Who we are
Celsio emerged from a deep‑rooted frustration with corporate innovation programmes and consultancy models that promised transformation but rarely built lasting capability.
We do it differently - by focusing on systemic innovation, international standards and the skills people need to make innovation work day‑to‑day.
Innovative businesses experience faster growth, improved efficiencies, and better staff engagement than non-innovative businesses. Every business wants to become more innovative; few manage it.
Our technology‑first approach accelerates change, helping you to achieve your goals faster with an ISO‑aligned innovation management system that fits how you really work. We help you navigate the ever‑changing terrains of the business world, empowering the innovators within your teams to lead transformation with confidence.
We believe in autonomy. Our job is to get you started, help you set the direction, develop your innovation skills, and equip and invigorate your internal champions to lead the way - so capability sits inside your organisation, not with external consultants.
Our purpose
To foster a culture of innovation that drives overall business improvement. What we do today, shapes tomorrow. Our insights, strategy and planning deliver solutions that have lasting impact.
Our core values
Integrity, diversity, and excellence guide everything we do - ensuring transparency, fuelling breakthrough thinking, and driving unparalleled client success.
Integrity
Integrity is at the heart of everything we do, ensuring transparency and honesty in how we assess, design and support your innovation work.
Diversity
Different perspectives fuel creativity, inclusive innovation and breakthrough thinking; diversity is our cornerstone.
Excellence
We continuously strive to help our clients achieve measurable innovation results, build recognised excellence in innovation, and reach heights unimagined.
Built on the standards, led by practice
We use the ISO 56000 family as a compass rather than a destination. Four things make that possible.
Standards authority
Contributor to the ISO 56000 series, member of the ISO Chair's Advisory Group, and convenor of the international working group developing ISO 56011. We did this ourselves first: our own platform was externally recognised against ISO 56002 guidance in 2019.
Proportionate by design
We have won work by declining to recommend a full innovation management system, because the client was not ready for one. Our job is to help you find the level that is enough - not the maximum you could be sold.
The missing middle
Standards expertise usually comes without a scalable product, and certification bodies usually come without advisory depth. We sit between the two: productised, repeatable methods, delivered by people who helped shape the standards behind them.
Practitioner breadth
Industry, academia, standards and public policy at once - so research, commercialisation, standards and skills connect, and what we recommend has been tested in all four.
Behind Celsio
We’re innovation specialists who partner closely with your leaders and teams to join the dots between strategy, capability, and real‑world impact.
Celsio grew out of a long‑running partnership between Charlie Tuxworth and David Mawhinney, who have worked together since 1995, initially on large‑scale software and innovation programmes in a UK technology business.
Years later, their work in a UK FinTech PLC designing and implementing an enterprise innovation system crystallised the idea for Celsio. David is now enjoying a well‑earned retirement, and we remain grateful for his early vision and support in helping get Celsio off the ground.
“I don't work this way because of the ISO standard. The ISO standard exists because I work this way, based on years of practice and research.”
Charlie Tuxworth, Managing Partner
Charlie Tuxworth
Charlie Tuxworth is Managing Partner of Celsio. Drawing on over 30 years’ experience across enterprise software, financial services, public and voluntary sectors, he helps organisations align their innovation ambitions with corporate strategy and build the competence, capacity, and confidence to deliver measurable impact.
His work ranges from national sports bodies and international development programmes to local government and SMEs, always with a focus on practical, evidence‑led innovation that can be run with the time and resources organisations actually have.
Charlie is Convenor, Chair and Project Lead of ISO/TC 279/WG 5, the international working group developing ISO 56011 - the emerging global standard for innovation management competence, now at Draft International Standard stage with publication expected in 2027. It builds on his close involvement in the development of the ISO 56000 series of innovation standards, the foundation for Celsio’s maturity and skills work, and he sits on the ISO Chair’s Advisory Group.
In 2020 he created F!Sk®, the Framework for Innovation Skills, independently validated by Ulster University as “the first model of its kind”. Its evidence base went on to inform ISO 56011, and its latest version sets out 52 competences for innovation management. His research with Ulster University Business School examines how innovation competences can be conceptualised, standardised and operationalised.
He has designed and delivered innovation ambassador and leadership programmes for Sport Ireland, GIZ and others, creating structured roadmaps, practical toolkits and applied projects that move teams from good intentions to real outcomes. He brings a calm, highly practical facilitation style, combining design thinking, creativity tools and portfolio‑level thinking so leaders can connect innovation activity directly to their strategic priorities.
Alongside his client work, Charlie is a regular visiting lecturer and keynote speaker on innovation with universities across Ireland and the UK and serves on Northern Ireland’s government‑appointed Matrix panel, advising on innovation and technology exploitation, and is an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Catalyst. He is founder and co‑chair of Innovate Island, the all‑island community for innovation practitioners, advocates and explorers, and a leading voice in the professionalisation of innovation practice and innovation competencies.