WIBF Annual Award Winners 2012
WIBF Award for Achievement 
Liz Bingham
Liz Bingham is Managing Partner, People and Talent at Ernst & Young. She is not a graduate, in a business largely staffed by graduates. She is a woman in a profession notoriously short of senior women. Liz is an authentic leader unlike others who might use their position in the hierarchy to drive change.
In 2001 Liz was promoted to Director and asked to lead a restructuring team generating £2-3m in business. She grew that business to £10m and in 2004 became a partner. In 2006 she was asked to lead London Restructuring and in 2009 to lead the national Restructuring team. When she took it on it was a £50m business and it became an £80m business employing 350 people. This achievement earned her a leadership team position as Managing Partner, People and Talent.
During Liz’s career she has constantly been watching for barriers and removing them – for non-graduates, for women, for parents, for flexible workers and for gay people. Her current Leadership Team position reflects the respect that she commands in our business for both her business leadership and her people skills.
WIBF Young Professional Award
Jennifer Wan
Jennifer Wan is a Treasury Sales Officer at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. She has become one of the youngest sales officers within Global treasury Solutions and pioneered the role of building out the Asian portfolio within EMEA. Previously she worked at Bank of America Business Capital Europe as a Senior Collateral Analyst. She quickly made her mark by instigating and implementing new initiatives, primarily driving efficiency and restructuring the setup of multicurrency deals. She moved to a role that gave her responsibility for managing some of the largest multinational relationships in the region. She was instrumental in building and managing these relationships; taking on additional responsibility for producing the group’s revenue reporting and working on projects to further develop the capability of the group. She has not only raised awareness of cross regional capabilities but added global value to clients; navigating this effort across cultural challenges.
Jennifer has participated in the Community Garden Project for the Wapping Women’s Centre in Tower Hamlets and actively supports Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s Intern Programme. She has recently been nominated to participate in ‘Creating the Edge’, an upcoming female leadership programme at the bank.
WIBF Champion for Women
Charlotte Sweeney
Charlotte Sweeney joined Nomura International PLC in April 2009 as Head of Diversity and Inclusion (EMEA). She was brought in to develop and implement Nomura’s Diversity and Inclusion strategy and embed it into the culture of the firm. She has had a number of major achievements in this role, including creating and gaining executive commitment to the first diversity strategy, developing and launching the emergency and permanent care solutions programme, creating the ‘Parental Transitions’ Programme that is recognised as industry leading and creating ‘career pathways’ that focuses on profiling role models at all levels of the firm.
She is a Non-Executive Director for a number of not for profit organizations including the President of the London Chapter of European professional Women’s Network, Board Member for City HR Association and Advisor to WOB UK. She works closely with the Commission for Equality and Human Rights, FSA, advises Government on inclusion strategy and speaks at a number of MBA courses specifically on cultural change, diversity and inclusive leadership. Charlotte writes for a number of professional publications globally and presents at both national and international conferences. She was awarded the 2010 Global Diversity Leadership Award in the US.
