The Grierson Trust has added three new Trustees to its Board: BBC Head of Talent, Donna Taberer; Managing Director of Naked Television, Fatima Salaria; and, Sky UK’s Director, Documentaries and Factual, Poppy Dixon.
Chair of the Board, Lorraine Heggessey says, “I’m delighted to welcome Donna, Fatima and Poppy to The Grierson Trust Board. Each of them has already made a significant impact in the world of documentary programming as well as showing a demonstrable commitment to advancing diversity. Their wide ranging skills and experience will be invaluable to the Trust, particularly as we are about to expand our DocLab training programmes, providing a route into the industry that many find impenetrable, especially those from diverse backgrounds.”
After 35 years in TV production, management and commissioning, Donna Taberer is now BBC Content Head of Talent where she heads up the Commissioner Development Programme and BBC Elevate for mid-career disabled talent as well as other diversity interventions. She is also Director of the ScreenSkills Series Producer Programme.
In September 2020, Fatima Salaria joined Naked Television. She joined from Channel 4, where, as Head of Specialist Factual, she was responsible for History, Science, Natural History, Arts and Adventure.
Poppy Dixon is Director, Documentaries and Factual for Sky UK, responsible for commissioning original features and multi-part series for Sky’s three recently launched factual channels; Sky Documentaries, Sky Crime and Sky Nature. Previously, she was a producer of documentary and television, including the BAFTA-winning The Imposter, Grierson–nominated Untouchable and BIFA-winning American Animals.
They join fellow Trustees Ben Anthony, Simon Chinn, Guy Davies, Amy Flanagan, Danny Horan, Marjorie Kaplan,James Quinn, Rob Stapledon and Kate Townsend.
Stepping down from the Board are Liz Brion, Jo Clinton-Davis, David DeHaney, Liesel Evans, Tom McDonald, Sanjay Singhal and Andy Whittaker who have all reached the end of their term of service.
Lorraine Heggessey says, “I would like to thank all the Trustees who are stepping down for so generously giving their time and expertise to the work of The Grierson Trust. We are lucky to have had people of such high calibre on our board. As a small charity we rely on the dedication of volunteers to help us promote excellence through our annual awards and to run the DocLab training scheme that supports young people as they enter the documentary world.”
Jon Creamer
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