THE WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED ON 10 DECEMBER 2020

Rob Neil OBE, has over 37 years experience in the Civil Service and was a founding member of the Ministry of Justice’s BAME Staff Network P.R.O.U.D. He was also the first elected Chair of the (now) Civil Service Race Equality Network. Rob has been a Trustee with RELATE for eleven years and also volunteers as the Social Media Director with the Reach Society @ReachSociety10. Rob was awarded an OBE in the 2018 New Year’s Honours list for ‘Services to Race Equality in the workplace and the community’ and received his gong from the Queen at Buckingham Palace in May 2018. Later in the same year, Rob became the inaugural winner of Investing in Ethnicity’s Workplace Hero Award in November 2018 before successfully graduating from the Civil Service Future Leaders Scheme in January 2019. A member of the CIPD and speaker at numerous people and race related conferences and events, Rob also designs, delivers and evaluates a range of development activities rooted in his vast experience and works in collaboration with an expanding team of Krystal Alliance Associates.

An award-winning global leader and influencer in D&I, Amir is currently Global Director of Diversity and Inclusion and has been listed in the Global Top 50 Diversity Professionals List, Top 50 Most Influential Diversity Stars 2020 List, and won the ‘Head of Diversity’ Award at the European Diversity Awards in 2017, for his commitment to and 12+ direct years of service in the field of D&I. Amir has also received the following accolades: Telegraph’s Top 50 LGBT Executives List 2015; Winner of ‘Corporate Rising Star’ at the British LGBT Awards 2015.

Wincie Knight is VP Global Inclusion Strategy at ViacomCBS Networks International (VCNI) EMEA. She is responsible for leading VCNI’s diversity and inclusion strategy in EMEA, where she is a passionate advocate for championing a company culture centred on belonging. In the UK, and is instrumental in VCNI’s participation in Creative Diversity Network’s Project Diamond, as well as liaising with Ofcom on ViacomCBS’s diversity developments. Knight holds an MSc in Organisational Behaviour from Birkbeck, University of London where she conducted research focused on BAME employees in media organisations.

Coral is HSBC UK Head of Diversity and Inclusion and believes that she is very lucky to have a job that lets her work on her passion for fairness for all. She has over fifteen years of experience of delivering diversity and inclusion programmes in the public and private sectors, and for her focus on delivering measurable change, Coral was named Head of Diversity and Inclusion of the year at the Inclusive Company Awards in 2018.

Justin is Head of Retail Multi-Asset Funds at LGIM and a member of the Asset Allocation team which manages over £50 billion for pension schemes and savers throughout the world. He leads on the management of the team’s retail and risk-profiled multi-asset funds managing the award-winning Multi-Index Funds. Justin co-chairs the Legal & General Inclusion Team (LEGIT), which aims to create a culture that supports all of LGIM through networks and events across five key areas: leadership engagement, talent attraction and development, leadership development, marketing and communications and community engagement. Externally, Justin is an adviser to the board of City Hive Ltd, which focuses on driving diversity initiatives throughout the asset management industry. In addition, he sits on the ethnicity workstream of the industry-wide Diversity Project and is a co-founder of the movement #talkaboutblack, which focuses on creating more black senior leaders in the asset management industry and beyond as well as addressing the taboo that surrounds conversations about ethnicity. Justin is a CFA charterholder, winner of the Ethnicity Awards Future Leader category, featured on the 2020 EMpower Senior Executive Leaders List and was a finalist for the 2019 Black British Business Awards (Financial Services). Earlier this year, Justin was awarded the honour of the Freedom of the City of London, due to his work within diversity and inclusion.

Paulette has been involved with the BAME at Tesco colleague network since its creation in 2010. The network aims to support with career advice and ensure people in the wider community know that Tesco is a great place to work and shop. Paulette is passionate about supporting colleague development and have been Network Chair since 2018. She has supported the creation of two new colleague D&I conversation guides, and organising virtual focus sessions with BAME colleagues, to discuss the biggest obstacles they face at work.

Liam is a Global Inclusion Manager based in Edinburgh, prior to joining the world of Diversity & Inclusion, Liam worked in Personal Banking for 10 years in a variety of roles in Operations, Business Management and Branch Banking. Up until October Liam held the global responsibility for LGBT+ inclusion agenda and driving change across the organisation to ensure it is inclusive for their customers and their people. Liam now leads the bank’s Ethnically Diverse agenda, for which the aim is to ensure that Natwest Group is representative of the communities it serves.