---
title: "Chloe Hoggard: Leadership, Influence and Purpose"
description: Chloe Hoggard left school at sixteen with no degree. She talks about capability over credentials, family, and opening doors for other women in leadership.
author: Dame Neslyn Watson-Druée, DBE (Executive Contributor)
date: 2026-10-22T11:17:28.976Z
updated: 2026-10-22T11:17:28.987Z
canonical: https://richwoman.co/article/chloe-hoggard-leadership-influence-purpose
image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/chloe-hoggard-featured.webp
categories: Leadership
content_type: Profile
region: London
publication: Sovereign Magazine
schema_type: Article
about:
  - type: Person
    name: Chloe Hoggard
    description: Chloe Hoggard is a senior technology and public sector leader. She left school at sixteen with no degree and built her career in sales and leadership at Vodafone, Dimension Data, Oracle and Salesforce.
    jobTitle: Senior Vice President and Head of Industry, UK&I Public Sector
---

Chloe Hoggard left school and home at sixteen with a handful of GCSEs and the ambition to build a different future. With no degree to point to, she knew her credibility would have to come from what she delivered, and sales gave her that chance.

Sales meant understanding what a customer needed, earning their trust, competing for the business and turning an opportunity into a result, and technology let her do that at scale. She took on bigger commercial roles at Vodafone, Dimension Data, Oracle and Salesforce, building strategic relationships, leading teams and learning to find her way through large and complex organisations. At Salesforce she received an EMEA Public Sector Sales Leadership Award after, in her words, delivering "176% year-on-year growth in public sector during an election year".

Today Chloe is Senior Vice President and Head of Industry, UK&I Public Sector, at Atos, where she leads a large public sector business, and she has moved into board and governance roles. For her, commercial success and public value have to reinforce one another.

She is also the mother of five sons. Her youngest, Hector, was nonverbal until the age of ten, and advocating for him through his diagnosis, education and support taught her to challenge decisions, question assumptions and keep going when the route was hard. She describes motherhood as the turning point that most shaped how she leads.

Her leadership rests on foundations she set early in her career: understand the market, set a clear direction, build the right team and hold yourself accountable for performance. She wants to be judged by the strength of the business she builds, the results it achieves and the opportunities it creates for others.

![Chloe Hoggard standing in a cream jacket](https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/chloe-hoggard-1.webp)

**You left school at sixteen with no degree and have gone on to become a senior executive, board member and award-winning leader. Looking back, what were the defining moments that shaped your journey and convinced you that success would be determined by capability rather than credentials?**

There wasn’t one moment when I suddenly knew credentials wouldn’t define my future. That conviction grew as I took on responsibility, delivered results and earned the trust of people around me.

I began my career with no higher education or professional qualifications. I had to become resourceful quickly: listen carefully, understand people and find a way forward when the route wasn’t obvious. Those skills became fundamental to my career in sales and leadership.

Taking on increasingly senior roles was a defining part of that journey. Each new responsibility required me to exercise judgement, build strong teams and make decisions in complex circumstances. My confidence grew through experience and through seeing the impact I could make.

Motherhood also profoundly shaped my leadership, particularly advocating for my youngest son, Hector. I learned to challenge assumptions, navigate systems and keep going when the answer was no. Becoming Hector’s voice is how I found mine. It gave me a stronger sense of purpose and helped shape my commitment to public services and the people who depend on them.

Along the way, people opened doors and trusted me with bigger responsibilities. What mattered was what I did with that trust: learning, making difficult decisions and being accountable for the outcome.

Today, leading a sizeable public sector business at Atos, I bring both commercial discipline and a deeply personal understanding of why our work matters.

I value education enormously, and I have never stopped learning. But my journey has taught me that qualifications are one indicator of potential. Capability is demonstrated over time, in your judgement, your results and the strength of the people you develop around you.

