Women Who Inspire: Alison Davis!

We are incredibly fortunate to have such a close-knit community of women who are always to eager to inspire one another, whether it be through sharing their love of handbags, or bringing care and joy to one another when times get tough. Now that we have 4000 likeminded ladies from all over the world, we thought it was time to get some of these inspirational women on the blog, to empower us all with their amazing stories. 

The brilliant Alison Davis is a CIO in the pharmaceutials industry, as well as a valued member of our Bags of Joy club. We were lucky enough to have her come on the blog and share all about her amazing life and career. With great advice from letting your hair down with a spotify sing-a-long, to a reminder to always carry your lipstick into the boardroom, Alison has covered everything you need to inspire and boost your confidence. 

I’m currently the Chief Information Officer (basically the head of IT) for GE Healthcare’s Pharmaceutical Diagnostics (PDx) business.  I run a team of about 90 people across the UK, Poland and India. I don’t really have a typical day as such. I spend a lot of time in meetings since a large part of my role is to enable other people to work effectively.  As a great manager (and mentor) of mine once put it, “my job is to hire good people and make the political nonsense go away so that they can work”.  I agree!

The one consistent thing in my day is a morning meeting to make sure that the whole team are aware of any major things that we are working on or any urgent issues. I also sit on the executive team for the PDx business. As I report to the CEO and I am part of the wider GE Healthcare IT team, I meet with my IT counterparts from across the Healthcare business regularly.

My job also involves quite a bit of travel. My team are spread over 3 countries and I try to get to Poland and India regularly.  We have manufacturing sites in a number of countries, and I am trying to get round them all gradually. I try to get to the US, where most of the Healthcare IT folks are based, 3 or 4 times a year. 

2. How did you come to work in IT? Have you always worked in the industry?

I actually started life as a research chemist working for Glaxo. My degree is in chemistry, but I had done some IT as part of it, and deliberately chose to go to work for a big corporate so I’d have the option to move around.  I was the go-to person in the lab when the printer broke or technology failed, so when Glaxo set up their first IT Helpdesk, it seemed like a good fit for me.  I like working with people. My grandparents were teachers and my Dad was a University lecturer, so I like the people side of IT as much as the technical. This was in the days just before PCs came in, so everything was done on green screen terminals!  My career developed from there, through a technical route including data communications, which was quite a male dominated area, just taking on bigger and bigger roles.

I’ve deliberately stayed around scientific organisations, mostly pharmaceutical companies, but I was also the first CIO for the Francis Crick Institute in London, when that was being built (in case folks don’t know it, it’s the biggest single biomedical research institute in Europe and was opened in 2016) and just before I joined PDx this year, I was the CIO for the Natural History Museum, or as my daughter put it when I got the job “Mum, you’re the CIO for the dinosaurs!”.  So, I have had the best of both worlds, working in IT but still enabling science.

3. We know IT is an industry with a high disproportion of men to women. Can it be difficult for women to break into the industry? What is your number 1 tip for other women looking to get into IT?

I actually don’t think that it’s difficult for women to get into IT.  I feel that I have had plenty of opportunities in my career and being a woman has not been a barrier.  For example, I spent 5 years working in France as the European CIO for Bristol-Myers Squibb. I was contacted about that job when I was on maternity leave with my son, Kieran. However, I do think that women are put off going into IT.  I was once in a scientific computing meeting where the women in the room were outnumbered by men called Dave – we counted! There was a recent article in the Times about why there are no women heading IT companies that absolutely did not help in that regard!

I think that it helps that I don’t care if I’m the only woman in the room. I once said to my late husband that sometimes when you’re a blonde woman in a technical environment, the men can look at you like you’re a talking dog. On the other hand, when they realise that you’re a talking dog who knows what they are talking about, you stand out.  If I think about the other senior women that I know in IT, none of us are afraid to stand out from the crowd!

I think is important is that we communicate how many different roles there are in IT.  I’m a school governor outside work and I think that it is so important that we reach girls at an early age.  Not enough girls go into IT (or other STEM subjects) and if women are going to reach the top positions, we need to feed the pipeline.  The other thing that I think should attract people to IT is that you can do it in any industry, so you can find an industry that you feel passionate about and work within IT in it.  In my case, it has been life sciences, but it could just as easily have been handbags!!

