. He is a member of the Leadership Council of The CityUK, the Advisory Board of the International Business & Diplomatic Exchange, the Association of British Insurers and the Chartered Insurance Institute.

His philanthropic activities have revolved around education, children’s hospice care and the arts. This included being a Governor at The King’s School, Canterbury, Saint Columba’s College in Dublin, St Dunstan‘s College in Catford and King Edward’s, Witley in Surrey.

With his focus on education, Nick has introduced National Numeracy to the Lord Mayor’s Appeal and intends to convene a conference to lead a national discussion about how to address the twin challenges of financial literacy and financial inclusion.

Nicholas is a Trustee of the St Paul’s Cathedral Choristers’ Trust and of the East Anglia Art Fund and is a Patron of Temple Bar Trust. He is a Court Assistant both at the Merchant Taylors’ Company and at the Bakers’ Company. He is a Liveryman of both the Insurers’ and the Educators’ Companies. He is a Lieutenant of the City of London.

Nicholas is married to Felicity who was until recently the Chair of Trustees of Tapping House, the Norfolk Hospice. She is a Liveryman of the Musicians’ Company, a sailor, kayaker and singer. They have four children, Oliver, Charles, India and Alistair, two (soon to be three) daughters-in-law, one son-in-law and four grandchildren and counting.