Professional Expertise
Shannon Banks, MSocSc, is an award-winning consultant, facilitator, and executive coach with extensive experience working with leaders and teams in the commercial sector. With a corporate leadership background that spans product development, marketing, planning, and HR, she brings a unique perspective that ensures all people challenges are looked at through a broader business lens. Shannon specializes in Action Learning, an experiential approach that provides the framework and methodologies to advance leadership skills while solving complex business challenges.
Experience
Prior to her current work, Shannon spent seventeen years with Microsoft in a variety of leadership roles across the business and HR, with responsibilities managing globally distributed, multi-functional teams. She served as Talent Management Director for Western Europe, as Senior HR Business Partner supporting the Advertising & Online business for Europe, and as a Worldwide Leadership Development Consultant. She was Microsoft’s global thought leader for action learning and was responsible for the development of Front Lines, an action learning experience that links learning directly to business impact through work with partners in the developing world.
Shannon is a sought-after public speaker whose work has been highlighted in multiple publications and numerous global conferences. In 2013, Shannon was awarded the Best Practice Institute’s Top Practitioner Award for Talent Management. Her achievements in HR and leadership development earned Microsoft a 2010 WIAL Outstanding Organization award and a 2010 Workforce Management Optimas award for Corporate Citizenship, as well as a 2011 EFMD Excellence in Practice Award for Executive Development. She currently serves on the board of directors for the World Institute for Action Learning (WIAL) and lives outside of London with her family.
Education
- MSocSc – University of Birmingham, England
- B.A. – University of Kansas, USA
- B.S. – University of Kansas, USA
- Certified Master Action Learning Coach – World Institute for Action Learning
- Certified Executive Coach – NeuroLeadership Institute
- Certified Executive Coach & Accredited – International Coach Federation (PCC)
- Certified MBTI Practitioner
- Certified in Hogan Suite of Psychometrics
- Certified Lumina Spark Practitioner
- Certified Leadership Circle Practitioner