Delivering through outstanding leadership and a strong work ethic
Catherine Portman is the Overall Winner in the Adam Smith Awards Woman of the Year category. The recently appointed Head of Global Treasury at Uber has spent the majority of her fantastic career in treasury at Juniper Networks, an industry leader in automated, scalable and secure networks headquartered in California. During her tenure at Juniper, Catherine’s role evolved with the growing business and she quickly became known for her visionary leadership in treasury and for driving change across the organisation. She is now in a new role at Uber, a testament to a professional whose career has been marked by a commitment to best practices in leadership and a strong work ethic.
Catherine is truly an outstanding leader who inspires and coaches not only her team but many others around her in the organisations in which she works. Catherine recognises the importance of diverse teams with a variety of skillsets in today’s corporate world. She fosters a professional environment which allows for multiple skillsets and personality types to be valued and appreciated on a meritocratic basis and has been instrumental in advancing the careers of many who have worked for her.
Known for cultivating a learning and collaborative environment amongst her teams to encourage growth and leadership development, Catherine encourages and supports her teams to work cross functionally and proactively. A lifelong learner and strategic thinker herself, she is constantly observing where the industry is heading and positioning her teams to be out in front of coming changes.
A native Californian with roots in Silicon Valley, Catherine’s early career began at Apple as a treasury analyst. She continually took on additional duties and found herself working with increasing responsibility and advancing into more senior management roles at other local high-tech firms. She was recruited to build out Juniper’s treasury organisation soon after its initial public offering. Catherine stayed at Juniper for 18.5 years, her last position before leaving as Vice President, Corporate Treasury and Finance Operations.
Catherine is rare in her unwavering commitment to the development of her teams. It is a quality that should be held up as a fine example to corporate leaders everywhere. She is committed to her vision and isn’t afraid to take a stand to make sure that the companies she works at are heading in the right direction. This, coupled with her humble approach to her business success, makes her a true model of a leader.
Ken Miller, EVP and CFO at Juniper Networks said the following of Catherine, “I’ve worked with Catherine Portman for all of her 18.5 years at Juniper. Over her career at Juniper I’ve watched her build out our treasury function after our IPO from hiring team members to creating and implementing policies to managing our relationships with the banks and everything in between. She’s been instrumental in ensuring our treasury function is a key partner to achieving business results through the development of our financing offerings and partnering with our financial services sales teams to increase our relevance with these strategic customers. Most recently she’s led the development, implementation and execution of our strong capital return programme. This has been a critical part of the evolution of our company, and her leadership was key to our success in this area.
“In addition, Catherine is a leader I look to as a role model in hiring strong and diverse team members from skillsets, to backgrounds and diversity of thought. She’s known as someone who gets things done collaboratively across the Juniper organisation to make sure the right long-term decisions are being made for the company. She’s mentored and developed strong team members who will use their learnings to continue to drive this critical behaviour within Juniper.”
