SUBSCRIBE for 50% OFF & GET ALL PREVIOUS ISSUES
FOR FREE NOW
@ www.pitchblack.online/subscribe
PROFESSIONAL PROFILE
7
Mahari Hay
Making A Difference to the Lives of Others
What does an average working day look like for you?
1
It’s always key to remember we are superheroes outside of work and are not defined by what we deliver in our jobs. My day usually starts at 6:00am and I’m up and headed to the gym before getting to the office – it sounds cliché but I do feel better when I work out in the morning! I’m in the office for 8am because I like to structure my day (emails and diary check) before meetings kick off around 8:30am/ 9:00am. The mornings are a mixture of focus time, face to face collaboration sessions and of course virtual meetings… nothing beats face to face meetings though especially if you’re a people person like myself. As we move over into the afternoon, I have a great team and I sometimes I walk out for lunch with a few colleagues just to get away from the computer screen. I find taking that time to refuel and have lunch is highly beneficial and gives you that boost for what majority of the times is a busy afternoon. My day runs on again with project work, meetings and focus time and usually finishes about 6pm (school run dependant, of course) There is no place like home – so I always look forward to getting indoors,
I am very big on family and spend as people from a hearts and minds much time with them as possible, plus perspective has been crucial to my own my Mrs (Nikki) is an unbelievable cook career journey. so I reap the benefits of that daily come dinner time and then I close off the day Challenges you have faced with a nice bit of Netflix or watching in your role and getting to football if the season has started.
your position.
4
2
What is the inspiration for Life is full of challenges but how you bounce back and overcome those this career path?
3
What things do you enjoy What advice do you have about your job? for others who want to
challenges is the bigger story. I’ve been in The Financial Sector is a highly the Financial sector for over 18 years and complex and dynamic sector that has the biggest hurdles were, others being always played a huge impact on unable to spot the potential you have, society. and then nurturing that talent in order for you to progress. When I was growing up, it was difficult to have conversations about money I had to take ownership of my own because my family did the best we development and career goals by could to provide for each other. I came actively seeking out the help of my peers from very humble beginnings and and senior leaders that could help guide gaining access to money from financial me. I would set out clear objectives institutions was something we needed ahead of any conversations because not more education on in order to thrive everyone has the time so you want to be not just as a family but as a community. ready for any conversation at any given time. I was very good at being purposeful The lack of knowledge about finance in what I wanted, and at the same time and obtaining access to cash for was able to demonstrate how I would personal and business ventures is what add value to any role or opportunity that drove my passion for wanting to build a presented itself. All these attributes career in Finance. I wanted to be a role combined with a willingness to be kind model for my community in order to and personable with those I worked with provide the key financial information to all played a key role in me obtaining the those that needed it. senior role I am in today.
One thing I love about my job is the exposure it gives me to collaborate follow a similar path? I would say do it – be bold in your with other people. Connecting with
5
Professor Dr Funke Abimbola MBE
Professor Foluke Adebisi
Corporate Lawyer, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Leader, Healthcare Executive, Non Executive Director, Speaker & Podcast Host
Professor of Law, The University of Bristol Law School & Member Board Of Trustees, Black South West Network
Born in Nigeria and from a family of medical professionals, Funke is and currently operating in the UK, having trained as a solicitor.
With a background in legal practice and NGO work, Foluke is the UK's 61st Black Professor whose scholarship focuses on decolonial thought in legal education and its intersection with a history of changing ideas of the 'human.'
This multi award winning professional is a fierce advocate for diversity across UK society and was notably awarded a Point of Light Volunteers award by the Prime Minister in 2016 and an MBE in 2017 for services to diversity in the legal profession and to young people.
