Career
He was previously the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Head of Public Affairs and then the first Head of Corporate Social Responsibility (2003-2006). Hastings is a trustee of the Vodafone Group Foundation and previously served for 9 years on the Board for Responsible Business at British Telecom (British Telecom). He first represented Klynveld Peat Marwick Goerdeler International on the Global Corporate Citizenship Committee of the World Economic Forum (2008-2010) and was a Board Director of the Global Reporting Initiative (Global Reporting Initiative) (2010-2012).
In 2012 he led the WEF Agenda Council - The Future of Civil Society, as Vice Chairman.
Given the impact the group has had over the year that led to the launch of the WEF report (The Future of Civil Society) in January 2013, he has been invited to lead the Council for the second consecutive year until July 2014. In 2005, Hastings was awarded the honour of an independent peerage to the House of Lords by Her Majesty The Queen, taking the title Baron Hastings of Scarisbrick, of Scarisbrick in the County of Lancashire.
Hastings is president of ZANE - a development aid agency focused on Zimbabwe. In 2014, Hastings was conferred with an honorary doctorate in civil law from the University of Kent, Canterbury in recognition for his leadership at Klynveld Peat Marwick Goerdeler, and the British Broadcasting Corporation on the work he has led towards International Development and Corporate Responsibility.
He was also the vice chairman on BiTC"s (Business in the Community) International Leadership Board.
In 2010 he was a leading advisor to the Chatham House enquiry into the Future Role of the United Kingdom in Foreign Affairs. Hastings sits on the council of the Overseas Development Institute in the United Kingdom and previously on the partners council of the Center for Global Development in the United States. In 2011 he became a vice president of United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund - the United Nations Children"s and Education Fund. In January 2002, Hastings was awarded a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (Commander of the British Empire) in recognition of his services to crime reduction, including 15 years as Chairman of Crime Concern and 21 as a Trustee.
He led the merger of Crime Concern with the Rainer Foundation to create Catch 22.
He served on the Commission for Racial Equality for nine years as a Commissioner (1993-2001). He is listed as one of the 100 most influential black people in Britain.
Hastings began his career as a teacher and then moved into Government service in 1986 supporting policy initiatives to bring employment and development to Britain’s inner cities. In 1990 he moved to work at TVAM on education programming and then GMTV as Chief Political Correspondent and then the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1994 as a presenter of the weekly Around Westminster programme before joining the British Broadcasting Corporation Corporate Affairs division in 1996.