UK Sport has today announced the appointment of Deborah Kester as its new Director – People.
Kester arrives at UK Sport with a wealth of knowledge and experience, having spent 17 years at financial services organisation Man Group, heading their global HR function from 2013 as well as recently working at the pioneering inclusion programme, 10,000 Black Interns.
She joins the Executive Team in a newly created Director – People role to help UK Sport ensure everyone within the high-performance community benefits from the best possible development and support.
Sally Munday, CEO at UK Sport, said: “I am delighted to welcome Deborah as our new Director – People at UK Sport. She joins with an impressive background in a key area for our high-performance community. Through a competitive interview process, Deborah demonstrated the parallels of developing brilliant people in the fast paced and demanding financial services sector and our own high-performance community.
“We have created this role to recognise the importance of people in our new strategy, which is to create the greatest decade of extraordinary sporting moments; reaching, inspiring and uniting the nation. Deborah brings over 20 years’ experience in HR and People Development and her strong interest and experience in equality, diversity and inclusion aligns with what is at the very heart of our new mission.”
Kester, who will start in her role next month, said: “I am thrilled to be joining UK Sport in the newly created Director – People role. Sport has played a huge part in my life for as long as I can remember, and I am so excited to take on a position that allows me to combine my passion and expertise for people development and HR with my genuine love for sport.
“I am particularly looking forward to helping UK Sport build on an already well-established elite performance culture. Following such a successful summer, and with a home Commonwealth Games less than a year away, I couldn’t have chosen a more exciting time to join.”