Sharon Varney Author

Sharon Varney is a scholar-practitioner who specialises in developing people and organisations. Sharon developed her deep expertise in leadership and change working in large, complex organisations. She was Vice President for international learning and development at a US bank, before joining a global engineering and construction company in the offshore oil and gas industry as their group head of learning and communications. In the early 2000s, Sharon was bitten by the complexity bug. This changed the trajectory of her career and she left the offshore business to take a deep dive into academia. Her award-winning doctoral research, which has a very practical edge, explored the complex dynamics of organisational change and the role of change leaders within it. Sharon now effectively bridges academia and practice. Working across a wide variety of business settings, she applies complexity science insights in her leadership and organisational development (OD) work. This includes bringing thought and practice leadership to The Henley Forum, an applied research centre at Henley Business School, and to Masters’ programmes at Henley and beyond.