The UK’s Top 12 Women to Watch

By Elizabeth Harrin (London)

It’s been ten years since Cranfield School of Management first produced a report benchmarking the number of female executive directors on the corporate boards of the UK’s top 100 companies. This time the authors of the Female FTSE report has gone a step further – perhaps to celebrate a decade of highlighting the paucity of women at the top – and put together a list of women to watch.

There are 2,281 women (which is 404 more than last year) on the corporate boards, executive committees and senior teams in the FTSE 250. The ‘Women to Watch’ report identifies 100 women in that group, chosen from the largest organisations, whom the authors believe should be seriously considered for the most senior positions.

The Glass Hammer has picked out the financial services high fliers – women you should be watching out for in 2010. Is anyone at your company on the list?

1. Amanda Makenzie, Group Marketing Director at Aviva
   Makenzie has held this role at Aviva, the international savings, investments and insurance group, since 2008. Before this she worked at British Gas where she was the Commercial and Marketing Director. She has over 20 years of experience and since joining Aviva she has been key in developing the Aviva brand. Outside of work, she’s a keen musician, playing the piano and singing. She’s also a governor of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.
2. Fiona MacRae, Regional Head at Alliance Trust
   Alliance Trust, the largest generalist UK investment trust by market value listed on the London Stock Exchange, has benefited from MacRae’s skills since she joined the company in 2008 as Head of European Equities. MacRae previously worked as Pan European Equity Investment Manager at the boutique asset management company, Kempen Capital Management.
3. Jane Stevens, Executive Officer at Friends Provident
   Stevens joined this leading UK-based life and pensions company in 2005. She also holds the role of Managing Director of Operations at Friends Provident Life and Pensions Limited.
4. Dawn Reid, Division Director at Friends Provident
   Another entry on the list from Friends Provident, Reid took on the Division Director role after a stint as Compliance Director and Executive Officer.
5. Sian Lewis, Head of UK Renewals for Admiral Group
   Lewis made the headlines recently as part of a group of eight senior managers who sold 5 million shares in the company – making a profitable 54 per cent return. Lewis has worked for Admiral for over 15 years and previously moved to Swansea to launch the Diamond car insurance operation.
6. Ellen Alemany, Regional CEO at the Royal Bank of Scotland
   Alemany has also been in the news recently. RBS is now majority owned by the UK government and her role has become that of turnaround specialist. Listed as one of the 25 most powerful women in banking, Alemany manages the US division of the Scottish bank. She has taken tough decisions – like closing branches – to maintain the bank’s profitability while launching innovative products like the TruFit Student Loan program. She is also a non-executive director on the board of the of Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
7. Orlagh Hunt, Group Human Resources Director, RSA Insurance Group
   Hunt worked in a variety of HR management roles at Walkers, Tesco and Pepsi Cola before taking the step into financial services by joining AXA Sun Life as Head of Human Resources, prior to this directorship.
8. Clare Sheikh, Strategy, Marketing and Customer Director, RSA Insurance Group
   Another RSA Insurance Group entrant on the list, Sheikh joined RSA in 2007, from a directorship at ITV plc. This was a stint away from financial services – her background includes time at Prudential and the role of Managing Director of AA Financial Services and she currently serves as a non-executive director of Alliance Trust. She is also a Trustee of Breast Cancer Campaign.
9. Anne Jaeger, Chief Auditor, RSA Insurance Group
   The third RSA woman to make the list, Jaeger came to this role from a position as Regional Chief Auditor in Denmark. She joined RSA in 2001 and was previously CFO at Maersk Data. She spent 13 years at KPMG as a State Authorised Public Accountant and graduated from Copenhagen Business School.
10. Anne Richards, Chief Investment Officer, Aberdeen Asset Management
    In addition to her CIO role, Richards is head of multi-asset investment and a member of Aberdeen’s group management board. She’s had a long, established career in financial services, serving as joint managing director of Edinburgh Fund Managers, which was purchased by Aberdeen in 2003, chairman of the UK institutional asset allocation committee and holding roles at Merrill Lynch Investment Managers, JP Morgan Investment Management and Alliance Capital Limited. However, she didn’t start out in financial services – Richards was once a research fellow at CERN, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, in Geneva.
11. Rebecca Hughes, Head of Investor Relations, SVG Capital
    Hughes joined SVG Capital, a private equity investor and fund management business, in 2005. Before taking on this role, she was head of client services at Global IR, and she also managed investor programs at Taylor Rafferty, an investor relations consultancy. She graduated from UWE in Bristol with a degree in Politics and International Relations
12. Priscilla Vacassin, Group HR Director, Prudential
    Vacassin has held this role since 2005. She hasn’t always been in financial services, but made the move in 2003 when she became Executive HR Director of Abbey National. She is also a non-executive director at the UK’s Ministry of Defence.

In addition to these financial services high fliers, there are another 2269 star women in senior FTSE roles – so there is a huge pipeline of female talent available to boards looking to diversify their membership. “This year’s report demonstrates unequivocally that we have a huge and growing pipeline of female talent to FTSE 100 corporate boards,” says Professor Susan Vinnicombe, co-author of the report.

“There is still much more that needs to be done,” says Harriet Harman, Minister for Equality and Women. “Businesses that run on the basis of an old boy network and do not draw on the talents of all the population will not be the ones that flourish and prosper in the 21st century.”