Director, Delivery and Distribution, LSEG

I wrote my first program in junior school, aged maybe 10. It was for the Commodore 64 and it made a balloon float across the screen, copied line by line out of a magazine. I took the opportunity to study GCSE Computer studies and then A level and ended up at university, I was the only girl to graduate my course at every level.

I started as a trainee at the only graduate position available and within weeks was out working on customer sites with a company car, mainly focussing on SOP process and finance. I really enjoyed the independence and worked all over the UK and Europe, I eventually ended up at HSBC and stayed there for an unexpected 17 years developing more than just coding skills, managing teams from many backgrounds.

Aviva gave me a fantastic opportunity to set-up and run their planned new digital office in Sheffield, where I managed to achieve record breaking diversity statistics, but most importantly I had a fabulous team around me. I had many volunteers to help at the local Code first girls sessions after work, and we sponsored the food for them. We also hosted some great events at the office for the Sheffield tech community.

Now at Refinitv/LSEG I have ownership for my largest ever area, Delivery and distribution, compromising so many technologies and languages it’s another amazing opportunity to try and effect change, this time really globally.