Heather Rabbatts

Why organisations work with Dame Heather Rabbatts

• She co-founded TIME’S UP UK in 2018 and played a founding role in establishing CIISA, the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority – a track record of translating accountability advocacy into operational governance infrastructure rather than policy recommendations.
• As the first woman on The Football Association board in its more than 150-year history, she has direct experience of governance cultures structurally resistant to inclusion – and of the specific mechanisms through which that resistance operates and where it can be broken.
• Non-executive experience across Associated British Foods, M&C Saatchi, and Bloomsbury Publishing, alongside earlier roles at the Bank of England, the BBC, and Crossrail, gives her a governance perspective formed across very different ownership structures and operating environments.
• Her legal training as a barrister and her track record as a public-sector CEO who led the turnaround of the London Borough of Lambeth give her a precise understanding of what accountability looks like when it is working – and when it is not.
• Her experience stepping up from non-executive to executive chair of a listed company during a period of CEO succession and commercial pressure is a live credential on what active board oversight requires in practice.

Biography highlights

• Barrister qualified in 1981; educated at the London School of Economics
• Chief Executive of the London Borough of Lambeth; youngest local authority chief executive in the UK at time of appointment
• First woman appointed to the board of The Football Association in its history (2011); resigned from FIFA’s anti-discrimination taskforce on principle following Sepp Blatter’s re-election (2015)
• BBC Governor (1999-2001); Managing Director of 4Learning, Channel 4’s education arm; former Chair of Shed Media, overseeing its sale to Time Warner
• Executive Chair, M&C Saatchi; Senior Independent Director, Associated British Foods; Non-Executive Director, Bloomsbury Publishing; former non-executive roles include the Bank of England, Crossrail, and the Royal Opera House
• Co-founder and Chair, TIME’S UP UK (since 2018); founding Chair, Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority (CIISA); Chair, Soho Theatre; DBE awarded in 2016 New Year Honours for services to football and equality

Biography

Boards rarely lack formal structures – what they frequently lack is the culture, diversity, and accountability practice to make those structures function as designed. Dame Heather Rabbatts has spent three decades working at exactly that intersection. Her career spans barrister practice, the CEO role at the London Borough of Lambeth, and non-executive directorships across sport, media, and listed companies.

Her 2011 appointment as the first woman on The Football Association board placed her inside one of the most structurally resistant governance environments in British sport. She used the role publicly – criticising the composition of the FA’s commission on diversity, and resigning from FIFA’s anti-discrimination taskforce in 2015 following Sepp Blatter’s re-election. Her broader media career included serving as BBC Governor and Managing Director of Channel 4’s education business, 4Learning, and subsequently chairing Shed Media through its sale to Time Warner.

She serves as Executive Chair of M&C Saatchi, Senior Independent Director at Associated British Foods, and Non-Executive Director at Bloomsbury Publishing. She co-founded TIME’S UP UK in 2018 alongside Barbara Broccoli. Together they played a founding role in establishing CIISA, the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority, which provides an operational framework for handling misconduct across film and television.

The unifying thread across her career – council chambers, listed company boards, football administration, and film production – is a single practical question. What does genuine accountability at board level actually require? Her answer is grounded in experience of governance under real pressure, not governance in theory.

Key speaking topics

• Board governance and accountability
• Inclusion in corporate leadership
• Governance in sport and football administration
• Culture change in creative industries
• Ethical oversight and organisational standards
• Non-executive leadership and board composition
• Public sector leadership and institutional reform

Ideal for

• Boards and non-executive directors navigating governance reform, composition review, or accountability challenges
• CHROs and Chief People Officers building the case for inclusion at board and senior leadership level
• Sport governing bodies and rights holders managing governance and inclusion reform
• Senior leadership teams in media, creative, or public institutions undergoing culture change

Audience outcomes

• A clearer understanding of where formal governance structures typically fail to produce actual accountability – and what intervention at board level usually requires
• Insight into inclusion as a governance discipline, drawn from direct experience of institutional resistance and cultural change in high-profile organisations
• Practical perspective on how organisations can move from policy-level commitments on DEI to embedded board-level practice
• Clearer framing of the non-executive role in holding executive teams to account on culture, ethics, and standards
• An understanding of how industry standards bodies can translate advocacy into operational governance infrastructure, illustrated by the development of CIISA