1 Christopher Bailey

Burberry

Chief creative and chief executive

Christopher Bailey took over as chief executive of Burberry, the luxury retailer, this year, becoming the first openly gay person to lead a FTSE 100 company, writes Denise Law.

The appointment is “groundbreaking” says Suki Sandhu, founder of UK-based OUTstanding in Business, a non-profit networking group that campaigns for LGBT rights in the workplace.

He adds: “He represents the ideal LGBT leader of the future: unselfconscious, successful and comfortable with his gay identity in public. He has not been held back by his sexuality nor has he been defined by it.”

Vanessa Friedman, former fashion editor at the FT, noted that what sets Mr Bailey apart in an “industry of divas” is not that he is gay, but that he is “famously nice, famously normal, famously un-diva-like”.

Since Mr Bailey joined Burberry as creative director in 2001, the company’s revenues have increased fourfold. He has been credited with turning the brand into a digital leader in the luxury industry.

2 Antonio Simoes

HSBC

Chief executive UK

3 Beth Brooke-Marciniak

EY

Global vice chair, public policy

4 Anthony Watson

Nike

Global chief information officer

Antonio Simoes: ‘People want to follow leaders who they can trust. This is where authenticity comes into play’

5 Stephen Clarke

WHSmith

Chief executive

6 Jason Grenfell-Gardner

IGI Laboratories

President & chief executive

7 Alex Schultz

Facebook

Vice-president, growth

Anthony Watson

8 Paul Reed

BP IST

Chief executive

9 Robert Greenblatt

NBC Entertainment

Chairman

Stephen Clarke

10 Claudia Brind-Woody

IBM

Vice-president & managing director, global intellectual property licensing

11 Brian Bickell

Shaftesbury

Chief executive

Jason Grenfell-Gardner

12 Dan Fitz

BT

Group general counsel & company secretary

13 Trevor Burgess

C1 Bank

Chief executive

Paul Reed: 'People like to see that someone else has done well and that their career hasn’t been affected by coming out'

14 Sally Susman

Pfizer

Executive vice president, corporate affairs

15 Mary Portas

Portas Agency

Chief creative officer

16 Charles Allen

Global Radio

Chairman

Mary Portas

17 Arjan Dijk

Google

Vice president, marketing

18 Robert Annibale

Citi

Global director, Citi microfinance & community development

Faried Chopdat

19 Faried Chopdat

SAB Miller

Global business services deployment lead

20 Neil Tallantire

Diageo

Global portfolio director

21 Joseph Evangelisti

JP Morgan Chase

Chief communications officer

Claudia Brind-Woody: ‘There’s a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt I try to live by: it’s not fair to ask of anyone what you’re not willing to do yourself.’

22 Robert Hanson

John Hardy

Chief executive

23 Jan Gooding

Aviva

Group brand director

24 Mary Jo Abler

3M Unitek

Vice-president and general manager

Robert Hanson

25 Julie Hogan

NCR Corporation

Vice-president, North America services delivery

26 Liz Bingham

EY

Managing partner for talent

27 Josh Graff

LinkedIn

Senior director, marketing solutions, EMEA

28 David Isaac

Pinsent Masons

Partner & global sector head, advanced manufacturing & technology services

Paul Wood

29 Paul Wood

Bloomberg

Chief risk & compliance officer

30 Angela Darlington

Aviva

Chief risk officer, UK Life

31 Justin D’Agostino

Herbert Smith Freehills

Global head of practice, dispute resolution

32 Louis Vega

Dow Chemicals

Chief of staff

Simon Millson

33 Simon Millson

British American Tobacco

Group head of corporate affairs

34 Michael Rowe

Slaughter & May

Partner, head of competition litigation

35 Jim McEleney

BNY Mellon

Chief operating officer, EMEA

36 Tim Baxter

Standard Chartered Bank

Global head of communications

37 Richard Beaven

Lloyds Banking

Insurance operations director

Jo Rzymowska

38 Jo Rzymowska

Celebrity Cruises

Managing director, UK & Ireland

39 Crawford Prentice

M&S Banking

Deputy chief executive

40 Antonia Belcher

MHBC

Founding partner

41 Jim Ford

Allen & Overy

Partner, head of corporate intellectual property

42 Andrew Williams-Fry

Gatwick Airports

Chief economist

43 Guy Black

Telegraph Media Group

Executive director

44 Jonathan Mildenhall

Airbnb

Chief marketing officer

45 Dan Perlet

EE

Director of corporate and financial affairs

46 Peter Zorn

Deutsche Bank

Managing director, group technology and operations

47 Margaret Stumpp

QM Associates

Senior adviser

48 Mark Q McLane

Barclays

Managing director, global head of diversity and inclusion

49 Dennis Layton

McKinsey

Partner

50 Margot Slattery

Sodexo

Managing director corporate services, Ireland & Northern Ireland

51 Debbie Gupta

NEST

Managing director, corporate services

52 Marianne Roling

Microsoft

General manager, small & medium market solutions and partners business, central and eastern Europe

