Karren Brady: the baroness who means business

Karren Brady is the ultimate example of a woman having it all: managing director of a football club at 23, at the helm of some of the UK’s biggest companies, wife, mother of two, and now a member of the House of Lords. Women just need a little self-belief — and a lot more role models, she tells Rosamund Urwin
Rosamund Urwin26 June 2015

Karren Brady is trying to convince me she doesn’t practise her raised eyebrow of disdain in the bathroom mirror. ‘Honestly I don't, I promise,’ protests the better-looking of Alan Sugar’s The Apprentice sidekicks (sorry, Nick). ‘You don’t even know when you’re being filmed. Most tasks take about two days and you work 12 to 16 hours per day. There are probably eight cameras in the room and you’ve been going since the crack of dawn. It’s 8pm and the candidates are doing a pitch. You’re absolutely exhausted and someone says something stupid, and you’ll go, “Whaaaat? Please!” No one tells you to pull a face. I didn’t even know I had that expression.’

It’s hard to believe that exhaustion is in her repertoire either. The 45-year-old may shrug off superwoman status, but she’s the ultimate juggler. Alongside filming the BBC One series, there’s the day job as vice chair of West Ham United football club, and a spot on the board of Philip Green’s Arcadia and Simon Cowell’s company SyCo (Brady calls Cowell ‘a gentleman above all others’). Then there’s the small matter of her having just become a Tory peer, Baroness Brady of Knightsbridge. Oh, and she’s also mother to two teenagers, splitting her time between London, where she lives in SW3, and the family home near Solihull.

It’s 7.45am when we meet. But while I’m still wiping the sleep from my eyes, Brady is as sharp-witted as ever. Sartorially, she puts me to shame, too, looking as though she’s stepped straight off the set of The Apprentice, in a navy Nina Ricci skirt suit, LK Bennett patent pumps, a full face of make-up and a perfect blow-dry.

We’re talking in her room at Ham Yard Hotel in Soho, where she stayed the previous evening because she had an early start. When she arrived, Brady says she almost opened the bottle of vodka in her mini-kitchen, mistaking it for water — ‘Imagine how much I’d have been charged.’ She could probably afford it — her fortune is estimated at £82 million.

Today, she’s talking about someone else’s money, though: Pantene’s. The shampoo brand is launching a £20,000 fund, ShineStrong, to help women to develop their career or education and Brady is chairing the judging panel to determine the winners. What inspired her was watching the ShineStrong advertisement, which compares the treatment of men and women in the workplace: the authoritative man is the boss, the authoritative woman bossy; the confident man ‘smooth’, the confident woman ‘a show-off’. ‘It really resonated with me,’ she says. ‘The research showed that a lot of women felt held back because they either lacked confidence or finance. So we’re putting money together with confidence to empower women.’ It’s open to anyone, she adds, from school-leavers to stay-at-home mothers mulling a return to the workplace.

Are women less confident in their careers? Brady nods. ‘When I put a job up, it goes to internal candidates first. Guys just bang in their CV, not even knowing what the job’s about — they don’t care. The women go: “Should I? Can I do this?” They need prompting.’ What holds them back? ‘A number of things. It’s partly about not having any role models. There are these superwomen: Oprah Winfrey, Hillary Clinton, but they’re not real for most women. What women want is someone in their own workplace who has a family and a career, is professional but can also say, “I have to go now to pick up the kids.” There’s also this “pink-collar brigade” where women are seen as waitresses, hairdressers, nurses. If a girl says she wants to be a mechanic, you should never say, “What?” You have to break down those barriers.’

Brady grew up in Edmonton, North London, the daughter of a printer and self-made millionaire businessman and a glamorous stay-at-home-mother. She has experienced more than her fair share of sexism. When she became managing director of Birmingham City FC aged 23 (she rounded it up to 24 in a bid to combat ageism), she was dubbed a ‘Page 3 model’ by one newspaper. A rival club banned her from the boardroom because of her sex.

‘I just toughed it out. I couldn’t care less what other people thought. This was my opportunity and I wasn’t going to let anyone take it away from me.’ She had two coping mechanisms: a sharp tongue and a rhino hide. ‘In a male-dominated business, if you don’t have a thick skin, you won’t last long,’ she says. Is the football industry improving for women? ‘Oh, definitely. When I joined in ’93, it was [she affects a voice of disbelief] “A woman in football?! What is this strange creature doing in the building?” That feeling has gone. There are so many successful women in the game now.’

