Cecilia Lasecki | BMC Software
I am a specialist in IT service management solutions, with more than 20 years of experience in designing and demonstrating the value of innovative solutions for the management of digital services.
Although I chose to study mathematics after finishing high school, I have always loved researching and have a knack for exact sciences. Because of this, I later switched to computer science, which remains a passion of mine. As computing is more of a tool to solve something that other subjects need, I felt this area is where I could make the most difference in my professional career.
Stephen Gill | Salamander Limited
Over 40 years of progressive responsibility and achievement in the HVACR/Building Services Engineering industry.
A specialist in refrigeration systems and energy efficient solutions for buildings. I also have a keen interest in personal development within the workplace and am involved in a number of initiatives raising awareness of the HVACR sector.
Broad international business and technical experience as company owner, board director, senior manager, design engineer, projects manager, consultant, speaker and technical/business writer. Contributing chapters to several business books and numerous technical articles to trade press.
A champion of a number of industry causes and initiatives in the refrigeration and air-conditioning engineering (RAC) sector: I am the founder of the Women in RACHP network – an RAC industry wide network started in 2016; and founder and Head of Secretariat of World Refrigeration, Air-Conditioning and Heatpump Day (World Refrigeration Day - WRD). A new initiative started in 2019 which aims to raise awareness to the wider public of the role of refrigeration technology and science in modern living. This has received the support of UNEP’s OzonAction programme, and UNIDO. In its inaugural year, WRD was celebrated by over 1000 events in over 153 countries making an overnight industry global success.
After working for several engineering companies in increasingly senior roles, I formed my engineering and business consultancy in 2014.
Lee Chambers | Essentialise Workplace Wellbeing
Lee Chambers is a psychologist, coach and founder of Essentialise Workplace Wellbeing, a wellbeing and inclusion consultancy.
After a diverse career, including time in corporate finance, elite sports and the third sector, alongside scaling a videogame business, he has brought his knowledge and lived experience together to support companies in creating equitable culture, psychologically safe spaces and effective wellbeing strategies. This has been borne from his own lived experience, which has included mental health challenges, time as a stay at home Dad, and learning to walk again in 2014 after illness.
Daniel López Rovira | OLIO
Daniel has been working in Software Engineering for over ten years, after graduating from university in Barcelona.
He worked at Klarna in Stockholm for a few years before he moved to the UK in 2014, where he has worked in a few startups of different sizes. As an individual contributor, he mainly worked on backend and data, which continued when he moved into a leadership position.
Daniel focuses on culture and creating safe and inclusive places where everyone can become the best version of themselves. Nowadays, he's leading teams and driving high performance while building high trust, safe and inclusive teams in startups.
Richard Pickard | Inclusive Search
Equality, purpose and mission are important to me. I want to give back more than I take from life.
20+ years experience personally delivering exceptional recruitment solutions, both on a contingent & retained search basis, to start-up & scale-up tech firms through to FTSE100. Exciting and engaging teams with empathetic leadership, launching new business units for international recruitment organisations.
Having served as a Board Director for 10+ years, I created a business with a clear purpose & mission to represent a broad talent pool of diverse candidates.
Businesses with diversity have a greater balance of voices that enable them to create innovative solutions. Companies need to reflect their customers and the regions they operate in. Also...surely it's just the right thing to do.
The data is in...diverse companies achieve better commercial results, with most successful companies now viewing equality, diversity & inclusion as essential to their business performance and growth.
Inclusive Search works with the highest quality diverse candidates in the market, and with clients who value, reward, respect & celebrate everyone's diversity - and who wish to be proactive in recruiting, retaining & developing high-performing diverse talent.
As an advocate for TLA Black Women in Tech, The 30% Club, and a judge of the WeAreTheCity Rising Star awards, I am actively involved in creating leadership dialogue around equity and allyship, and also advising & mentoring candidates.
I am the author of the ‘Exceptional Female Role Models’ interview series – championing the achievements and excellence of inspirational females trailblazing in business. I won the LinkedIn 'Best Talent Voice, UK' award for 2021. I was listed in the Top 50 Trailblazers in Gender Equality 2021.
William Torrie | Barclays
William is VP of Legal External Engagement at Barclays, having started his career on the 2018 graduate programme following University.
