Since becoming a CEO 29 years ago I have worked with boards to deliver results and build trust and integrity. I serve as a Chair, Non-Executive Director, Trustee and Senior Advisor on boards and believe clarity of purpose and values in a Boardroom are game changers for achieving corporate objectives driven by a sustainable and responsible culture

My current roles include Walgreens Boots Alliance Advisory Panel, Member; Government Legal Department, Non-Executive Director; Wisdom of Crowds Ltd, Chair; and Senior Advisor to a number of financial and professional services firm Boards, and to Tomorrow’s Company and Blueprint for Better Business. I also chair conferences and am inspirational public speaker.

My wide-ranging board experience since becoming the first woman CEO in my sector in 1989, includes working internationally, in public, private and not for profit sectors, with large complex national and international organisations and entrepreneurs in energy, health, financial and professional services. The organisations I have worked with in addition to those mentioned above include Berwin Leighton Paisner, DLAPiper, KPMG, JLT, NHS, Old Mutual Wealth, Oliver Wyman (USA), Signet Bank (USA).

As a member of the City Values Forum, the Lord Mayors’ initiative to restore trust and integrity in the City, I led and co-authored with Tomorrow’s Company: “Governing Values: a Guide for Boards of Financial Services Companies” in October 2013; co-authored “Tomorrow’s Chairman” serialised in the FT in 2014 and co-authored “Governing Culture: Risk & Opportunity” published by City Values Forum and Tomorrow’s Company for the Financial Reporting Council’s Culture Coaltion in 2016.

I was nominated as a Cranfield FTSE “100 Women to Watch” in 2012 and 2013.

Awards and accolades

  • Listed in Debrett’s “People of Today” for over 15 years
  • Listed in 100 Women to Watch, part of the Cranfield School of Management’s Female FTSE Board Report 2013, 2012
  • Partnership Secretary and Director of Corporate Responsibility, Linklaters LLP
  • Co-Founder and CEO of Enterprise Insight, a public-private joint venture promoting entrepreneurship by CBI, IoD and BCC
  • Chair of the Institute of Directors’ National Forum on the purpose and values of business
  • Co-Founder and principal tutor of Nottingham Law School’s MBA in Legal Practice
  • Founding committee member of the RSA forum Ethics in the Workplace
  • First non-lawyer CEO of a law firm at BLP (then Berwin Leighton)