Dame Linda Penelope Dobbs, DBE is a retired High Court judge in England and Wales, who served from 2004 to 2013. Dobbs was the first non-white person to be appointed to the senior judiciary of England and Wales.
Sir Damon Marcus Buffini is a British businessman, deputy chair of the BBC Board and chair of the BBC Commercial Board. He was formerly head of the private equity company Permira and governor of the Wellcome Trust.
Shirley Joy Thompson is an English composer, conductor, and violinist of Jamaican descent. Her output as a composer encompasses symphonies, ballets, operas, concertos, and other works for ensembles, as well as music for TV, film, and theatre. Her New Nation Rising, A 21st Century Symphony was composed in 2002 and debuted in 2004. Also an academic, she is currently Professor of Music at the University of Westminster. In the 2019 New Year Honours she was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to Music.
Sonita Alleyne, is the Barbados-born British co-founder and former CEO of Somethin’ Else, a cross-platform media production company. Alleyne is a member of the BBC Trust, the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation, and in 2019 was elected Master of Jesus College, Cambridge, becoming the first woman to hold the post since the founding of the college in 1496, as well as the first black leader of an Oxbridge college.
Chinyere Adah "Chi-Chi" Nwanoku is a British double bassist and professor of Historical Double Bass Studies at the Royal Academy of Music. Nwanoku was a founder member and principal bassist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, a position she held for 30 years.
Dame Sharon Michele White, Lady Chote, is a British businesswoman who served as the sixth Chairman of the John Lewis Partnership, having previously held a variety of roles in the Civil Service.
Samantha Tross is a British consultant surgeon. In 2005 Tross became the first black female orthopaedic surgeon in Britain and has been regularly recognized as one of Britains most influential Black Britons in the annual Powerlist.
Heather Patricia Melville is a British banker, Senior Managing Director of Teneo and Chancellor of the University of York.
Laura Maria Serrant, FRCN is a British nurse and academic. She is currently Regional Head of Nursing for North East and Yorkshire at Health Education England and Professor of at Manchester Metropolitan University where she was previously Head of Department.
Margaret Henrietta Augusta Casely-Hayford CBE is a British lawyer, businesswoman and public figure who is active in the voluntary sector. She is at the forefront of working to create diversity on boards and is joint-manager of a rap artist and digital media entrepreneur. Casely-Hayford is a candidate in the 2024 University of Oxford Chancellor election, described by The Times as an outside bet for the role.
Vanessa Kingori is a multi-award-winning businesswoman with over 20 years of experience in the media and creative industries. She now serves as Google's Managing Director of Technology, Media, and Telecoms, bringing a fresh perspective to the company's business and cultural shifts for the AI era.
Professor Dame Donna Kinnair DBE is a British nurse and former Chief Executive and General Secretary of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN). She has specialised in child protection, providing leadership in major hospital trusts in London, teaching, and advising on legal and governmental committees.
Ric Lewis is a British businessman. He is a founding partner of Tristan Capital Partners, a British property investment firm, and its predecessor, Curzon Global Partners (1998–2008). He is also the founder and chairman of a registered charity, The Black Heart Foundation. He ranked first in the Powerlist 2019, an annual list of the UK's most influential people with African or Afro-Caribbean heritage.
The 2019 Powerlist rankings were released in October 2018 and saw Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. included in the list for the first time, and named Ric Lewis as the most influential individual
The 13th annual Powerlist was judged by a panel chaired by Dame Linda Dobbs and published in October 2019; sponsored by J.P. Morgan & Co., pwc, linklaters and The Executive Leadership Council.
Michelle Ogundehin is a British magazine editor, creative consultant, TV presenter, and author known for writing and presenting on interior design.
Jacky Wright is a Senior Partner and Chief Technology and Platform Officer of McKinsey & Company.
Jacqueline "Jacqui" McKenzie is a British human rights lawyer specialising in migration, asylum and refugee law. Her legal career encompasses practice in the areas of civil liberties, crime and immigration with solicitors Birnberg Peirce and Partners, and since 2010 running her own immigration consultancy, McKenzie Beute and Pope (MBP), having previously spent more than a decade in senior local government roles with responsibility for equalities, community development, communications and urban development. She joined human rights law firm Leigh Day as a partner in 2021. She is the founder of the Organisation of Migration Advice and Research, which works pro bono with refugees and women who have been trafficked to the UK. McKenzie has won recognition for her work seeking justice for victims of the Windrush scandal that initially gained notoriety in 2018. She was named one of the top 10 most influential black Britons in the Powerlist 2022.
The 14th annual Powerlist, which names the 100 most influential people of African or African Caribbean heritage in the United Kingdom, was judged by an independent panel and published in November 2020, sponsored by JP Morgan & Co, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Linklaters, Refinitiv, Herman Miller, Facebook and The Executive Leadership Council. The 2021 Powerlist came in a year in which public debate on racial injustice had increased, with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and global protests against police brutality. Therefore, chief executive Michael Eboda decided that the 14th Powerlist would honour those who have used their voice to advocate against racial injustice. Furthermore, the rankings highlighted the work of healthcare professionals during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which also resulted in the awards being held virtually on 17 November 2020, hosted by Kwame Kwei-Armah.
Anne Mensah is a British broadcasting executive, and vice-president of content at Netflix.
