John Anderson, director of Land Securities Properties and former managing director of Bovis Lend Lease Europe, has joined Chelsfield as director of construction – as predicted in Building in May
Anderson will relinquish his appointment at Land Securities Properties, but will stay on in a consulting role. The date of his appointment to the Chelsfield board has not yet been agreed.

The move confirms speculation that Chelsfield had been looking for an experienced person to oversee major projects such as the £1.5bn White City retail scheme in west London.

Elliot Bernerd, chairman of Chelsfield, said Anderson would be working on the firm's development strategy. He said: "We've been looking for some considerable time for the right person to handle what we consider to be a very important job. We look forward to welcoming John and him devoting his energies to Chelsfield's development programme."

Anderson has 25 years' experience at Bovis and P&O, where he started in property development before moving into construction. This know-how will prove useful to Chelsfield's big schemes, such as Paddington Basin and, in the longer term, its £3bn redevelopment of a 73 ha brownfield site in Stratford.

Anderson had worked at Bovis as managing director of its European division. He was involved with key projects such as the privatisation of the government's Property Services Agency, Bovis' UK expansion into PFI and the integration with Lend Lease.

He resigned in October 2000 to join Land Securities, where his duties included the development of e-commerce and e-procurement.

Land Securities chief executive Ian Henderson paid tribute to Anderson's achievements and said he was pleased that he was remaining with the company in a consulting role.

He said: "John has completed his assignments at Land Securities most successfully. We wish him well and thank him for all he has contributed."