Carla is the CEO of The Way Youth Zone. She started volunteering at 16 and knew she wanted to work in the charity sector. She studied English at The University of Birmingham and got her first charity job when she graduated. Carla has worked in the sector for 20 years in a range of roles and charities, with income generation as a focus. This has included community fundraising, trusts and grants, corporate and major donor fundraising and working with statutory organisations. She has worked in both London and the West Midlands. She is about to start a new CEO role of a national charity in Feb 2022. She joined her current organisation in 2016 when a role was created for her managing projects (13 total). When the CEO left, she became a CEO at 33. She has been in that specific role for 4.5 years, managing a team of up to 95, with a budget of £1.2 million, of which she is responsible for raising circa half. She has brokered partnerships with over 50 organisations where the charity is based to maximise impact of the organisation. They have had over 250,000 visits from young people in her time as CEO. Carla also completed her MBA at Warwick Business School during this time (achieving a distinction, top 10% of cohort). She did her dissertation on supporting women into their first management role. She is also a volunteer director/trustee on a charity board for arts in the Black Country and has been since 2018. She is passionate about using her skills and giving her time in this way. Her areas of expertise are income generation, HR, strategic planning, project management, budgeting and re-forecasting and leadership/management.