The Chartered Banker Institute Annual Banking Conference

Antoni Ballabriga is Global Head of Responsible Business at BBVA. He reports directly to the Board of Directors. His mission is to ensure that people are systematically placed at the decision-making processes.

Co-chair of the Global Steering Committee at UNEP FI (United Nations Environmental Program for Financial Institutions) and European banks’ representative.

Chair of the Sustainable Finance Expert Group at EBF (European Banking Federation).

Moreover, he is professor at ESADE Business School. Former President of DIRSE, Spanish Association of CSR Professionals and Former President of SpainSIF, Spanish Forum for Socially Responsible Investment. Antoni holds a Degree in Business Sciences and MBA from ESADE Business School. He has studied at Harvard Business School and is First Mover Fellow at The Aspen Institute.

Bernadette joined NAB Group during lockdown in the UK, and in August 2020 made it to Australia. She is a banker by training and obtained her chartered banking qualification early in her career at Barclays.

She has specialised in Human Resources for the last 20 years. Her portfolio at NAB includes culture, leadership, talent and learning. She was previously at Aviva as Global Talent & Organisational Development Director. She was responsible for setting the talent, leadership and organisation effectiveness strategy for the group, and was a key member of the People Leadership Team.

She joined Aviva from global technology specialist Fujitsu. Prior to that she held a number of business and HR roles at BT, Virgin Money, Northern Rock and Barclays. Operating at Board and Group Executive level, Bernadette has a track record of developing and leading innovative transformational people strategies across several sectors.

Away from the office Bernadette’s passion is her family. She took a long career break (6 years) to focus on her children and enable her husband to fulfil a dream to set up a school in the African bush. She now spends her time away from work supporting her kids with their passion for theatre and sport.

Sophia Cheng is the Chief Investment Officer of Cathay Financial Holdings and also teaches in the Department of Intl Business of National Taiwan University. Sophia has near 30 years of experience in research and investment with last position acting as Chairman and head of research of Merrill Lynch Taiwan.

Sophia is highly regarded by the government. She is well known for her work in financial sector research and her proactive participation in forming government policies, including promoting banking reform and tax reform. Sophia has been appointed as Government Affairs Consultant of Executive Yuan and Advisory Committee Member of National Development Council since 2012 and 2015, respectively. Sophia also acts as the Fellow of Asia Pacific Industrial Analysis Association (APIAA) and Board of Director of the Taiwan M&A and Private Equity Council (MAPECT).

In the recent years, she has also been actively promoting Corporate Sustainability and Responsible Investment in Taiwan. Sophia has been selected as 2019 Asia’s Top Sustainability Superwomen and 2021 Global Top 50 Women in Investment Management. She has been acted as Chair of Asia Investor Group on Climate Change (AIGCC) since November 2018, and also appointed as the member of Taiwan National Sustainable Development Committee.

Sophia holds Master of Science degree in finance-banking from Golden Gate University, San Francisco, California, USA and a bachelor degree in Atmospheric Sciences from National Taiwan University.

Johanna is a Sustainability Expert and the PRB Implementation Support Manager at UNEP FI. In her role, she helps banks implement requirements of the Principles for Responsible Banking (PRB), such as target setting in the identified areas of most significant impact, and meet their commitments as signatories. Prior to joining UNEP FI, she was a CSR manager at a cooperative bank, and has several years of experience in sustainability management in both banking and insurance.

Johanna studied Economic Geography at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich/Germany and Lund University/Sweden, and holds a PhD in Sustainable Finance.

Giles leads the Institute’s thought-leadership on ethical banking, particularly around the area of digital ethics.  He has around 20 years' experience in the arena of professional education and professional standards. He has led a very wide range of education and professionalism projects to significantly diversify the work of the Chartered Banker Institute, developing major strategic programmes to diverse areas of the banking industry around the globe. In particular, he has specialised in developing a wide range of bespoke professionalisation programmes for banks, coupled with highly innovative accreditation services. These projects have reached many tens of thousands of banking professionals.

Giles holds a degree in law, a Masters in education, and has recently finished studying a Masters in applied professional ethics.

Rafe Haneef is the Chief Executive Officer, Group Transaction Banking and Group Chief Sustainability Officer at CIMB.

In his capacity as Group Chief Sustainability Officer, Haneef has the responsibility for driving sustainability, which includes reducing environmental footprints and increasing ESG handprints, across CIMB group’s own operations, financing products and services, and through CSR initiatives in education, economic empowerment, environment, health and community wellbeing.

Previously, as CEO of CIMB Islamic Bank Berhad, Haneef was in charge of the Group’s Islamic banking and finance franchise and was instrumental in the inclusion of CIMB Islamic in the Value-based Intermediation (VBI) Community of Practitioners, working to develop VBI together with Bank Negara Malaysia to contextualise and drive sustainability within Islamic finance institutions in Malaysia.

He played a vital role in CIMB Group being a member of RFI as well as a founding member to the UNEP FI. Haneef received a Master of Laws (LL.M) from Harvard Law School and a Bachelor of Laws (LL.B) from International Islamic University Malaysia.

Oliver is currently Director of Strategy and Ventures and holds responsibility for Group Strategy, Sustainability, Economics, Ventures, and Corporate Development. He was appointed an attendee of Group ExCo in November 2019.

Oliver joined RBS in September 2018 from UK Financial Investments (UKFI) where he was latterly CEO, with responsibility for managing the government’s shareholdings in RBS, Lloyds Banking Group, and UK Asset Resolution.

Before joining UKFI Oliver worked at Bank of America Merrill Lynch for nearly 14 years, where he undertook various roles including head of equity syndicate for Europe and head of UK equity capital markets origination.

