Hamish Thompson
I've been in the PR profession for nearly 20 years. My career has been in-house for the most part, most recently as group director of media relations at DSG international and prior to that for a global investment bank. My experience spans creative direction, consumer, corporate and financial PR, crisis management and political counsel. I've won several industry awards and our business has been the recipient of an outstanding consultancy award for every year of trading.

The PR industry has changed more in the last five years than it has in decades. The consumption and distribution of news - and the way in which news is discussed, debated and shaped - have changed beyond recognition. The practice of PR is changing in parallel, though not always fast enough. More than ever I disagree with the still widely held view that PR is about rigid, undeviating control of a message. I think PR is about firing the imagination and creating a discussion about a business or a theme. At its heart that is about the ability to create and tell a great story.
I can be reached on +44 (0) 7702 684290.

Nicola Carslaw
Doing my job means being flexible; turning my mind to any subject - and understanding the business of it.

After moving from newspapers to broadcast, I became a BBC foreign correspondent - one of the first women to be based abroad. I worked all over the world, for radio, TV and online. I was the BBC's consumer correspondent and latterly moved behind the microphone into news management, retained as a consulting editor. During my career in news, I covered the part gentle, part violent collapse of communism in Europe, witnessing all the revolutions. I reported retail price wars and personal finance; I unravelled the science, politics and business of BSE, GM, Fair-trade. I steered a path through the conflicting mix of food, risk and health stories.

Having dodged bullets, why now do bullet points? And why in PR?

I don't - couldn't - do any old PR. I work with businesses I respect and with people I like. With Twelve Thirty Eight I'm proud to be part of a team that helps small firms punch above their weight and big brands make an even bigger impact for good, both on their customers and their bottom line.

Tracey Harrison
I have more than 20 years' experience as a journalist for two of Britain's biggest and most demanding national newspapers, the Daily Mail and the Daily Mirror. Having cut my teeth as a news reporter, I became consumer correspondent for the Mirror - a fantastic post which involved writing about what really mattered to readers.

After turning freelance, I wrote extensively for newspapers on a range of business and consumer issues, compiled company reports and provided strategic advice to PR agencies. Then I met Hamish and the poacher turned gamekeeper.

Although PR and journalism are opposite disciplines in some ways, they are both about getting great stories out there, and that's what I really enjoy. I retain my great contacts at the nationals (having been to the pub so often with many of them), my highly-tuned news antennae and my knowledge of all the tricks of the trade. Nothing irritated me more as a journalist than sloppy PRs who rang up on deadline trying to sell deadbeat stories for non-existent columns.

We never do that at Twelve Thirty Eight.

Dawn Murray
A successful corporate communicator, Dawn has wide-ranging experience spanning consultancy and in-house work in the private and public sector. Dawn's communications career began at a leading financial PR consultancy where her clients included The Housing Corporation, Scottish Widows, Zurich Municipal, Daimler-Benz and Deutsche Telekom. Moving in-house, Dawn spent six years in the retail sector for major national retailers including DSG international plc and Mothercare. During that time, Dawn worked across the communications spectrum, managing regional and national media relations and delivering corporate events and publications. Latterly, at Mothercare, Dawn was responsible for shaping and delivering the company's internal communications programme. Dawn graduated from Salford University with a degree in Business Studies.

James Horne
I haven't bought a newspaper in at least five years! I do however, love to read them online and most of the news comes to me via word of mouse. I am a huge supporter of the Internet and the wealth of communications it has on offer. Whether it's on targeted specialist sites or the unpredictable worlds of Facebook and Twitter, I feel entirely connected with the news of the hour.

I love to solve problems and bring varied design experience to the team. From user research techniques to prototype manufacture, my degree course provided a framework to take any project from concept through to completion. These skills allow me to work in a structured and controlled way on even the most creative of tasks.

I graduated in Industrial Design and Technology from Loughborough University and spent a year working for the Directories giant, Yell. Whilst I'm a fan of visual creativity I also enjoy writing fiction on a casual basis and believe that the only real barriers in life are dictated by your imagination!

Penelope Overton
I am responsible for the administration of the business, covering account management processes, compliance, legal and financial management and team development. I qualified as a solicitor in the late 1980s and worked in private practice before moving in-house, firstly for a trade union and later for an employers' association. I have also been employed to write legal teaching materials and as a lecturer in employment law. In 2005 I trained as a mediator since when I have successfully handled dozens of workplace, commercial and community mediations, helping people to resolve an array of conflicts from office bullying to commercial debt, from the encroachment of Japanese knot weed to disputes in the playground. My other passions are writing and literature. I studied English Literature at Oxford and I am currently doing an MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck with the firm intention of getting a novel (supported by an Arts Council Grant) published in the not-too-distant future.

Mike Crawshaw
Mike has extensive experience of global financial markets gained during a twenty year career with some of the world's leading investment banks. At UBS and NatWest he was number one ranked for both the European Oil and Utility sectors in the Extel Survey of Equity Fund managers. Later, as Head of European Equity Research at Schroders Securities he helped build a market leading small and mid cap stockbroker which received awards and plaudits for the high quality of its research. As co-head of European Equity research at Citigroup, he helped build a business that was ranked number one for European Equity Research in the 2003 Institutional Investor Survey. Mike and his co-head were also voted the number one research management team in the Sammons Associate Survey the same year.