A passionate advocate for change, he quickly climbed the ranks of Win, Barclays’ gender resource group, where he now serves as UK Deputy Chair, and is widely recognised for his campaign for gender equality. He also founded the ‘Alison Scott Scholarship’, a competitive programme awarded to four female undergraduate students at Queen Margaret University – providing the opportunity to upskill, travel and gain work experience whilst they complete their undergraduate studies.
In addition, William sits on the board of an LGBT+ Early Careers group; is a member of a London-based Think Tank, focussing on gender in the UK’s Foreign and Economic policies; and has held various roles in electoral and referenda campaigns in the UK and overseas.
Stuart White | HSBC
Stuart is the Chief Executive Officer and Board Director of the c.USD148 billion AuM HSBC Global Asset Management (UK) Ltd.
In addition Stuart is the Global Head of Strategy for HSBC Global Asset Management, the c.USD640 billion asset manager of the HSBC Group, responsible for its strategy, M&A and corporate management activities. Stuart is a member of the Global Management Committee, the Global Leadership team and the Global Risk Management Committee. Stuart is the accountable executive for the HSBC Global Asset Management global Diversity Equity & Inclusion programme which he established in 2000. Stuart is a Trustee Director of the c.£35 billion HSBC Bank Pension Trust (UK) Limited, and is Chair of the Investment Committee. Stuart has been with HSBC since 2010 and prior to that he worked at Insight Investment for 5 years and started his investment management career at Threadneedle Asset Management in the 1998. Stuart graduated with a BSc honours degree in Chemistry and European Studies (German) from the University of Sussex and the University of Freiburg. He holds a MBA from London Business School, holds the Investment Management Certificate and the PMI Award in Pension Trusteeship. Stuart is on the Advisory Board of the UK’s Diversity Project and a member of the Gender Balance CEO committee.
Ian Clarke | Deilight Consulting
A successful, multi-award winning Philanthropist, Entrepreneur, Author and Social Justice campaigner, London-born, racially non-binary and LGBT, Ian Clarke, 36, has been recognized by Rising Stars, Social Entrepreneur and Millennium volunteers as a leading mind globally on human rights, the value of human differences and the costs of oppression.
A 9-times chartered and certified Psychologist, Therapist, Management, D&I practitioner and Investment Banker, with 15 years’ experience advising the world’s top companies across 2 continents, the authority of Ian voice comes from extraordinary life experiences, complex intersectionality and his ability to represent anyone by listening and then projecting empathy.
In 2021, his lifelong work to advance sustainable business practices globally culminated in his 45-page report he dubbed Project Speak Up, cataloguing the causes, costs and solutions of oppression in global financial services. Ian single-handedly delivered the change that led to the first black appointments in history to the board of Europe’s largest bank, and the first black female appointment to any European banking board in history. He now manages Deilight Consulting, a multi-award-winning Culture Transformation practice working at the forefront of boosting representation for marginalized communities everywhere.
Tim Hole | Sky
Since leaving University in 1997 I have fed thru the television, music and film industries in a range of roles that support talent.
In all roles I have endeavoured to join conversations, debates and campaigns to liberate marginalised voices to achieve equal airtime and value. In recent years I have been able to focus on operational frameworks and CSR activities that can really 'push the needle' on all things E, D & I.
Aidan Moran | ecx.io
My career began in 1991 when I left Ireland and came to England to find work.
I started as a mini-mainframe developer (VAX/VMS) and in 1995 I moved from the marketing industry into life sciences when I started working at Celltech. Over the next few years, I continued to expand my experience into network administration, security, compliance, database administration, web and app development, and management. Through a number of acquisitions and mergers, Celltech evolved into UCB, and during my 14 years there I held a number of senior management positions from Applications Manager (UK) to Associate Director, Global Web Applications.
In 2009 I was part of the team that launched the UK arm of ecx.io and have been the Managing Director since 2010. Our focus has been on Adobe and Sitecore and since we were acquired by IBM in 2016, we have gone from strength to strength and now provide the expert resources for all IBM engagements in these technologies. I am now part of the IBM iX UK Senior Leadership Team and look forward we can achieve in 2022 and beyond.