**Throughout your career, you have spoken openly about self-doubt. How did you learn to stop over-proving yourself and begin leading with confidence and authenticity?**

For a long time, I thought confidence would come from doing more: being better prepared, working harder and making sure I had every answer. When you haven’t followed a conventional route into leadership, it can be easy to feel you have to keep justifying your place.

What changed was recognising that proving myself and leading effectively were two different things. My responsibility was to set direction, exercise judgement and create the conditions for others to succeed. That meant trusting my experience, trusting my team and being comfortable saying, “I don’t know yet, let’s work it through.”

Advocating for my son, Hector, helped me find that confidence. In those conversations, the outcome mattered far more than how I was perceived. I learned to ask difficult questions, challenge decisions and speak with conviction. Over time, I brought more of that same clarity into my professional life.

I also learned to accept an opportunity without immediately feeling I had to repay someone’s confidence in me through extraordinary effort. They had recognised something I needed to recognise in myself.

Self-doubt still appears, particularly when the stakes are high. But I can listen to it without allowing it to make my decisions. I prepare, seek challenge from people I trust and then take responsibility for moving forward.

For me, authenticity means being clear about my values and consistent in how I lead. I can be warm, care deeply about people and still hold a high bar for performance. I no longer feel I have to edit those parts of myself to be credible.

**Your progression from commercial leadership into board and governance roles is particularly inspiring. How did you navigate the path to the boardroom, and what lessons would you share with women aspiring to follow a similar route?**

My path to the boardroom developed through taking on broader responsibility and learning to look beyond my own business area. Commercial leadership gave me a strong grounding in customers, growth, risk and accountability. Moving into governance meant broadening that perspective to the long-term health of the whole organisation.

I had to learn to contribute differently: ask the questions that expose an assumption, recognise where assurance is needed and support the executive while being willing to challenge. Experience matters, but so does the judgement to know when to listen, when to probe and when to speak.

Relationships were important too. People who had seen me lead encouraged me to consider where my experience could add value. I learned to articulate that contribution clearly and put myself forward, rather than wait to feel completely ready.

My advice to others is to build breadth before you acquire the title. Understand how decisions connect across finance, people, operations and risk. Seek opportunities to contribute beyond your immediate remit, and invest in understanding the responsibilities of governance.

Be deliberate about the board you join. Its purpose, culture and expectations should align with your values, and you should be clear about what you can contribute.

Above all, recognise the value of your own perspective. My route has given me commercial experience, resilience and an understanding of how decisions affect people. I bring all of that into the room, alongside a willingness to keep learning.

**You have built significant credibility across the technology and public sectors. What has been the foundation of your executive presence, and how would you describe the personal brand you are known for today?**

The foundation of my executive presence is credibility: understanding the business, being clear about the decisions we need to make and taking responsibility for the outcome. In technology and public services, you earn trust by connecting ambition with delivery and understanding what is at stake for the people relying on those services.

I prepare thoroughly, listen carefully and aim to bring clarity to complex conversations. I am comfortable asking difficult questions and making decisions, but I also recognise when someone else has the deeper expertise. You don’t need to dominate a room to lead it.

Over time, I have become more confident bringing my whole perspective to the table. My commercial experience and my personal experiences both shape my judgement. They help me connect business performance with purpose, particularly in environments where technology supports national resilience, safeguarding and essential public services.

I would describe my personal brand as a commercially focused, people-first leader with the ambition to think bigger and the discipline to deliver. I care about building strong teams, creating partnerships that achieve more together and developing people who can take on greater responsibility.

I hope I am known for warmth alongside resolve: someone who opens doors, speaks candidly and follows through. Inclusion is part of how I build a stronger business, by ensuring talent is recognised, different perspectives inform decisions and people have the opportunity to contribute.

Ultimately, your reputation is built through what people consistently experience from you. For me, that means clear direction, high expectations and a real commitment to the people and outcomes entrusted to my leadership.

