Productivity Research Conference  4th – 5th September 2025 Find out more

A diverse community of leading experts, policymakers and practitioners

The Institute’s key research themes are led by ten academic partners spread across the UK.

Working closely with policymakers

We’re a UK-wide research organisation exploring what productivity means for business

Businesses are crucial to solving the UK’s productivity problems.

Tera Allas CBE

Chair, Pro Bono Economics, Senior Economic Advisor, McKinsey & Company and Honorary Professor at Alliance Manchester Business School

Committees: Advisory Committee chair, Governing Council member

Career

Tera is a leading expert on economic growth, productivity, and public policy, with a distinguished career spanning three decades in business, government, and the social sector. She was awarded a CBE for contributions to economic policy in 2019.

Tera is the chair of Pro Bono Economics and The Productivity Institute’s Advisory Committee, a trustee of Be the Business and a governor of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research. She is a senior economic advisor to McKinsey & Company, having led their UK economic research for 10 years, and contributes to several expert advisory bodies, including the Office for Budget Responsibility, the LSE Centre for Economic Performance, and the Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence. She holds an Honorary Professorship at the Alliance Manchester Business School and is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences and the RSA.

Previously, Tera served on the boards of Innovate UK and the Royal Economic Society, and on the States of Jersey Fiscal Policy Panel, and advised organisations on innovation policy and strategy. Over a period of 10 years, she held chief economist roles at the UK’s energy, transport, and business departments. At the Department for Business, she was Director General for Strategy, Analysis, and Better Regulation and Deputy Head of the UK Government Economic Service. Earlier in her career, she spent over a decade as a management consultant at McKinsey.

Tera holds an MSc in Technology (Industrial Economics) with distinction from Helsinki University of Technology and an MBA with distinction from INSEAD.