International Women’s Day 2023: Interview with Sonya Ghobrial

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Sonya talks about her IR career and recent role working on Haleon's IPO.

Sonya Ghobrial is head of investor relations at Haleon

What has been your career path to date?
Currently I am head of IR for Haleon, the consumer healthcare business demerged from GSK and listed on the London Stock Exchange in July last year. Originally I joined GSK in 2020 as head of IR for consumer healthcare to undertake all of the preparation and execution required ahead of the listing. I am also a NED on the board of LSL Property Services plc.
 
I started my career as a chartered accounted at KPMG Glasgow before moving into banking, mostly as a research analyst and laterally specialist sales, always covering consumer, at banks including Barclays, Goldman Sachs and Morgan. I then moved into IR and was head of IR at Heineken before starting my own consultancy company, Clear Giraffe IR, advising small and large cap listed global companies. The head of consumer IR at GSK role felt too good an opportunity to refuse given the unique situation.   
 
What qualities and skills do you think are key to bring to the IR role?
Excellent communication skills and the ability to not only understand the broader business but also hone in on the areas that shareholders and analysts are likely to really focus in on. Obviously one needs a good understanding of accounting, company financials and analysis as well as an interest and an understanding of the financial markets. It always helps if you are happy to work under pressure and adapt to changes in the environment as it can be at times outside of results be quite unpredictable.
 
What changes have you seen in IR and where do you see the role of IR in the future?
The biggest change in recent years is the elevation of the role. Expectations of IROs have increased not just post-MiFID II but also as shareholders and analysts have access to more and more information. I have also noticed internally, there is a lot more interest in a company’s performance and share price movements, so good internal engagement is critical. More broadly, IROs need to be able to interact more on sustainability initiatives as well as the need to monitor shareholder registers more rigorously for targeting and identifying activists etc. Encouragingly it does feel like correspondingly the importance of the role has stepped up, which is a positive.  
 
What challenges, if any, have you faced to reach where you are in your current role?
Having just listed on LSE, in the largest listing for a decade, the biggest challenge over the last three years has been preparing for this momentous milestone and then continuing on the Haleon journey thereafter. Internally, significant work building processes and structures around reporting, educating and ensuring we are ready for the increased scrutiny as a PLC as well as addressing all the necessary regulatory requirements. Externally, it has also been a huge lift to educate the markets on a new sub-sector with no direct listed peer and to consumer analysts and investors who traditionally didn’t look at the business as part of GSK. Additionally with a CEO and CFO new to leading a listed company there has been a lot of work on messaging, targeting and extensive market interaction. All hugely challenging but a unique and rewarding opportunity to be a part of.
 
Any advice to those either thinking about the next step up in their IR career or moving into IR?
I would always say to anyone given the chance to move into IR to take the opportunity. It is an incredible role which provides a rare perspective to look at the business in its entirety as well as sitting in a unique position to bring an external perspective back into the business which you are better placed than anyone to do. This combined with the ability to build relationships across all areas of the business as well as being in a privileged position in terms of exposure to senior management and the board, makes it a rather special place to be.
 
Do you have a female role model in your career? Who inspires you?
I am fortunate to have worked with some incredible women throughout my career.  There are however two standouts, most recently Laurence Debroux, the former Heineken CFO, who joined Heineken from the outside, from a different sector and into a company at a time of company transformation. She was a huge inspiration, someone to learn from, who believed and empowered IR and set a brilliant example of what female leadership could achieve. The second one, Claire Kent, I met at Morgan Stanley and she taught the power of passion and love for a sector, and who has been an invaluable mentor both when I started my own company but also when I took on my NED role last year. Finally my mum for her relentless work ethic.

Published 8 March, 2023