Byan Carter
Private equity investment officer - EBRD
Bayan was born and raised in Kazakhstan. When the Soviet Union has collapsed, she won a scholarship for a one-year study at an American high school. She completed her bachelor’s degree in International Finance in Kazakhstan and came to UK to pursue an MBA. Bayan is an Associate Director in a Private Equity department at the EBRD, an international institution that operates in emerging markets. She has worked on over 100 investments, mostly buying stakes in banks in over 20 countries. She is currently a member of the Board of Directors at a start-up challenger bank – TBC Uzbekistan. Bayan has recently joined a Board of Governors at Newland House School in Teddington.
Renu Randhawa
Director of finance - Royal Academy of Dance
Renu Randhawa is the Director of Finance at the Royal Academy of Dance, which operates in 82 countries. Renu started her career at PwC, qualifying as a Chartered Accountant. She then joined Plan International and was responsible for reviewing rural development programmes (in health, education, water, sanitation and agriculture) across South and Central America, Asia and Africa. Renu left Plan International to start a family and work in the public and charity sectors in the UK. Renu has a passion for sport, swims daily and practices Reiki healing in her spare time
Gillian Simpson
Management consultant - Deloitte
Gill is a Partner in Deloitte Digital. She has been a Management Consultant for 18 years and specialises in helping retailers with customer and digital transformations. She has experience across luxury, grocery and fashion retailers. She is also the people and purpose lead for her industry in which she manages senior career progression, performance management and well being programmes for her industry team. Gill has worked 4 days per week for the last 8 years and is the sponsor for the working families network in Deloitte Digital. Ask Gill about all things digital, marketing, retail and management consultancy.
Abigail Gill
Financial adviser - RBC Brewin Dolphin
Abigail is a Chartered Financial Planner, and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Insurance. She provides financial advice to individuals, helping her clients invest for their future; providing expert advice on how they might best fund the purchase of a new home, pay for a wedding, school fees or to provide sufficient funds for their retirement. She has held a variety of roles through her career in finance, and has been practising as a Financial Planner for 7 years. She is currently a Wealth Adviser at RBC Brewin Dolphin, and you can ask her about the variety of roles available within the Financial Advice sector, what a financial adviser does, the adviser experience and routes into this profession.
David May
Investment research - HSBC
David runs the Global Investment Research division at HSBC, this is a team of 600 people based in 20 cities globally writing research and coming up with investment views across Economics, Fixed income, foreign currency, equities, data science and environmental, social and governance issues. Clients are hedge funds, asset managers (pension funds), corporates and central banks/governments around the world. David is based in London but has previously also worked in Hong Kong. Before HSBC, David worked at another bank, Goldman Sachs, for 6 years. He holds a degree from the University of London in French and Management studies, having done a 4 year course including 1 year at business school in Montpellier, France.
Mark Hughes
Aircraft leasing - Falko
Mark is Chief Commercial Officer at Falko, the world’s largest aircraft leasing company focused solely on the regional aircraft segment (<150 seats). Falko manages a portfolio of 270 aircraft, worth $3 billion and operated by 44 airlines worldwide including customers such as British Airways, Air France, Delta, Air Canada & Indigo. At Falko, Mark is responsible for all airline, manufacturer and lessor relationships. Mark has a 1st class degree in Economics from the University of Edinburgh and started his career in banking before moving into aerospace where he has worked for over 25 years
Ciara Stewart
VP Global partnerships and new business development - Asprey
Ciara is an experienced vision maker responsible for building and executing the global brand partnership and marketing strategy as well as leading corporate brand marketing, CRM, brand partnerships and field marketing activities and client activations for Asprey. Ciara lead the house brand-wide initiatives – including defining the client experience, from building brand preference for customers and investors, to on-site product and service touchpoints as well as New Business and Product Development.
Ciara’s background is in PR and marketing, working on Burberry, Margaret Howell, Boden, M&S, Molton Brown
and jewellers Mikimoto, Stephen Webster and Chaumet, before joining Asprey in 2004.
Jo Taylor
Executive director of corporate affairs - Shionogi Europe
Jo is an Executive Director of Corporate Affairs for Shionogi Europe – based in Amsterdam and London.
Shionogi is a pharmaceutical company based in Osaka, Japan that researches and develops medicines for infectious diseases such as Covid-19, antimicrobial resistance and antifungal resistance.
Jo’s job entails influencing health policy at both country and European level by engaging politicians in national governments in member states and at the European Parliament and EU institutions in Brussels. It also involves raising awareness of infectious diseases in the media and working with trade bodies, non-governmental organisations (e.g. WHO) and civil society groups.
Following a degree in Business Studies Jo began a graduate programme at GlaxoSmithKline and over the last thirty years has held various roles in corporate affairs and communications in many pharmaceutical companies serving on several leadership teams and boards.
In 2020 Jo was drafted into the UK Government’s Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Department to work on the UK Vaccines Taskforce to try to find a vaccine for Covid-19.
You can ask Jo about anything to do with public relations, government lobbying, working with NGOs and charities, corporate strategy, employee communications, working in government, working in science and the pharmaceutical industry.