Tim Ingram, the chairman of stockbroker Collins Stewart, has been hired by Alliance Trust to sit on the board as a non-executive director.He ran Caledonia Investments for eight years until his retirement in July by which time he had already taken the job at Collins Stewart from Terry Smith.In his time, Ingram has built up a wealth of experience as finance director, CEO and later chairman of First National Finance Corporation, and as a managing director of Abbey National for six years until 2002. Directorships at Sage, Savills, ANZ Bank (Europe) and Alok Industries also keep him busy."His extensive experience will be invaluable to us as we continue to develop both the investment trust and our complementary financial services and asset management subsidiary businesses, and deliver superior value to our shareholders," said Alliance Trust chairman Lesley Knox.