EXPERT WITNESS SERVICES ● NEURODIVIRGENCE ASSESSMENT ● VOCATIONAL REHABILITION  ● CAREER & EXECUTIVE COACHING AND ASSESSMENT

Paul Doherty - Expert Witness, Occupational Psychologist & Assessment Specialist

Paul Doherty is an award-winning expert witness, Chartered Psychologist, and Chartered Scientist with over 35 years of experience in disability and injury-related workplace assessments, expert witness services, and organisational consultancy. A Fellow of the British Psychological Society (BPS) and Registered Occupational Psychologist with the HCPC, he provides evidence-based assessments in loss of earnings, disability, occupational stress, and vocational rehabilitation cases. Paul is regularly instructed by both Claimant solicitors and Defendants, as well as acting as a Single Joint Expert, ensuring impartial, balanced assessments and reports. He has prepared many hundreds of reports for courts and tribunals and frequently gives testimony in high-profile and high-value litigation. His expertise extends to bullying, workplace stress, neurodivergence, and reasonable adjustments. He has a comprehensive understanding of workplace demands—including cognitive, emotional, and leadership aspects—the labour market, and the support services available to help individuals with disabilities or health conditions enter, retain, or return to employment. He also conducts structured workplace assessments, including dyslexia and cognitive ability evaluations, personality profiling, and retraining potential assessments.

Beyond his expert witness work, Paul is highly experienced in organisational consultancy, including assessment centre design, fair recruitment, and workplace resilience. He has played a key role in developing selection processes for the British Civil Service, assessing candidates for Senior Civil Service (SCS) roles up to Director General level. For over 20 years, he has been involved in the Civil Service Fast Stream Assessment Centre (FSAC), designing assessment exercises that reduce bias, promote inclusivity, and avoid adverse impact on underrepresented groups. His consultancy spans government bodies, the NHS, law enforcement, financial services, IT, and the third sector. He has also advised the UK Supreme Court on fair judicial recruitment and supports senior executives transitioning to new roles through outplacement services, objective assessment, and coaching. His deep involvement in neurodiversity assessment includes both employment litigation and workplace inclusion, helping organisations create supportive environments for neurodivergent employees. A highly experienced trainer, he has delivered workshops on resilience, fair recruitment, and workplace inclusion to government and corporate clients, and has trained over 500 psychologists and HR professionals. In recognition of his contributions to applied psychology, Paul was elected Fellow of the BPS in 2024.

Paul was also awarded Fellow status of the Academy of Experts in recognition of the excellence of his work for the Courts as an expert witness.

 

Christine Stobbs - Partner

Christine brings together a unique range of complementary skills and experience with which to assist clients.  An ABP Certified Principal Business Psychologist and a BACP Registered Psychotherapist, she is also on the British Psychological Society Register of Qualified Test Users and has undertaken training in Company Direction with the Institute of Directors, so has good insight into the needs of both the individual and the employer/organisation.

Christine uses her combination of skills to deliver executive coaching and career coaching for individuals making difficult career decisions, as well as for those at the start of their careers. She is often called in by employers when there is a case of under-performance in the workplace, to identify the cause and make recommendations to address the issues. She often uses the Egan model with both individuals and organisations. A significant part of Christine’s work is assessing the retraining capability of individuals with acquired disability, exploring their vocational rehabilitation needs and preparing them for a return to work. Her experience with employers gives her good insight into their performance requirements, which helps when reality checking ideas for either job retention or getting back to work after an accident.

She is an experienced trainer and works with companies and organisations to identify their training needs. Her clients include Central Government, Scottish Government, local authorities, charities, and commercial organisations. She is frequently asked to deliver training on Equality & Diversity; Bullying in the Workplace; Personal Impact; Building Effective Relationships at Work; Preparation for Promotion; Resilience and Assessing/Interviewing. All training is bespoke and designed to meet the needs of the client.

Her professional memberships and designations include: British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (Registered BACP); Vocational Rehabilitation Association (PVRA); Association for Business Psychology (CPBP); Royal Society of Medicine; BPS Register of Qualified Test Users.