She is also the founder and Director of Forever Africa Conference and Events FACE.
prof-foluke-adebisi-2403167 funkeabimbola
Kenny AnnanJonathan Founder, The Mailroom & Trnsmission, Creative Director, Crystal Palace Football Club Having founded sports marketing & management agency, The Mailroom in 2017 as well as and production company/media outlet Trnsmission, Kenny has been appointed as the football clubs first Creative Director with responsibility for brand partnerships and collections. This is not his first rodeo as he has worked with sports personalities before. He is expected to launch their first collection in September.
kenny-annan-jonathan46941687/
Kenny Imafidon Co-Founder, Clearview Research, Author, That Peckham Boy & Social Commentator Kenny currently serves as the Managing Director of ClearView Research, an agency that specialises in research, strategy, and engagement projects focused on diverse and underrepresented communities. Kenny has worked on projects across the world, with global businesses, with international charities and large philanthropic foundations. In 2023 he released his book, That Peckham Boy that chronicles his journey from incarceration to being an inspiration to many.
kennyimafidon
Alford Dalrymple Gardner is one of the few living passengers to have travelled on the Empire Windrush. He is one of 10 whose portrait was commissioned by King Charles, and appears in the BBC's Windrush: Portraits of a Generation special. Now published for the first time, Finding Home is his stirring life story. Alford's story traverses both the uplifting highs and intolerant lows that West Indian migrants of his generation encountered upon travelling to Britain to forge out a life. In the context of a supposedly 'postImperial' Britain where the lives of West Indian migrants hang precariously on the whims of the Home Office, Alford's heartening testimony is a celebration of those who endured hardships so that generations to come could call this place home.
Two days after his eighteenth birthday, Kenny Imafidon was charged with the murder of a seventeen-year-old boy in south-east London. The middle child of a single mother with ambitions for her children, Kenny grew up near an estate in Peckham where deprivation and hopelessness were rife, and gang culture flourished in his community. Kenny faced a minimum of thirty years behind bars - longer than the life he had lived. A candid and unfiltered take on some of the most challenging topics that define our times, That Peckham Boy is a personal manifesto exploring what it means to be young, Black and poor in the city. It is shaped by Kenny's difficult childhood, his transformative time in prison, and the people and conversations that took him from being on trial for murder into the company of some of the most successful people in the world.
Samuel Kasumu was the most senior black advisor in Boris Johnson's government, until he left in April 2021. Throughout his time in Whitehall, Samuel became increasingly aware that he was an outsider - that his own experiences, assumptions and language were so different to many of those he found himself surrounded by in Downing Street. In The Power of The Outsider Samuel considers who outsiders are, why they are not talked about enough and how it can be a source of strength that leads them to become high achievers. He argues that the success of many great people can be explained by their outsider status. Samuel shows how outsiders are more likely to be trailblazers and break barriers, how they have a greater sense of perspective and progress and how our differences can be a force for good.
The Sunday Times bestseller, Making It is an inspirational memoir about beating the odds and turning things around even when it all seems hopeless, by Jay Blades, the beloved star of hit BBC One show The Repair Shop. In his book, Making It, Jay Blades shares the details of his life, from his childhood growing up sheltered and innocent on a council estate in Hackney, to his adolescence when he was introduced to violent racism at secondary school, to being brutalized by police as a teen, to finally becoming the presenter of the hit primetime show The Repair Shop. Jay reflects on strength, weakness and what it means to be a man. An expert at giving a second life to cherished items, Jay’s positivity, pragmatism and kindness shine through these pages and show that with care and love, anything can be mended.
(People Who Lift as They Climb)
by
Richard Adeshiyan
NETWORKING
Add a taste of the tropic to your life with our fou artisan rums...
cs ur
DISCOVER THE TASTE OF THE CARIBBEAN WITH OUR ARTISAN SELECTION OF LUXURY RUMS. FROM THE SEDUCTIVE CHARM OF OUR WHITE COCONUT RUM TO OUR RICHEST, DARKEST SPICED RUM, EXPLORE OUR RANGE OF FANTASTIC FLAVOURS! MARSHALLANDBROWN.CO.UK