But I don’t think that women necessarily want the same things as men – the Times article that I mentioned, featured for its main picture Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates.  I don’t want to be like any of them. I really have no interest in having a load of money to waste on launching rockets!  But IT has so many different roles, that there is really something for everyone!  I personally like people focussed roles, if I’d ever been shut in an office writing code, I’d have gone crazy!! 

If anyone does want to get into IT, please give me a shout – I can’t give everyone jobs, but I’m always happy to give advice!  I’m 59 now, so I’m getting late on in my career and one of the things I’m really keen to do is to give back and foster the next generations of women in IT.

4. With a stressful work life, what are some of your favourite ways to switch off and unwind?

I love rock music, especially live music. Whether it is going to big gigs, or hearing a band in a local pub.  I also play a bit of guitar and sing and have occasionally done open mic nights.  I’m never going to be a rock star, sadly – I’d give up the day job in a heartbeat! – but I think singing is just a great release and everyone should do it at home…  Dancing round the kitchen belting out a song at the top of my voice with Spotify is a real stress reliever!!

I also watch rugby – I’m a big Saracens fan.  That’s also how I met my current partner, Russ (my husband passed away from cancer in 2016).  I’m not sure that rugby is always a way to unwind, it’s great when your team are doing well! But it is a great way to make friends and travel.  We often go to the European away matches too, we were in France earlier this year for a match against Brive and will be in Lyon in December with a gang of friends from the Saracens Supporters’ Association, of which I’m currently Chair.

5. Not only do you have an amazing career, you are also a mother. Juggling work life along with family can be an extremely difficult task. Do you have any advice for other mums struggling to balance their home and work lives?

      Having a supportive partner is top of the list!!  My late husband was great – he was 20 years older than me and ran his own company, but was incredibly supportive of my career.  Although he liked to work long hours for the company, he would always flex his hours to accomodate my career. It worked both ways – my corporate salary paid the bills, so he had the freedom to take some risks with the company. Russ is a heating engineer and runs his own company too, so there’s clearly a theme.

      I think that the most important thing is to take it easy on yourself.  As a working Mum, I’ve often felt like I’m short changing either work or home.  I have had to be realistic about what matters – there is a great book called “First Things First” by Stephen R. Covey which was recommended to me by a coach and it was a real help.  Put simply, its message is that you can’t do everything, so you have to ruthlessly prioritise that you are doing the right things. I would add that you also have to be prepared to apologise for the things you haven’t done and acknowledge that they weren’t top of your list – and that is fine, because what you were doing was more important. This was particularly relevant when my husband had terminal cancer, while my kids were 15 and 18, so my daughter was doing exams and I was also right in the middle of moving scientists into the Crick laboratories. We were able to keep my husband at home until he passed away and have a last family holiday, thankfully my work team were wonderfully supportive, so everything got done.

      I’ve always considered my family in my work decisions and been lucky to have jobs that benefit the family, not just my career. For example, when we lived in Paris, we put my daughter, then aged 4 into the local French nursery. She now has a degree in International Business and French. My current role is based 2 miles from my home and 1 mile from my parents’. I was approached about it the day after my Mum was diagnosed with cancer and it’s been great to be local and able to support my parents.

      The final thing I would say is that it helps if you share interests with your kids.  Mine are now 21 (I’m just recovering from the party!) and 24.  I brainwashed them (not really) from an early age with rock music and we’ve always gone to rugby matches as a family – although my son is at Uni in Leicester and is now a season ticket holder at Tigers… I remind him that his main allegiance is to Sarries!  I remember another Mum once saying to me “it’s lovely how you get involved with your kids’ interests” to which my response was “no, it’s great because they’re now old enough to join in with mine!”

6. Knowing we look good often helps us feel good about ourselves. Many women feel empowered when they style themselves well. Do you think your personal style has an impact on your confidence in the workplace? How do your SH bags help you in your work life?

