Bio

Sheila has over 31 years experience in the global tech sector. She is a dynamic business leader who has a passion for enhancing diversity in the workplace and creating exciting careers for the next generation of digital talent. She played an integral role in FDM’s flotation on AIM in 2005 and was a key instigator of the management buy-out of the Group in 2010 and the subsequent listing onto the main FTSE Market in 2014. Sheila’s knowledge of the sector has been crucial in driving FDM’s global expansion programme, taking them into the FTSE250. She spearheads the ‘Global Women in Tech’ campaign and created FDM’s hugely successful Returners Programme. Sheila is President of TechUK and member of the Government’s Digital Skills Council. One of her proudest moments in business was when FDM achieved a zero gender pay gap. When not immersed in the tech space she can be found overseeing the extensive restoration of Logiealmond Estate which satisfies her interest in farming, forestry, ecology and conservation. She has won numerous awards during her career for services to the tech industry and was recognised in the 2020 New Year’s Honours list with ‘Commander Of The Order Of The British Empire’ (CBE) for her services to gender equality in IT and the employment of graduates and returners. She is also listed in Computer Weekly’s ‘Most Influential Women in UK Tech, Hall of Fame.’ At the 2020 European Tech Women Awards, The Department of Trade and Industry recognised her outstanding achievements by conferring Sheila with a ‘Career Recognition’ award. Some of her other recent accolades include, Information Age ‘Women of the Year 2018,’ ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ at the 2017 Scotland Women in Tech Awards, ‘Tech Champion’ at the 2018 TechWomen100 Awards, as well as being regularly named one of the 25 Most Influential Women of the North American Mid-Market by CEO Connection. She has also been named ‘Entrepreneur of the year’, ‘Leader of the Year,’ included in the 100 Women Role Models in Tech by Business Cloud and selected as one of Brummell Magazine’s Top 30 Most Inspirational Female Entrepreneurs in the City. Sheila leads FDM’s diversity and inclusion agenda and is fully invested in progressing broader diversity matters beyond gender and is inspirational in showing the way and proving what’s possible – especially (but not exclusively) for women. She is a qualified helicopter pilot and is licensed to fly both R66 and R44’s