Dr Jill Shepherd

I specialise in leadership, which to a large extent is a wasted word as it means so much that it ends up meaning very little. As we specialise in digital at QA, we talk of ‘leadership in the digital age’ or digital leadership. Whatever sector and company you work in, at whatever level of digital maturity, to future-proof your leadership CV/resume or talent you need to embrace being a digital team player.

If you are a deep-tech specialist, refining how you communicate with those who are not specialists will help your career. If you are already a leader, understanding digital technology and exhibiting a set of behaviours that suit digital transformation, and sharing perspectives such as agile or customer mindsets with tech specialists, will add value. As an L&D manager or capability manager, you need to ensure your leaders are leaders in the digital age. 

You cannot afford to reskill staff to become more technical if they are not so good at making the tech come alive.

To develop and deliver learning that makes leadership in a digital world add value, I pull on my background in digital start-ups, corporates and management consulting, my PhD in Strategy Innovation, and my experience as an academic in triple-accredited business schools in the UK and Canada.

The paradox of making learning easier – and yet not hiding from how tricky it can be to learn to perform in the digital age, fascinates me. I work to make practising and applying new ways of working add value to you as an employee and as an employer have a higher ROI.

Reading or being told by consultants what to do in a digital world helps, of course. Learning involves far more. It involves practising conversations with peers with technology perspectives, training yourself to be curiously confident about the digital world, and aligning yourself to the digital maturity of your organisation and sector to push it relentlessly forward.

Read my academic profile here.