I think that this is really important. My previously mentioned mentor, a man, gave me the best piece of advice ever.  He was the VP of Finance when I got my first European CIO role and I was about to go to my first leadership meeting.  He gave me four pieces of advice, the last of which was “wear lipstick”.  When I looked confused, he said “this isn’t politically correct, but… you don’t usually wear lipstick and I’ve noticed that when you do, people sit up and take notice”.  He was very wise and I have wondered whether this was actually more about giving me courage than really reflecting the view of others, because ever since then, lipstick has been my armour…if I’m going into a tough discussion and I’ve got my lippy on, I’m ready…  It was the greatest gift. 

But the other big thing is my handbags!  I have always had a thing about handbags as a way of expressing my personality, especially in a corporate environment – not that I’ve ever really conformed to any sort of corporate uniform. I have worked for GE before and when I started back with the company in March, one of the executive assistants said that when she heard I was coming back, she really looked forward to seeing my handbags again!  Being a bit of an IT nerd as well as doing a lot of business travel, I love handbags that look good and are functional. 

7. We all have people we look up to, who inspires you? (Either in personal life or public figures)

There are loads of people that I look up to – I am part of a WhatsApp group of other senior women in IT and I am always really inspired to hear what they are achieving.  Although I may be coming towards the end of my career, I always want to feel that there are new things to learn!

My Dad was a Biochemistry lecturer before he retired and his father taught Maths.  They were the people who inspired me to get into science.  My Dad is quite challenging, so it was slightly weird that he was really impressed when I got my job at the Francis Crick Institute.  As I said at the time, I’m a daughter who admits she wants to impress her father, so it’s a real luxury to have done so. 😊  

8. Do you have a style you like to stick to, or are you always changing your look? Do you have any style inspirations?

I’m a certain shape with inherited wide hips (thanks Mum!) and short legs with large calves (thanks Dad!), so I’ve always had to understand what suits me and I think that I have my own style that I tend to stick to, rather than going with fashion. 

I really like bright colours – I’m very much any “any colour but black”!  Particularly for handbags – so many computer bags are black and boring!

I would love to feel that I look like Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac – I don’t, but if I was aspiring to any particular style, it would be hers…  I’d like to sing like her too!

9. What is your go-to work bag?

I do like change, so I don’t tend to stick to one bag – although that’s one of the great things about the Sarah Haran bags, that I can change the accessories and give myself a new look!

At the moment, I’m using an Aubergine Fern as my work bag for my laptop, charger and headphones and either an Ivy for essentials, or my Berry Hyacinth with an Ivy.  I have literally just bought a Berry Jessica, so I expect I’ll be co-ordinating Jessica and Hyacinth, especially for travel!  I love the fact that with the two Ivys on Hyacinth and Jessica, I can get away with 4 cabin bags!

10. There are things that we carry with us at all times. Do you have any daily essentials that you always need in your handbag?

      I can be quite minimal but the biggest things that take up space in my bag are my mobile phones – I have one for work as well as a personal one.  As I’m an IT nerd, I love my gadgets and I like the freedom to buy the latest mobile phone, rather than have whatever we give out at work (and being in charge, I have to be good about following my own policy!).  I’m currently using the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 – as I said about SH bags, I really admire things that are functional, so having a phone that doubles as a tablet is great!

      Apart from the two phones, I have a small purse for credit cards and a little bit of cash, a Mont Blanc Ferrari pen (the nearest I can get to the car… 😊), a glasses cleaning cloth, hand sanitiser and a lipstick (in case I have an important meeting!).  I can just about get all that in an Ivy.

11. What is one SH bag or accessory you just can’t live without?

I love tactile things, so my fluffies are absolute essential accessories!!  I particularly like the new faux fluff capsules – I have black, navy and red!!  The flamingo pink fluffy is another favourite.  I am very happy to combine any of them with the fur deco strips too – you can never have too much fluff!!

12. Is there anything else you would like to share with our lovely ladies?

      I haven’t talked about how I discovered Sarah Haran bags.  I was a bit of a ‘lurker’ on the website for a while until, earlier this year, I finally took the plunge and bought my first one, which rapidly led to quite a few more!  I joined the Bags of Joy FB group at the same time and it’s wonderful to see how the ladies in the group support each other and to get ideas about how to style the bags – although it does tend to encourage me to spend more!!