![Chloe Hoggard seated in a sitting room](https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/chloe-hoggard-3.webp)

**Many accomplished women say they are not fully recognised as credible leaders until their fifties. Why do you think that perception persists, and what needs to change to ensure women's expertise is recognised much earlier in their careers?**

Women have for too long been recognised for what they do rather than what they think. Their delivery is valued, but their judgement, ideas and strategic insight have not always been given equal weight. That influences who is seen as capable of running the business and who is trusted to shape its future.

During the course of my career, we have also seen tremendous progress. Better policies and systems around parental leave, flexible working, fair recruitment and progression have helped more women build successful careers and move into leadership. That progress matters, and we should recognise the people who worked hard to secure it.

The next step is ensuring those policies translate into everyday experience. Women need fair access to opportunity, meaningful responsibility and recognition of their expertise at every stage of their careers.

By their fifties, many women have accumulated enough experience, results and resilience that their credibility becomes harder to question. We need to challenge why such an extensive body of evidence was required before they were trusted. Delayed recognition costs organisations talent and years of potential contribution.

Leaders must be clear about how they identify potential and judge performance, and challenge assumptions about who is ready. Sponsorship is essential: someone prepared to advocate for a woman when appointments and opportunities are being discussed, and to back her with meaningful responsibility.

We also need to recognise that authority takes different forms. Warmth, empathy and collaboration sit comfortably alongside commercial discipline, sound judgement and decisive leadership.

I know I have a responsibility to turn that conviction into action: recognising capability early, putting talented women forward and ensuring their voices influence decisions. The progress we have made gives us a strong foundation. Our responsibility now is to make opportunity and recognition consistent.

**As someone who has benefited from coaching, sponsorship and influential relationships, what role have these played in your success, and how can senior leaders do more to open doors for the next generation of female leaders?**

Coaching, sponsorship and influential relationships have all played an important role in my career, but each has contributed something different.

Coaching has helped me examine my assumptions, recognise my strengths and become more deliberate about how I lead. It has given me space to think beyond the immediate demands of the business and ask where I can make the greatest contribution.

Sponsorship has created opportunity. Having someone willing to put my name forward, advocate for my capability and trust me with greater responsibility has been significant. Those decisions gave me the opportunity to demonstrate what I could do.

The relationships I value most have combined encouragement with honest challenge. They have broadened my perspective, strengthened my judgement and helped me recognise possibilities I might otherwise have overlooked. I still had to deliver, but I didn’t have to navigate every step alone.

For senior leaders, opening doors needs to be a deliberate part of the job. We should know who the emerging female leaders are, understand their ambitions and ensure they have access to the assignments that build executive experience: leading a business, owning a budget, managing complexity and contributing to strategic decisions.

We must also advocate for them in the rooms they have not yet entered. Put their names forward for significant roles. Invite their perspectives into discussions about the future of the organisation. Give them visibility with customers, boards and decision-makers, and make sure they receive credit for their thinking as well as their delivery.

I take that responsibility personally. People invested their credibility in me, and I have a responsibility to do the same for others. The measure of that commitment is whether talented women gain the opportunity, authority and support to progress.

**One of the hallmarks of great leadership is developing others. How do you identify talent, particularly in people from unconventional backgrounds, and what is your approach to building high-performing teams?**

I look for evidence of potential in how people think, learn and take responsibility. Qualifications and experience matter, but they don’t tell the whole story. I want to understand how someone approaches an unfamiliar problem, responds to feedback and brings others with them.

My own route has made me attentive to talent that might be overlooked. People from unconventional backgrounds may not have had the same access to opportunities or know how to present their experience in familiar corporate language. As a leader, I need to ask better questions and recognise the capability behind that experience. Resourcefulness, resilience and judgement can be developed in many settings.

I also look for curiosity and the courage to challenge constructively. Some of the strongest contributions come from people who ask a question everyone else has stopped asking. That means making space for quieter voices as well as those who are immediately confident.