53 Phil Kleweno

Bain & Company

Partner

54 Daniel Winterfeldt

CMS Cameron McKenna

Head of international capital markets and D&I partner

55 Chris Stening

Telefonica UK

Transitional services director

56 Michael Brunt

The Economist

Executive vice-president & managing director, global circulation

Sadiq Gillani

57 Sadiq Gillani

Lufthansa

Senior vice-president and chief strategy officer

58 Mike Hoban

Morrisons

Brand and communications director

59 Matthew Flood

Balfour Beatty

General counsel and divisional manager, services division

60 Alison McFadyen

Standard Chartered Bank

Head of governance, west

61 Patrick Rowe

Accenture

Deputy general counsel

Elyse Cherry

62 Elyse Cherry

Boston Community Capital

Chief executive officer

63 Michiel Kolman

Elsevier

Senior vice-president, global academic relations

64 Denny Tu

British Sky Broadcasting

Head of strategy & planning

65 Veit Schuhen

Maitland Group

Chief operating officer

66 Klaus-Stefan Hohenstatt

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer

Regional managing partner

67 Sandy Gould

Yahoo

Head of recruiting, senior vice-president of talent acquisition

68 Matt Batham

Deloitte

Senior tax partner

69 Scott McGregor

Camco Clean Energy

Chief executive

70 Jeffrey Krogh

BNP Paribas

Managing director, media & telecom finance, London

Vincent François

71 Vincent François

Société Générale

Regional group chief audit executive

72 Mike Anderson

Coutts

Managing director, wealth manager

Renee Brown

73 Renee Brown

Wells Fargo

Senior vice-president, director of enterprise social media

74 Rob Hudson

British Land Co

Group financial controller

75 Jeff Davis

Barclays

Managing director, global head of sales & trading

76 Steven Wardlaw

Baker Botts

Partner in charge, London office

77 Richard Cristofoli

Debenhams

Marketing director

Julia Hoggett

78 Julia Hoggett

Financial Conduct Authority

Head of investment banking department

79 Tim Hailes

JP Morgan

Managing director & associate general counsel

80 Harry Rich

Royal Institute of British Architects

Chief executive officer

81 Steven Cox

Fujitsu

Executive director, public sector

82 Nicolas Patrick

DLA Piper

Partner, head of pro bono & corporate responsibility, international

Andy Woodfield

83 Andy Woodfield

PwC

Partner

84 Svetlana Omelchenko

Coty

Vice-president, global marketing insights

85 Tim Fetherston-Dilke

Accenture

Finance director for UK & Ireland

Peter Murray

86 Peter Murray

Arup

Head of government affairs

87 Jacqueline Davies

Financial Conduct Authority

Human resources director

88 Harry Small

Baker & McKenzie

Partner, global head of information technology & commercial practice

89 Nicholas Creswell

Thomson Reuters

Vice-president, performance & talent management

90 Robert Kerse

Circle Housing

Executive director, resources

91 Siobhan Martin

Mercer

Executive director, human resources

92 Audrey Connolly

Lloyds Banking

Head of FOS operations

Darren Towers

93 Darren Towers

EDF Energy

Head of sustainability & environmental leadership

94 Michael Chissick

Fieldfisher

Managing partner

95 Mark Aldridge

Jacques Vert Group

Group marketing director

96 Isabella Segal

Nyman Libson Paul

Partner

97 David Lyon

Tony Blair Associates

Board managing director

Tim Millward

98 Tim Millward

Extrastaff

Chief executive officer

99 Pierre Landy

Yahoo

Deputy general counsel, EMEA

100 Andrew Nicolls

Hudson Sandler

Vice-chairman

This list was compiled by OUTstanding

——————————————-

OUTstanding’s second annual list of Top LGBT executives has doubled in length, but our methodology for ranking them remains largely unchanged, writes Suki Sandhu, OUTstanding’s founder.

We asked what nominees had done inside and outside the workplace to make it more welcoming to LGBT individuals and looked for information about the candidate’s influence within the business as well as recent significant achievements.

We favoured people who were active in inclusion as well as movers and shakers.

Last year, we had no out LGBT chief executives of FTSE 100 companies. But this year that changed, as Christopher Bailey reached the helm at Burberry, making him the perfect fit for the top place.

However, we still have a way to go. It is disappointing to see women filling only 24 per cent of the list and Black, Minority Ethnic nominees wildly under-represented. We have only three transgender representatives on the list, all of whom transitioned from male to female. We do not have anyone we are aware of who publicly identifies as bisexual. Much work is still to be done.

But LGBT people are not the only ones with a responsibility for making workplaces inclusive. This is why we have introduced the ally leaders list. Allies are those who, while not LGBT, have been active in ensuring their organisations are welcoming places for LGBT staff. We assessed their nominations on the same criteria we used for our LGBT list.

Richard Branson is a deserving number one for this: he has been supporting the gay community for very many years.

There are also four serious omissions from the lists: Lord Browne, partner at Riverstone Holdings; Dawn Airey, senior vice-president at Yahoo; Harriet Green, chief executive of Thomas Cook; and Ashok Vaswani, head of personal and corporate banking at Barclays. As our advisory panel, they are reluctantly omitted.

This year’s lists represent a move towards a world where talent can rise to the top, unimpeded by discrimination.

Harnessing the abilities of all executives is powerful for our companies, our economy, our society and for the individuals involved.

This story was updated on October 9