Britain should ‘continue to do what’s right’ on diversity, says Microsoft executive

Pamela Maynard won the Black British Business Person of the Year award last year. She has gone on to become Microsoft’s Chief AI Transformation Officer, having worked at a range of tech and consultancy groups from Oracle to EY.

Nominations are open for the 12th year of the awards. You can submit yours here.

There was an expectation coming from a West Indian family that I would become something professional like a lawyer, a doctor or an accountant. I was set to go down the path of doing a law degree at Leeds University

Then, just as I finished my A-Levels, I walked into the house and I remember having a conversation with my mum. She said: “Why do you look so glum?”

And I said: “Because I’m not really sure what I want to do. I hope I’m not going to disappoint you by saying I don’t want to do law. What I actually enjoy is business studies”. I’d done business studies as an A-Level. And she said: “Follow your instinct.”

My career has been characterised by not always knowing where I am going to end up, following my instinct and using mentors to help me to navigate some of those tougher decisions. I think about my mum as being one of my greatest mentors.

My parents were of the Windrush generation. They came to the UK in the Sixties, which was a big change. They were both from Barbados.

They actually met in London. My dad was a teenager, my mum was in her early 20s. They both had that courage to continue to push forward, to go into situations where you don’t really know what the outcome is going to be.

They instilled that courage in us – I’m one of three siblings – and my passion comes from them.

In the latest Parker Review report [a Government-commissioned study of representation on boards of directors] we now see 95pc of FTSE 100 boards with an ethnic minority board member. And so there is progress.

But one of the challenges that I see is that when you look at the senior manager layer, there’s still only 1.2pc of those who are Black.

I’ve been asking that question recently of peers: are we seeing the same impact in the UK as in the US? I would definitely say there’s a nervousness. But what people are saying to me is that they’re not yet seeing the same sort of actions being taken as in the US.

I think it’s really important in the UK that we continue to do what’s right. And what’s right is that we have the right level of representation in leadership positions.