PowerWomen Speak

Jess Hall is Chief Product Officer at Just Eat Takeaway.com, one of the world's leading on-demand delivery platforms, connecting hundreds of thousands of partners with tens of millions of consumers across 17 international markets. She leads the global product vision powering this ecosystem, evolving the platform beyond food delivery into a broader digital high street for everyday convenience. With...

Jennifer Tejada is the Chairperson and CEO of PagerDuty, the global leader in digital operations management (NYSE: PD).  Jennifer brings to the role 25 years of diverse experience spanning mass consumer products to disruptive cloud and software solutions. She has a successful track record in product innovation, optimizing operations, and scaling public and private enterprise technology companies....

Shiva McMahon is the CEO and MD of Petro Australis Energy (PAE), an Australian exploration and production company. With over 30 years of experience in the energy industry, she has built a distinguished career in business leadership, delivering safe and sustainable operations, strategy development and implementation, financial management, business development, and risk management. Before joining PA...

Established in 2008, the luxury womenswear label Emilia Wickstead has become known in the industry as the epitome of modern femininity. Born in New Zealand to a part-New Zealand part-Italian mother and a part-Samoan father, Emilia was raised in the suburbs of Pakaranga, Ellerslie and Parnel in Auckland. After her father, an artist, passed away when Emilia was four, her mother Angela Wickstead foun...

Serpil Timuray is an Independent Non-Executive Director at British American Tobacco Plc.  Most recently, Serpil was the CEO of Vodafone Investments and a member of Vodafone Group's Executive Committee. Her previous roles at Vodafone Group's Executive Committee included CEO of Europe Cluster, Group Chief Commercial and Strategy Officer, and CEO of AMAP (Africa, Middle East, Asia, Pacific).  Prior t...

Margarida is a founding team member and VP of Operations at poolside. Before joining poolside, Margarida spent two years as a venture capitalist at Beacon Capital, primarily investing in early-stage deep tech companies. Prior to that, she served as COO at Lifebit, an AI genomics platform for developers, where she played a key role in growing the company from Day 0 to their $60M Series B round. Mar...

Nneka is a Senior Director at Alvarez &  Marsal, where she leads the UK 's Wealth Management Performance Improvement practice. She was previously Chief Operating Officer at a wealth management business and prior to this, Nneka spent almost 10  years in Management Consulting at Deloitte and Accenture. A passionate champion of improving social mobility, Nneka is a mentor with the Social Mobility Fou...

Ingvild Næss is the CIO of Schibsted and CEO of E-Tech AB delivering IT services across Schibstead. She is on the Board of Komplett ASA, an electronic consumer goods company, and Neddy AS, an ed-tech startup. Ingvild was named female media leader of the year in Norway 2023. She chairs the board of Feltgis, a startup focused on using data in forestry. Ingvild used to chair the Norwegian Media Busin...

Sarah Friar, former CEO of Nextdoor, soon to be the CFO of OpenAI, led the company to nearly triple its reach to over 92M Neighbors in 335,000 neighborhoods worldwide. Previously, as CFO at Square, she oversaw its IPO and $30 billion market cap increase. Her prior experience spans Goldman Sachs, McKinsey, and Salesforce. Currently a Board Member of Walmart and Consensys, she's also known for her B...

Joanna Jensen is the founder of the UK's number one baby and child personal care brand, Childs Farm, having created the brand in 2010 as a result of her own daughter's sensitive and eczema prone skin.  In March 2022, Jensen sold Childs Farm for £40m to PZ Cussons Plc Jensen is a keen supporter of other female entrepreneurs.  She is a mentor to a number of British SMEs through Imperial College's me...

Today we welcome Ruba Borno VP, Worldwide Channels & Alliances for Amazon Web Services (AWS). In this role, Ruba leads the AWS Partner Organization (APO), a global team responsible for recruiting, enabling, buying and selling with over 100,000 companies in more than 150 countries. Ruba also leads AWS Marketplace where AWS partners can sell their services and solutions to customers. Prior to joinin...

Ann Cairns started her career as a research scientist and was the first woman to work offshore with British Gas. She moved into investment banking in her 30's and rose up the ranks in Citibank – ExCo Citi Global Transaction Bank, CEO of ABN Amro Transaction Bank, CEO of Lehmann Holdings and was responsible for the restructuring (with Alvarez & Marsel). After 15 years at Citi, she enjoyed a number...