Building a high-performing team starts with clear direction. People need to understand what we are trying to achieve, why it matters and what they are accountable for. They also need the authority and support to deliver.

I set high expectations and believe in candid, timely feedback. People should know where they stand, where they excel and what needs to improve. Trust grows when those conversations are fair and consistent, and when people can raise a concern early without fearing the consequences.

Development must include real responsibility. I give people opportunities that stretch their judgement, with support appropriate to the challenge. I also build teams with complementary strengths, where people respect each other’s expertise and share responsibility for the overall result.

For me, leadership is demonstrated in the performance of the business and the capability we build for its future. I want people to leave my team with stronger judgement, greater confidence and the experience to take on more.

**Your experience as a mother, particularly advocating for your son, has profoundly shaped your leadership. How has family life influenced the leader you are today?**

Family life has shaped both my ambition and my understanding of responsibility. As a mother, provider and breadwinner, I have learned to prioritise, adapt and recognise that different people need different things to thrive. Those lessons influence how I lead every day.

Advocating for my youngest son, Hector, has been particularly profound. Navigating systems and challenging assumptions taught me to prepare carefully, ask difficult questions and stay focused on the outcome, even when progress was slow. Becoming Hector’s voice is how I found mine.

That experience also sharpened my understanding of what public services mean to the people who rely on them. Behind every policy, process and technology decision is someone whose life may be affected. In my work at Atos, that gives me a very clear sense of purpose and accountability.

Employers need to recognise that people with dependants are often more determined to succeed. Responsibility for others can strengthen ambition, focus and the drive to build a secure future. Caring commitments should never automatically be interpreted as a lack of commitment to a career.

I know what it means to carry significant responsibility at home and at work. That has made me more deliberate about how I use time, more understanding of the pressures others face and clearer about judging people by their contribution and results.

As a leader, I want people to have both meaningful careers and fulfilling lives. Clear expectations, trust and flexibility help make that possible. Family life has strengthened my resolve to build teams where people can perform at a high level and be supported through the realities of life.

**Women in senior positions are often balancing significant professional and personal responsibilities. How have you successfully navigated family life alongside executive leadership, and what advice would you give to others attempting the same?**

I have navigated it by being clear about my responsibilities, deliberate about my time and realistic about where my attention is most needed. As a mother, provider and breadwinner, my career is also part of how I care for my family. My ambition and my family responsibilities are closely connected.

There have been difficult choices, and I would never suggest I have achieved a perfect balance. What has helped is accepting that priorities shift. Sometimes the business needs more of me; sometimes my family does. I make those decisions consciously and communicate clearly with the people who depend on me.

At work, building a strong team and delegating properly are essential. Executive leadership requires you to develop people who can exercise judgement and take responsibility. At home, support matters too, alongside being honest about what is manageable.

I am clear with my teams that family comes first. That sits alongside high expectations for performance, preparation and accountability. When people have trust, clarity and flexibility, they can manage their responsibilities and deliver.

My advice is to establish boundaries before exhaustion establishes them for you. Be clear about your availability, ask for support and resist making constant accessibility the measure of your commitment. Protect the moments that matter, while recognising that you will sometimes need to adapt.

Above all, don’t assume that having caring responsibilities makes you less suited to leadership. Those responsibilities can strengthen your focus, judgement and determination. You can be ambitious for your career and deeply committed to your family. Employers should recognise and support both.

![Portrait of Chloe Hoggard](https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/chloe-hoggard-4.webp)

**You have spoken about moving away from a culture of over-working. What does sustainable success look like to you now, and what practices help you maintain your wellbeing, resilience and performance?**

Sustainable success means delivering strong results in a way that I, and the people around me, can sustain. It means building a successful business with the judgement, energy and resilience to keep leading it well.

Earlier in my career, I too often treated working harder and being constantly available as evidence of commitment. Experience has taught me that sustained performance requires clear priorities, capable teams and time to recover.