Brady takes her position as the ‘First Lady of Football’ seriously. That includes confronting issues such as the convicted rapist Ched Evans’ possible return to the game. ‘There are many women working in football clubs who don’t want to work alongside a convicted rapist — who won’t work alongside a convicted rapist. People don’t think about that when they say, “Well, he’s served his time”, “Did he do it?” or “Didn’t he do it?” I think those are the wrong questions actually.’ She feels both a responsibility to speak up on behalf of other women and a simple desire to make her opinions heard. ‘It’s very hard to say to other women, “Be confident, say what you mean,” and then say, “Ooh, Ched Evans is quite a difficult subject, I won’t talk about it.” ’

Brady is one of a group of new working peers announced by Downing Street earlier this year, and will be ennobled alongside former M&S boss Stuart Rose and Dido Harding, the CEO of TalkTalk. Brady — who is also Small Business Ambassador for the UK Government and introduced the Chancellor, George Osborne, at last year’s Tory conference — wants to use her position to help small businesses and women in the workplace. Her forthright manner may be just what the fusty House of Lords needs. She admits she doesn’t have a clue what it will be like: ‘It feels very much like starting school for the very first time. Where do you put your coat? Where do you go for lunch? Am I going to get on with people?’

She hasn’t even figured out her coat of arms. ‘I went in to see the man who creates them and I suggested putting a football on, but then he showed me all these beautiful coats of arms. Julian Fellowes had a tortoise because it took him so long to achieve his success. So I thought I needed better ideas.’

There have been rumours, too, that Brady might be persuaded to try to take over from BoJo in City Hall. She has scotched them, however, telling The Telegraph last year: ‘I’m not going to become an MP and I’m not going to be London Mayor. I have no political ambitions.’

She’s already doing things her way, though, asking Lord Sugar — a Labour peer — to walk her into the House of Lords. ‘He said, “Hmmm, it’s a bit untraditional.” But we’re friends. Friendships should cross political divides. It would have been very strange for me not to have him stand by my side.’ She’s clearly a loyal friend: when I ask if she’d ever want his job on The Apprentice, she looks horrified. ‘No, never. It’s Alan’s show, not mine. No one could do it as well as him, it would only be a poor imitation. And I wouldn’t want him not to do it.’

They do have one area of common ground politically: tax. Lord Sugar said recently that he had turned down the avoidance schemes used by celebrities such as Gary Barlow. ‘We all have to pay our taxes,’ Brady nods. ‘It’s part and parcel of being British.’ She won’t be joining the deep-pocketed who refuse to pass on their wealth to their children, though. ‘My kids will inherit everything; I have no problem with that,’ she says. ‘But the most important thing is they have absolutely no idea how much money we have. If you say to your kids, you’re going to inherit £10 million, they think: “How will I spend that?” ’

She has tried to instil a sensible attitude to money in her children, so they ‘never take anything for granted’. That means they’ll have to earn their own crust. Her son Paolo, 16, wants to be a professional rugby player, and is scrum half at Worcester Warriors Academy. ‘I’d like him to be a lawyer, though, because, boy, can he argue his way out of anything.’

Meanwhile, 18-year-old Sophia has just started at Nottingham University, studying film and television: ‘She wants to write scripts.’ Sophia has a student loan and used to have a Saturday job in Hollister. ‘Being able to invest in yourself and look back and say, “I did that myself” — I wouldn’t want to take that away from her. It’s also important to understand the value of money, and the best way to do that is to earn it yourself. It’s much harder to part with if you’ve worked for it.’

Sophia may be financially independent, but she’s not domestically independent. Brady revealed recently that she had driven up to Nottingham to do her daughter’s washing. ‘I still look at her like she’s a six-year-old,’ Brady admits. ‘When your child calls and says, “Er, washing?”, you say, “I’m coming!” It’s nice to be wanted. They grow up so quickly and they don’t want you at all. You realise the change has happened when you say to your kids, “What are we going to do this weekend?” and they go: “I don’t know what you’re doing, but I know what I’m doing.” Suddenly they don’t want to go to the zoo and they don’t want help with their homework; they just don’t need you any more.’

Unfortunately, the washing situation has got even worse: now Paul picks Sophia up every weekend and she lugs a bag of dirty garments home. ‘The other day, I was doing her washing and realised most of the clothes weren’t hers: her friends have started putting theirs in, too. So now I’m doing washing for half of Nottingham University.’ Karren Brady: Baroness of Knightsbridge and First Lady of laundry. ES

Karren Brady is partnering with Pantene for the launch of its £20,000 ShineStrong fund for women (facebook.com/PanteneUK)

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