A NEW Director of Finance and Investment has been appointed to join the executive team and Boards of NHS Hastings and Rother & NHS East Sussex Downs and Weald – the two East Sussex primary care trusts (PCTs).
Sharmila Nebhrajani has held senior roles in the BBC since 1996 and is currently Chief Operating Officer and Finance Director of BBC Future Media and Technology.
Prior to this she worked on major BBC joint ventures and acquisitions and was responsible for driving and reporting on operational performance management across all the BBC’s services.
Sharmila started her career in management consulting after being awarded a First Class degree in Physiological Sciences from Oxford University and has worked on corporate finance and strategy projects for a range of private sector organisations in media and technology.
A member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales since 1991, she gained a Yale World Fellowship at Yale University in the US in 2007.
She has had several non-executive roles in the health sector including as a Board member of the Human Tissue Authority and for ten years Non-executive Director, and most recently Deputy Chair, of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, the body that regulates and inspects Assisted Reproduction clinics in the UK.
She is currently a Charity Commissioner, and also sits on the Audit Committee of the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Mike Wood, Chief Executive of two East Sussex PCTs, says:
“I am delighted Sharmila will be joining the PCTs later in the year. Her extensive leadership experience at the BBC, in the private sector and her other roles will be invaluable to the PCTs as we move towards becoming world class commissioners of healthcare for people across East Sussex, improving health and well being, and being leaders of the local NHS.”
As Director of Finance and Investment, Sharmila will be responsible for the PCTs’ allocations – the money the organisations receive from the government to fund NHS care and treatment in primary care, health centres and clinics, local hospitals and specialist centres.
The current budgets are: £296 million for NHS Hastings and Rother and £487 million for NHS East Sussex Weald and Downs.
