The Madras College Archive

     


Former Pupil Biographies

Dr Catherine Eve Poole O.B.E., BA, MBA, PhD (1972 - current)

Eve Poole was born 5th February 1972 and was one of the four Poole siblings who were educated at Madras College. In 1989 she gained an English Speaking Union scholarship to study in the United States for the second half of the session at Westminster School in Connecticut. These scholarships are open to the whole of the UK, most go to independent schools  and very few girls were successful.

She went to Durham University gaining her BA in 1993 and Worked for the Church Commissioners. In 1998 she graduated from Edinburgh University with a Master of Business Education (MBA). In 2010 she completed her Doctor of Philosophy degree (PhD) at Newnham College Cambridge with a thesis entitled 'From the fall of the Wall to the collapse of credit, Church of England views on capitalism (1989 - 2008)'

Her career followed these paths:

  • Working for the Church Commissioners for England (1993 to 1997)

  • Change management consultant for Deloitte, specialising in capital markets and the public sector (1998 to 2002)

  • Teaching Leadership at Ashbridge Executive Education, one of the top 10 UK business schools (2002). Here she pioneered a new approach to the development of leaders (Leadersmithing).

  • Deputy Director of the Public Leadership Centre running programmes for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the BBC, the Ministry of Defence, Tesco and local government.

  • Trustee and Deputy Chair of the Christian Association of Business Executives (2005 to 2011)

  • Trustee of the Foundation for Church Leadership (2006 to 2012)

  • Founding Director of the Foundation for Workplace Spirituality (2007 to 2014)

  • The first female Chair of the Board of Governors of Gordonstoun (2015)

  • Research Fellow of William Temple Foundation and the St Paul's Institute (pre 2018)

  • Third Church Estates Commissioner, one of the most senior lay people in the Church of England (2018)

  • Life Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts

  • She was appointed as interim Chief Executive Officer of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2022

  • She is a regular contributor to 'Thought for the Day' on BBC Radio Scotland

  • She was awarded an O.B.E. in the new Year Honours list 2023 for services to education and gender equality
     

Her publications include:

  • The Church on Capitalism: Theology and the Market (2010)

  • Ethical Leadership: Global Challenges and Perspectives (2011)

  • Capitalism's Toxic Assumptions: Redefining Next Generation Economics (2015)

  • Leadersmithing: Revealing the Trade Secrets of Leadership (2017)

  • Buying God: Consumerism and Theology (2018)