How do we keep EDI in mind all year and not just for International Women's Day?

Dr Iwi Ugiagbe-Green has over 20 years’ experience of working in higher education and nearly 15 years’ experience of supporting and enhancing student success in higher education.  Iwi is Reader at Manchester Metropolitan University Business School and a (lapsed) accountant! Iwi describes herself as an academic activist, committed to equity in education.

Her work is inter-disciplinary and collaborative. Iwi has won several institutional and sector awards for equity, inclusion, belonging and has provided EDI consultancy to a range of national and international organisations.

Julia Rouse is a Professor in the Centre for Decent Work and Productivity at Manchester Metropolitan University. After a long career of researching entrepreneurship – and particularly women’s enterprise – Julia has spent the last 5 years running innovation projects that experiment with how to make organisations fairer. Her current projects are RHYTHMS (improving the NHS’s ability to manage workplace maternity fairly and productively) and BOOST (changing social housing providers so that ethnically diverse leaders can emerge and thrive).

 

David is founder and Managing Director of the award winning learning and development company ABSTRACT. He has had extensive experience of both leading and working with major businesses, ensuring that they have the right people, exuding the right behaviours and within the right environment, for the benefit of the organisation’s goals and objectives. David has developed a highly-regarded reputation that has delivered superior and sustainable results for many organisations over more than two decades. 

David is the creator of ABSTRACT's career management development programmes, ACCELERATE and AMBITION, that have so far helped thousands of women in the UK, Ireland and worldwide to develop and manage their careers, developing the growth of talented people in business to lift others as they climb. ACCELERATE won the Diversity Initiative of The Year at the Women in Finance Awards and David was Highly Commended in the IOD Director of the Year Awards in the category of Equality, Diversity & Inclusion.

Leontia McArdle is a Legal Director in the litigation team based in the Manchester office of global law firm, DLA Piper UK LLP.

Through her work, Leontia has extensive experience in the financial services sector. She advises on the resolution of disputes for and on behalf of high street banks; "challenger banks"; payment services providers; invoice and asset finance providers, from both a claimant and defendant perspective. Her work is undertaken on an national and cross-jurisdictional basis.

Leontia's practice has a particular focus on group litigation and mass claims' activity, and she is currently very focused upon the outcome of the pending Supreme Court hearing of the appeals in Wrench, Johnson and Hopcraft which will take place at the beginning of April. Since the Court of Appeal judgment in October which related to the alleged secret commission arrangements between finance providers and car dealerships in respect of motor finance, Leontia has been kept incredibly busy in advising clients of the ramifications and legal issues.

Leontia is recommended by Lexology and the Legal 500.

It was through her involvement in the financial services sector that Leontia came to volunteer for Women in Banking & Finance. Since 1980, Women in Banking & Finance has been run as a not for profit, volunteer led organisation to promote diversity and gender equality in financial services in the UK. Since 2023, Leontia is now Co-Chair of the Manchester branch of Women in Banking & Finance, and promotes its events and ethos to help women progress in their career and achieve their goals.