Celebrating unhealthy working practices is not acceptable. When we praise late-night emails, cancelled holidays or people working through exhaustion, we send a message about what it takes to succeed. As leaders, we are responsible for the behaviours we reward and the example we set.

There will be periods of exceptional demand. The leadership task is to recognise them, support people through them and address the causes when exceptional demands become routine.

For me, wellbeing starts with being deliberate about my time: setting clear expectations around availability, delegating properly, protecting time with my family and creating space to think. I also pay attention to when I am stretched and need to reset, rather than assume I can keep absorbing more.

Resilience includes recognising when something needs to change and having the confidence to act. Sometimes that means asking for support, challenging a deadline or stopping work that adds little value.

I remain ambitious and hold a high bar for performance. Sustainable working practices help protect that ambition by keeping people healthy, focused and able to make good decisions. That is part of running a business well.

**Inclusion has been a consistent theme throughout your career. What does an inclusive organisation truly look and feel like, and what practical actions should today's leaders be taking to create cultures where everyone can thrive?**

An inclusive organisation is one where people can contribute, progress and influence decisions without having to hide part of who they are. You feel it in whose ideas are heard, who receives meaningful opportunities and how people are treated when they challenge the prevailing view.

It also has to be visible in outcomes. Who gets recruited, developed and promoted? Whose potential is recognised early? Are our systems enabling people to succeed, or creating barriers that we have stopped noticing?

My own experiences have made me attentive to the gap between good intentions and everyday reality. A policy can be well written, but its value depends on how consistently it is applied and whether people feel able to use it.

Leaders need to examine how they allocate opportunities, assess performance and identify future leaders. They should seek perspectives beyond their usual circle, make reasonable adjustments part of normal working practice and hold themselves accountable when patterns show that some people are being left behind.

Listening matters, but it must lead to action. As Executive Sponsor of the Atos Together Network, I see the value of creating spaces where colleagues can share experiences and help shape the organisation. Leaders must then turn that insight into better decisions, policies and ways of working.

An inclusive culture combines belonging with high expectations. People need clarity, honest feedback and the support to perform. They should also be able to raise a concern, ask for help or disagree without putting their credibility at risk.

For me, “Inclusive by Design” means considering different people’s needs from the outset, in our workplaces, our technology and our services. Inclusion should be part of how we run the business, with clear ownership and measurable progress. That is how we create an organisation where more people can thrive and contribute to its success.

**Finally, if you could leave one leadership message for ambitious women who may currently be questioning whether they belong at the table, what would you want them to know?**

You do not have to follow a conventional path to make a significant contribution. Your experience, judgement and ideas have value, even if your journey looks different from those around you.

I know what it feels like to enter a room and question whether you have earned your place. What I have learned is that you cannot make belonging conditional on knowing everything or never making a mistake. Leadership requires you to contribute, make decisions and keep learning.

Be clear about what you bring. Speak about your achievements without diminishing them, share your thinking and put yourself forward for responsibility. You can be warm, collaborative and deeply committed to others while also being ambitious for yourself.

Choose people who will challenge you, advocate for you and help you grow. Then take ownership of the opportunities that follow. You do not need to navigate your career alone, but you do need to give your ambition a voice.

And when you gain influence, check yourself: you now have agency. Use it to advance others. Ask whose voice you can amplify, whose potential you can champion and whose path you can help open.

I am unapologetic about being a leader who builds bridges for others to cross and leaves the ladder down for others to climb. Creating opportunity for others is part of how I measure my own success.

My message is this: trust the capability you have worked hard to build. Your perspective can help shape the decisions being made at that table. Give yourself permission to contribute, and expect your contribution to be taken seriously.

**About Chloe Hoggard**
Senior Vice President and Head of Industry, UK&I Public Sector

Chloe Hoggard is a senior technology and public sector leader. She left school at sixteen with no degree and built her career in sales and leadership at Vodafone, Dimension Data, Oracle and Salesforce.