Denise Jagger

Denise was appointed to the National Trust’s Board of Trustees in January 2021. She started her career as a corporate finance lawyer with Slaughter and May and is experienced in mergers and acquisitions. She then assumed more commercial, general management roles first on the board of Asda Stores where she was Company Secretary and General Counsel during its rapid transformation and later once part of Walmart. With a retailer’s focus on the customer she then applied this experience in the professional services sector, as a partner leading client development at international law firm Eversheds Sutherland.

Throughout her career Denise has been responsible for a range of functions including legal, regulatory and governance; insurance and risk; public affairs; customer service; remuneration and benefits. A consistent focus wherever she has worked has been on promoting equality, diversity and inclusion for which she has received a number of awards including an honorary doctorate.

Alongside her executive career she has held non-executive appointments as chair and board member in public, private and not-for-profit organisations in a variety of sectors including retail, financial services and reinsurance, housebuilding and real estate, the performing arts and heritage and higher education.