Jasmine Whitbread

Jasmine Mary Whitbread (born 1 September 1963) is a British businesswoman, and the chair of Travis Perkins since 2021.^[1]

From 2016 to 2021,^[2] she was the chief executive of London First, an independent non-profit organisation whose mission is to make London the best city in the world to do business.^[3] She was CEO of Save the Children from 2005 until 2015; firstly leading Save the Children UK and in 2010, creating Save the Children International.

Whitbread was born in London on 1 September 1963.^[4] Her mother, Ursula Whitbread, is Swiss and her father, Gerald Whitbread, is English.^[4][5] She was educated at Kneller Girls' School, then an all-girls comprehensive school in Twickenham, London.^[6] In 1986, she graduated from the University of Bristol with a bachelor's degree in English.^[4][5]

She later returned to university study. In 1998, she completed the executive program at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University.^[7]

Whitbread began her career in marketing. From 1986 to 1988, she was a marketing manager at Rio Tinto Computer Services. She then moved to the United States and was director of global marketing at Cortex Corporation.^[4][8] From 1990 to 1992, she was in Uganda with the Voluntary Service Overseas as a management trainer at the National Union of Disabled Persons of Uganda.^[4][9] From 1994 to 1999, she was a managing director of Thomson Financial (now Thomson Reuters).^[4]

She then joined Oxfam GB, where she was regional director for West Africa from 1999 to 2002, then international director from 2002 to 2005.^[4] In 2005, she joined Save the Children UK as chief executive officer (CEO); she was the first woman to head the charity.^[4] After five years, she was appointed CEO of Save the Children International.^[4] She stepped down from the role on 31 December 2015.^[10] In December 2016, she became the chief executive of London First.^{[11][citation needed]}

On 19 January 2011, Whitbread was appointed to the board of BT as a non-executive director, where she is a member of the Committee for Sustainable and Responsible Business and the Audit and Risk Committee.^[12] On 1 April 2015, she was appointed an independent non-executive director of Standard Chartered where she chairs the Brand, Values and Conduct Committee.^[13] She has served on the United Nations Commission on Life-Saving Commodities, which was jointly chaired by Goodluck Jonathan and Jens Stoltenberg, and issued recommendations to increase access to and use of 13 essential commodities for women’s and children’s health.^[14]

In August 2019 she was appointed a non-executive director at WPP plc effective from 1 September 2019 serving as a member of the Compensation Committee.^[15]

Whitbread regularly blogged for the Financial Times during the annual World Economics Forum in Davos.^[16] In 2013, she featured in the CNN Leading Women series.^[17] Acting as an ambassador for women in leadership, Whitbread spoke on the Evening Standard's panel debate with Cherie Booth QC, in 2012.^[18]

In 1994, Whitbread married Howard Exton-Smith.^[4] Together, they have two children.^[4][5]

Whitbread holds British/Swiss dual nationality.^[19]

In 2013, Whitbread was named one of the UK’s 100 most powerful women by BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour.^[6][20] In January 2014, she was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Bristol.^[5]