Black History Month

Legal Women celebrated Black History Month in October by featuring some of the many game-changing women of colour in Society. The stories were shared across our social media platforms and hopefully other women will be inspired on their own personal journey to success. We include a few examples below but head over to our social media pages to see more of these trailblazers.

Curated by Charity Mafuba; design by Emma Webb.

Sharon Blackman OBE

EMEA Head of FX & LM Rates Legal Managing Director and General Counsel, Citi

An Employed Barrister (England & Wales), NY Attorney and recently named in The Lawyer Hot 100 of 2023 and as GC of the Year, Legal Business Awards 2022, Sharon heads the FX and local markets legal team for Europe Middle East & Africa. She is Chair of the Bank of England’s FXJSC legal sub-committee and member of the global steering committee for Citi’s Black Heritage network . Sharon is a founding member of the In House Pro Bono Group, a trustee and playing member of the Croydon Symphony Orchestra, a member of Brunel University Council, a Corporate Advisory Board member for Urban Synergy and the Patchwork Foundation and BACFI representative on the Bar Council’s Race Working Group.

In 2021 Sharon was listed in Cranfield’s Women to Watch 2021, became a Bencher of Lincoln’s Inn and was recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to the financial sector. ■

Charlotte Pope-Williams

Charlotte is an award winning commercial/chancery barrister who specializes in financial services disputes. She has experience of the full gamut of practice having worked in the public sector as an employed barrister at the Bank of England, in the private sector in multinational law firm, and now in a leading set of chambers, 3 Hare Court.

Charlotte is exceptionally proud of her Vincentian heritage which is part of the reason why she enjoys and feels privileged to undertake Privy Council work originating from the Caribbean. She dedicates a substantial amount of time to mentoring, teaching advocacy and ethics on a voluntary basis and pro bono work e.g., she is currently working on a crypto fraud case on a pro bono basis. Charlotte sits on the Court (effectively the board) of the University of Aberdeen, is a member of the Financial Services Lawyers Association EDI Committee and is a self-employed member of the Bar Council’s Employed Barristers Committee. In her spare time Charlotte loves the arts, especially the theatre e.g., productions by the Talawa theatre company, anything carnival related and reading.FI representative on the Bar Council’s Race Working Group. ■