Team

LJ Silverman

LJ is the Head and Co-founder LSE Generate, managing the entrepreneurship centre in London and its international chapters across the globe. Prior to joining LSE, LJ founded and led a careers and recruitment consultancy focused on climate and sustainability sectors, and earlier in her career worked in television and media. Her work focuses particularly on social innovation, healthy ageing, and mission-driven entrepreneurship, with a strong interest in how innovation ecosystems can contribute to more inclusive and sustainable futures. In 2026, she was awarded an MBE for services to social innovation and education.

Kinga Zackowska

Kinga runs Generate’s administration and operations, supporting with diary management, staff recruitment and HR. In her spare time she loves dancing, and is obsessed with exploring the world, with a particular emphasis on Spanish-speaking countries where she can practise her language skills.

Alice Eddie

Alice leads our Schools Programmes, working with young people across the country to create social enterprise and tackle real-world problems. Alice is also a professional clarinettist, playing with BBC Concert & Symphony Orchestras at the Proms, Royal Albert Hall, and West End Shows.

Sian Kincade

Sian leads on our Events and Communications at Generate, managing all our operations and logistics for events and overseeing our communications channels. She’s passionate about ensuring that student experience is more than just time spent in a lecture theatre. When she’s not busy doing that, she’s hunting out bottomless brunch places or planning her next holiday. 

Livia Denis 

Livia manages Generate’s finances process, and oversees our co-working space, The GenDen. She makes sure all the budgets are aligned and invoices are paid. She previously worked in the city as an international trader, and then switched careers to work with neurodivergent primary school students.

Joanna Hamer

Joanna manages the core entrepreneurial support programmes at Generate, which is good because she loves designing and delivering learning and training programmes for founders. She previously ran a social enterprise shoemaking company, and helped build a video game to support young people’s mental health. 

Emma Higson

Emma co-leads Generate's international strategy, driving global growth and partnerships across North America, Latin America, East and Southeast Asia, and the UAE. She develops and scales entrepreneurial ecosystems by connecting founders with investors, operators, and industry leaders, and works closely with global technology companies, venture platforms, and institutional partners to expand opportunities for early-stage ventures.

Laura Ross

Laura co-leads on developing and delivering Generate’s international strategy, which sees her working with our International Chapters to galvanise the School’s entrepreneurial communities around the world. She’s been at LSE since 2017, previously part of the Executive Office as the President’s Executive Assistant and before that, she was with a health-tech charity dedicated to pre and post-natal advice for underserved audiences.

Paroma Bhattacharya

Paroma leads on social innovation at Generate, overseeing research and programme delivery. She’s also affiliated with the LSE Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa (FLIA), LSE Department of Management, and LSE Social Innovation Lab. Paroma has a PhD in Management and her research interests include social business model innovation in emerging economies, social venture teams and social innovation ecosystems. She has taught courses in social entrepreneurship at LSE, the Indian School of Design and Innovation Parsons, Mumbai. She’s also a researcher-in-residence at a menstrual hygiene social enterprise in Kenya.

Meenakshi Ajith

Meenakshi is the Community Officer at Generate, focusing on community engagement, communications, and data. She holds an MSc degree from LSE, graduating in 2023. Her diverse background spans clinical settings before transitioning into the startup world. She is passionate about research, data, and understanding human experiences, and is also a trained classical singer.

Huda Kherati

Huda supports the delivery of startup competitions and social innovation initiatives at Generate. She studied Economics with International Social and Public Policy at LSE. Outside of work, she skateboards and coaches to increase access in the sport for women of colour, and is building her own sustainable fashion brand! 

Cathy Walker

Cathy oversees the strategic development and growth of the LSE Generate Schools' Programme in the UK and globally, building and strengthening partnerships that will empower young people with the skills and entrepreneurial mindset to be future leaders and changemakers. She has 25 years of experience in education and schools as a former languages teacher and Head of Sixth Form and has a Masters in Education and Psychology. When she’s not at work, she’s gardening, cooking, reading or dancing.

Lisa Portz

Lisa is our startup acceleration and pitch coaching mastermind, supporting LSE founders with strategy and pitching. She has a PhD in Entrepreneurship, and has seen startup accelerators inside and out, from participating, to being an entrepreneur-in-residence, to designing and running them. When she’s not deconstructing a business case, she’s learning another language or doing a photoshoot.

Tim Deeson

Tim is one of our Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, supporting our entrepreneurs to success in whatever way he can, whether that’s moral support on life as a founder (he’s a qualified executive coach) or tactical advice on closing your first sale with a customer. He has founded companies that have gone from kitchen table to successful acquisition, as well as a few others that didn’t work out along the way. When he’s not immersed in startup world he’s usually aiming to be happily staring at the lasers at a music festival.

Ruben Portz

Ruben is our growth expert in residence, supporting our later-stage founders with customer acquisition and scaling. He has helped founders go from pre-revenue to 8-figure exit, and loves supporting founders to make real progress. When he’s not demystifying the hectic world of startup growth you can find him enjoying the calmness of Battersea Park.

Christian Tooley

Christian is one of our Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, guiding bold founders and big ideas from scribbles to seed rounds — across early-stage ventures, including scalable impact, taboo tech, and underestimated communities. A former Venture Lead at Bain, WEF Global Shaper, and founder of i³ investing (Europe's largest LGBTQ+ founder group), he's advised, built, and invested across startups, funds, and Fortune 500s, from London to Hong Kong. With 10+ startups in his portfolio spanning healthtech, deeptech, and consumer, Christian now coaches and consults radical founders, funders, and orgs building for systems change.

April Stephenson

April facilitates our Female Founders Programme at Generate. She loves to create space for entrepreneurs to explore and define their own approach to leadership and culture. She is the founder of Simba Technologies, and previously spent a decade in tech at Venmo, PayPal and Amazon. She has a MSc in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship from LSE, and she's interested in geopolitics, art, and the outdoors.

Heather Abbey

Heather leads our Race Equity Programme. Heather is passionate about supporting marginalised and vulnerable communities, and brings a wealth of experience from a 7-year career across the UK government. Heather is now the Founder and Director of Ase Creative Solutions, a purpose-led policy and management consultancy; and is an advisor to social entrepreneurs, universities, charities and government.

Kim To

Our Disability, Neurodiversity and Accessibility Programme lead is Kim To. Kim is a certified ADHD coach and founder of Own Your Flair, a platform that leverages AI and technology to make ADHD and neurodiversity coaching more accessible.  

Bonnie Chung

​Bonnie’s 12 years of experience building Miso Tasty into a household name, her work mentoring early-stage food entrepreneurs, and her ongoing consultancy for food brands of all sizes make her an invaluable resource. Bonnie runs our monthly drop-in Agony Aunt sessions, open to F&B founders and all startups!