S3E53: What Equality, Diversity & Inclusion in Project Leadership really means with IJ Samuel & Amal Khawaja

IJ Samuel

Associate Director at Turner & Townsend

IJ Samuel is an Associate Director at Turner & Townsend, with over 15 years experience working on multi-billion-pound projects, helping clients like High Speed Two (HS2), Heathrow Airport, Kuwait Oil Company, and more, across Oil & Gas, Energy and Infrastructure industries. With a background in Control Systems Engineering, IJ has excelled in leading multi-disciplinary Project Controls teams within various Project Management Organisations (PMO). She draws on her extensive Project management experience, PMO expertise, Governance, Assurance and Stakeholder management charm to develop strategies that enable the set-up, execution and delivery of multi-billion pound projects and programmes. IJ equally has a burning passion to diversify thought leadership and normalise Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in the industry. She is a people-oriented inspirational leader and her natural relationship building energy flows right into developing inclusive high performing teams through mentoring and coaching.

Amal Khawaja

Amal is a Senior Consultant at Turner & Townsend with seven years’ experience in planning, cost control, change management and performance reporting across a broad portfolio of projects and industries. She has a BE in Civil Engineering from the American University of Beirut and an MSc in Construction Management from University of Reading. Amal worked in the Middle East before moving to the UK to pursue her master’s degree. She is currently working in the Programme Advisory port of the business and has been with Turner & Townsend for over 3 years. Amal wears other hats as well. She is an ED&I champion & lead, challenging the status quo and bringing change, women, and ED&I to a male dominated industry. She founded the Client Diversity & Inclusion Network in March 2018 and since then played a crucial role in championing and progressing D&I in the business. She is passionate about addressing the gender balance in the construction industry and making inclusion an everyday reality in the workplace.