Oliver holds a BA, Jurisprudence from the University of Oxford

Dr. Huang received his PhD in Urban and Regional Planning from National Taipei University in 2001. He led the BOT Research Center at the Taiwan Economic Research Institute (TIER) from 2003 to 2008, serving as project leader for several projects. He designed a nationwide procurement mechanism for private participation in wastewater treatment systems, created cash flow management methods for local governments, and also designed a development approach for regional target industries.

Later, he was appointed Director of the Finance Department of the Yilan County Government, located in the Northeast of Taiwan. Yilan faced a serious deficit at the time, in 2011. Dr. Huang reversed the decay in public finances and achieved the first surplus in two decades.   

Dr. Huang joined the Taiwan Academy of Banking and Finance (TABF) as Vice President in 2016, and subsequently became President in 2017, not only creating new revenue sources, but also shaping new thinking at the forty-year old institution.  He introduced courses on FinTech, Leadership, and Risk Management, enlarged the scope of online training, and improved the certification process. His ambition is to internationalize the organization in line with the growing needs of the Taiwanese financial services sector.

Joanne Murphy is the Institute's Chief Operating Officer delivering the Institute’s business wide digital transformation strategy and leading the strategic and annual business planning process.  Joanne’s remit includes driving our professional inclusion agenda and she has executive responsibility across a variety of business function including; Membership, Business Support, Finance, People, Innovation and Marketing.

In November 2014, following a period of significant growth at the Institute, Joanne became our first Operations Director and also the first female member of the leadership team, she led the organisational restructure which established the Operations function. With colleagues, Joanne ensures the needs of our members, clients and educational partners are identified and supported effectively by the Institute's resources.

Joanne joined the Institute to support the establishment of the Chartered Banker Professional Standards Board (CB:PSB). Joanne led the professional standards implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and devised the supporting operational infrastructure. Joanne oversaw the implementation of the CB:PSB Foundation Standard for Professional Bankers and its subsequent adoption by over 185,000 bankers globally.

Joanne has over 25 years' experience in financial services, working in a variety of roles in business and retail banking with RBS from 2002, and prior to that with GE Capital. Joanne’s career began working in marketing and research at Scottish Television in London. Joanne is a qualified learning professional with expertise in six sigma methodology, in consulting and project capacity her activities include outsourcing, international relocation and process improvement.

Joanne, is a member of both the Institute and of the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development and holds an MBA in Banking and Finance. 

Puleng is the Interim Banking Team Lead at UNEP FI. She was involved in developing the Principles for Responsible Banking, and currently leads the team that works closely with Signatory Banks and various stakeholders to support and drive implementation of the Principles for Responsible Banking, focusing on impact and driving alignment of bank portfolios with sustainable development objectives.    

She started her career as a commercial law attorney. She left practice to work in the legal departments of Investec and then Standard Bank. She spent four years in Standard Bank's corporate and investment banking department, working on property development transactions. Thereafter, she moved to Standard Bank's Regulatory Advocacy team, where she worked with a broad range of stakeholders on policy issues, engaging with policy makers and regulators on emerging policies and legislation, including financial technology.

Puleng has obtained a Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Laws, and Masters degree in Public Policy from Wits University. She is passionate about sustainable development, and working towards achieving the objectives of the SDGs in order to realise an equitable and sustainable future for all.

Jennifer develops strategic qualification and accreditation solutions, both in the UK and overseas, to support professional development in banks and financial services organisations.

Having worked in banking for over 20 years prior to joining us in 2009, Jennifer takes a very hands-on and practical approach to her role, viewing situations from a customer, employee and employer perspective, to deliver the best possible outcomes for all. Responsible for the recent development of tailored routes to qualifications across a variety banks, often involving the accreditation of internal bank learning programmes, increasing professionalism in banking is core to all her activities.

Having been a Chartered Banker for many years, and more recently awarded a Fellowship, she is proud to have been one of the very first to attain the Chartered Banker MBA qualification.

Outside of work, Jennifer enjoys spending as much time as possible with her family and dogs.

Simon leads the Institute’s thought leadership on green and sustainable banking.  He has been Chief Executive of the Institute since 2007, and for more than a decade has led our work on enhancing and sustaining customer-focused, ethical professionalism and responsible banking.  In 2011, Simon led the establishment of the Chartered Banker Professional Standards Board (CB:PSB).

Simon led the development of the world’s first benchmark qualification for green finance, the Green Finance Certificate, launched in 2018, and is editor of Principles and Practice of Green Finance that underpins the course programme.  He has contributed two new chapters to the 2019 update, on Fintech in Green Finance and the Role of the Green Finance Professional.  In 2018, Simon represented the Institute at the UN Climate Change Summit (COP24) in Katowice, Poland.

Mikael Sorensen was appointed CEO of Handelsbanken UK in September 2016.

Handelsbanken is a local relationship bank built on sustainable values. It offers individual and corporate banking with high levels of customer service via its UK-wide network of empowered local branches. Handelsbanken is a values-led organisation, believing in financial prudence, long-termism and in people’s will and ability to good things well. Today Handelsbanken is recognised as one of the strongest banks in the world.

Collectively, Mikael has over 34 years’ experience from the banking industry, and has spent the last 26 years’ at Handelsbanken.

Before joining the UK, Mikael worked in numerous roles and regions across the Handelsbanken Group, including Branch Manager and Regional Area Manager in Denmark, General Manager in Poland, and as CEO in the Netherlands from 2007 to 2016. Mikael has been a member of Handelsbanken’s Group Senior Management since 2013.

Mikael sits on the Council of the Swedish Chamber of Commerce, a not for profit organisation aimed at supporting entrepreneurs and businesses within the Swedish-British business community.

Mikael finished a Higher Financial Education within corporate banking, credit analysis and management, and completed Copenhagen University Law School.