A serendipitous interaction during a WB Directors session several years ago steered Javid Hamid towards a board career trajectory himself. Javid is a partner at KPMG and a staunch supporter of social mobility and equality, so had been elected to sponsor one of KPMG’s internal women’s leadership programmes. It was there he heard our message about integrating a non-executive career into his working life. Our WB Directors workshops reflect our Corporate Partners’ in-house priorities – whilst KPMG had chosen to focus on their women’s leadership, we regularly work with mixed-gender groups and all our content is highly relevant to all genders.

Though he was aware of community boards, he thought it was too early, given his full-on career as a leader of a significant business unit. However, our workshop conversations about the societal impact of joining a board piqued his interest to think again.

Javid’s journey with WB Directors stemmed from this curiosity and was further facilitated through KPMG’s corporate partnership and access to the WB Directors’ Women on Boards network. Javid realised it was all about how to ‘sell’ his board value add, so he registered for our signature ‘Get on Board’ course. Javid not only found our insights into governance and his potential board value add fascinating, but he was particularly empowered by the framework we gave him to identify his community passion, thereby sculpting his pathway into board involvement.

Javid aligned with his past theatre and acting interests and soon focused on Theatre boards propelled and supported by our network into action.

How we supported Javid

We supported Javid by assisting at key points, including helping him write a Board CV, advising him on covering letters and good governance as part of our Get on Board course, and via our ‘Applying for your First Role’ online resources, taking his pre-interview support calls, and offering guidance when a role wasn’t quite the right fit.

Javid had his sights set high for his first board position, applying for one of the UK’s most prestigious museums. We provided him with pre-interview support, but unfortunately, he was unsuccessful as a first-time non-executive in a highly competitive field.

His resilience amidst initial setbacks eventually landed him a position on the board of Tara Arts Group. The group, which owns the renowned Tara Theatre, not only provided Javid a platform to utilise his skills in data and change consultancy, but also resonated with his cultural roots and interests in acting.

Tara Theatre, recognised as a Theatre of Sanctuary, commits itself to bridging socio-cultural and geo-political gaps through the arts. Javid, enthused by the theatre’s commitment to societal change, proactive charity work, and active and compassionate stance towards sanctuary seekers, found a harmonious intersection where his corporate acumen could catalyse change within a socially impactful organisation.

Javid’s trustee role on the board of Tara Theatre burgeoned into a fruitful relationship where community and creative expression seamlessly intertwined with Javid’s knowledge of oversight and good governance. He had found the perfect role for him and the perfect ‘fit’ for his interests, passion and board value add.

Since its inception, Tara Theatre has occupied the political and activist space. Javid looks forward to continuing to promote social change and inclusion at KPMG and via Tara Theatre, telling stories from the unique lens of South Asian experiences and heritage. As Tara Theatre says on its website, ‘In today’s world, with the global pandemic, the climate emergency and the Black Lives Matter movement, things urgently need to change.’

Javid is proud of his work with Tara Theatre, and we are proud as a network to have supported him and thousands of others to join boards, make a difference and give them a CV differentiator that will most likely help them in their continued careers.

About our partnership with KPMG

Javid Hamid is a partner for KPMG, a Corporate Partner of WB Directors. Like many professional services companies, KPMG is committed to individual professional career development and social mobility through their association with our influential and empowering network. They know and appreciate that leadership matters and does good corporate governance and knowledge of opportunities.

KPMG today, via their connection with us, grant all their employees, irrespective of gender, access to the WB Directors’ board support network.

The primary aim of KPMG’s Corporate Partnership was to stimulate their employees to navigate and own their career trajectories, consider community board positions as a viable leadership development strategy and give a selected career group access to our influential career challenge workshops.

Since working with them, we have delivered a range of engagement sessions, from ‘On Track for Success’ career workshops to discussion sessions on securing community board roles and dynamics. The WB Directors sessions focused on exploring the many facets of developing one’s professional career, engaging the group on crucial career game changers as we looked at tools to improve individual abilities to meeting management, influencing techniques and the role of the board and good governance oversight.

Every Corporate Partnership is different, depending on the organisation’s needs and immediate priorities. WB Directors is currently assisting KPMG’s ‘IT it’s her future’ network to support the career development of ambitious professionals within IT.

Your next steps…

Join with our ‘Starting Out’ package to build your board career, combining membership plus our Get on Board workshop –