Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust have announced that following a competitive recruitment process, Stephen Wells has been appointed as the new Executive Director of Estates and Facilities for the Trust, taking over from David Cooper, who has been covering the role on an interim basis since earlier this year.
Stephen Wells is currently Director of Estates and Facilities at the University of East Anglia, and he will take up the post in August 2026.
Stephen has worked in the estates and facilities industry for more than 30 years - spending over 16 years of these within the Higher Education sector where he has held similar senior estates positions at London South Bank University, Queen Mary University of London, University College London, and the University of Surrey. Between 2020 and 2022, Stephen was also the Chairman of Association of University Director of Estates (AUDE), an association that represents over 160 Estates and Facilties departments across the Higher Education sector in the UK.
In his early career, Stephen spent a number of years in Estates and Facilities roles for the NHS across the South East and South London and brings with him a strong background in construction delivery and facilities management. He has a degree in Project Management for Construction and an MBA from the University of Brighton. In addition, Stephen is a Chartered Member of the Institute of Building (MCIOB).
Trust Chief Executive, Andrew Hines said: “I am really pleased to be welcoming Stephen Wells to the Trust as our new Executive Director of Estates and Facilities. His extensive experience in construction delivery and facilities management will be a really welcome addition and will put him in good stead to take forward a number of exciting and critical new estates developments for our patients, including a new theatre block and Urgent Treatment Centre - which will cut waiting times for urgent and elective patients and improve the Trust's local service offer. I look forward to working with him when he joins SASH in the next few months."
Stephen Wells said: "I'm delighted to be returning to the NHS and joining SASH this summer, especially at such a critical time for their estates and facilities programmes, with some really important and exciting capital developments ahead that will really change local patient care. I'm looking forward to meeting the brilliant teams at SASH and getting started."