Lisa is Co-Head of Global Banking Coverage, alongside Gerry Keefe, responsible for a multi-billion- dollar business delivering tailored financial solutions to Corporate and Institutional clients worldwide through a comprehensive suite of services including liquidity and cash management, trade services, lending and structured finance. In addition, Lisa has global responsibility for the Institutiona...

Katherine Ainley is the CEO of Ericsson UK and Ireland, working alongside major mobile network operators and service providers to create world leading mobile networks and game-changing technology for millions of subscribers and enterprise partners. She is also a member of the leadership team for Ericsson Europe and Latin America.  Katherine joined Ericsson in February 2021 from BT where she held a...

Alison Hutchinson CBE is the CEO of Pennies, an award-winning fintech charity making digital giving affordable, sustainable, and feel-good. She is also a Senior Independent Director at DFS plc, Yorkshire Building Society and Foresight Group Holdings Ltd. Alison was previously a Trustee of the Charities Aid Foundation, Non-Executive Director of Aviva Life Holdings UK and AIL (General & Health Insur...

Today we welcome Tracy Watkinson who is a Chief Operating Officer and Transformation specialist who worked in the world's largest investment banks for over 20 years, alongside a Non Executive Director career. She is currently the COO of the Finance Function at NatWest Group, and Board member of NatWest Trustee & Depositary Services company.  Tracy was awarded for her thought leadership in gender d...

I am delighted to be speaking today with Mary O'Connor, CEO of Howden CAP part of Howden, the global insurance group. She was most recently the acting CEO for KPMG in the UK. Mary has 30 years of experience in leading & advising financial services companies. She has held senior roles in law, government, public corporations and a Big 4 accounting firm.   Prior to KPMG, Mary held a number of executi...

I am delighted to be speaking today with Céline Assimon, CEO of De Beers Jewellers and De Beers Forevermark.  Celine has more than 20 years of experience in the luxury industry, specialising in watches and fine jewellery. She started her career at Richemont in 2001, when she joined Piaget North America's Marketing team. More recently, Céline worked at Louis Vuitton in New York and led the commerci...

Tina Fordham is a geopolitical strategist and advisor working at the intersection of geopolitics, financial markets and the drivers of social change. The first Chief Global Political Analyst on Wall Street and previously, head of global political risk at Eurasia Group, Tina has over 20 years' experience advising senior leaders—from prime ministers and 3- star generals to the C-suite, institutional...

We are delighted to welcome Maureen Wheeler, who with her husband Tony, founded the universally popular Lonely Planet guidebooks. Lonely Planet has printed more than 100 million copies of it's 600 guides in 17 languages. Maureen is the driving force behind Lonely Planet's philanthropy programs and created the Planet Wheeler Foundation. She recently received the UN World Tourism Organisation lifeti...

Today we speak with Mandy Hickson, who has over 30 years experience within aviation. She joined the Royal Air Force in 1994 and flew the Tornado GR4 on the front line, where she operated in hostile environments, including patrolling the 'No Fly' zone over Iraq. Since leaving the RAF she retrained as a facilitator and coach in human performance factors. Drawing on her experience of calculated risk-...

Today we welcome Kumsal Bayazit, Chief Executive Officer, Elsevier. As Chief Executive Officer, Kumsal Bayazit is a strong advocate of research and innovation and leads Elsevier's 8,600 people in their mission to help researchers and healthcare professionals advance science and improve health outcomes for the benefit of society. A lifelong champion of diversity & equality in science, Kumsal co-cha...

Today we welcome Julia Streets, founder & CEO of Streets Consulting, a business development, marketing & communications consultancy advising a wide range of domestic & international fintech clients.   Formerly global head of communications at Atos Euronext Market Solutions (serving on the ExCo) and head of marketing and sales development at Instinet Europe. Julia is the host of 'DiverCity Podcast'...

Today we are joined by Carrie Coombs. Carrie has become really well known in the UK and abroad for her ability to help executive, senior and high potential clients, teams and boards increase their leadership confidence and resilience in the context of personal, organisational and market transition. Carrie brings to her coaching and board assessment work experience from a career that has has spanne...

Today we welcome Aleida Rios, SVP of Engineering at bp, leading engineering across bp's 3,000 discipline engineers globally. Aleida has spent 25 years in manufacturing operations/P&L, commercial development, technical innovation and engineering. Aleida is an International Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, the first International Female Fellow of Latin descent. She currently serves on the...