Sandie Okoro

Sandie Okoro was born in Fulham, London, in 1964, to a Nigerian teacher father and a Trinidadian nurse mother. As a child, a schoolteacher's dismissive remark that "little Black girls from Balham don't become judges" was, in her own account, the spark that hardened her determination to succeed in the law.

She studied law and politics at the University of Birmingham before qualifying as a barrister in 1988. At just 25 she began managing a small trust department at Schroders, rising over more than three decades through senior legal roles at Barings, where she served as Global General Counsel, and HSBC, where she was General Counsel for Global Asset Management.

In November 2016, Okoro was appointed Senior Vice President and General Counsel of the World Bank Group, taking up the post the following year — becoming the first British national and the first Black woman ever to hold the role, as principal legal advisor and spokesperson for the world's leading development finance institution. She also chaired the World Bank Group's Task Force on Racism, pushing the institution to confront racial inequity in its own operations.

After leaving the World Bank in 2022, Okoro became Group General Counsel at Standard Chartered, overseeing legal and investigative functions across its global operations. She has been named among Britain's most influential Black people on the Powerlist multiple times, holds several honorary doctorates in law, and remains an outspoken advocate for gender equality and access to justice.