In addition, Christine is a freelance writer, with several articles published in professional journals, for example, British Veterinary Association In Practice Journal, and Fire, the national firefighters magazine – see links below.

Links to some of Christine’s articles:

 

Monica Bloomfield - Associate (Research)

Monica has considerable experience of labour market research, having worked as a researcher for Expert Witness reports since 1995.  She studied at the University of Hull.

Apart from her research work for Doherty Stobbs, she is also a qualified child counsellor/psychotherapist.

Sarah Schlieder

While Sarah is no longer based at Pantiles, she is still an important part of the team and provides valuable assistance in the delivery of our services.  She is also responsible for bookkeeping and credit control.

 

 

Mark Cheesman – Associate (Expert Witness)

Mark is a Chartered Occupational and Health Psychologist with expertise in the assessment of the impact of disability and illness on work and activities of daily living. He is an experienced expert witness, having written in excess of 500 reports for court and tribunals. He is also skilled in occupational health assessment, vocational rehabilitation and business psychology.

 

 

Rachel Frost – Associate (Expert Witness)

As a registered Occupational Psychologist, Rachel has nearly thirty years of experience in advising organisations on candidate selection across a wide range of sectors.  She guides and instructs in the effective use of psychometric testing and other selection methods for recruitment purposes, and is also experienced in producing in-depth personality and aptitude profiles on behalf of clients. 

Rachel is commissioned to ensuring that the selection methods chosen by organisations to recruit or resource staff balances legal obligations with the organisation’s desire to recruit and promote the most capable and effective individual for each vacancy.  Her expertise is called on when it is alleged that a resourcing decision has been made on the basis of falsified or inaccurate information, that an invalid selection tool has been used or a reliable selection tool has been used incorrectly or with insufficient training. 

Rachel also advises on employment potential in cases of divorce and other situations where career prospects are under question.  She is able to provide Expert Witness evidence.

Rachel's clients have included HM Government and various overseas governments, as well as clients in the health, financial, manufacturing and retail sectors, at all levels of seniority.

 

Roger Lloyd-Thompson – Actor-Coach

Roger is an actor/coach/facilitator with over 20 years experience in the personal development field. He is a passionate and skilled advocate of Forum Theatre; a technique that allows participants to experience live scenarios ‘bespoke’ to their needs. He also works ‘one to one’ as this encourages individuals to create their own light bulb moments in safely challenging environments. Both his writing and the one-man show that he performs have taught him valuable lessons about being mindful of audiences needs.

His training as an actor enables him to offer authentic and powerful observations on personal impact skills including feedback, status and body language.  He has been an executive coach for the last 10 years and is a member of the EMCC.

Roger prides himself on his ability to deliver powerful feedback with empathy.

Roger has held senior positions in both fashion PR and the retail world.

 

Steve Watts – Associate (Training)

Steve has considerable experience working with organisational capability in UK government. He’s led on assessing graduates for the Cabinet Office Fast Stream, building and running internal assessment centres, resource management, recruitment and talent development for major government programmes. Working alongside key CIOs and leaders, Steve has a strong track record in delivering learning and development initiatives across large workforces, focusing on certified training solutions.

Specialising in large scale organisation change in an IT environment, Steve’s work has been recognised by industry awards bodies for a strong emphasis on the people element of high value, successful and enduring change initiatives.

Steve’s skills also include vocational rehabilitation capability assessment and interview coaching.

 

Neil Williams – Associate

Neil is an experienced business leader and accredited coach, specialising in career, business, retirement, and executive coaching.  He is also an accredited coach supervisor which means he is used to dealing with complex issues involving numerous people and chains of command.

An excellent communicator and team builder, Neil has experience in business strategy, sales, marketing, and people development. He successfully turned around a distressed insurance brokerage by building a robust business plan, reshaping the team of directors with clear accountabilities, selecting and developing the management team and implementing a sales culture.

Neil's is a practical coach, using his previous business knowledge.  He enjoys working  with a diverse range of people and businesses. Neil particularly enjoys dealing with aspiring younger people who don’t necessarily get the support they might need, often as their line managers might be in a different city or country.

copyright © 2018 & beyond Doherty Stobbs