Overview
Melissa Sumner is a senior client principal in Heidrick & Struggles’ London office and a member of the Leadership Assessment Practice. She supports clients in identifying and building future-ready leadership, teams, and organizations.
Experience
Melissa is a chartered occupational psychologist with over 20 years of experience delivering senior-level executive assessments, succession planning programs, team acceleration, leadership development, and executive coaching in the U.K. and overseas. She combines strong technical expertise with a pragmatic understanding of how to deliver change and results within complex organizations and across geographies.
Throughout her career, Melissa has developed a strong reputation for building data-centric, scalable, and innovative solutions.
Melissa’s passion for building connectivity across the talent ecosystem enables her to help clients optimize the value of talent insights and guide talent decisions at both the tactical and strategic levels. She is trained in a wide range of psychometrics tools, including Saville Wave, Hogan, OPQ, 16PF, and others, and holds the Practitioner Diploma in Executive Coaching from The Academy of Executive Coaching (AoEC).
Prior to joining Heidrick & Struggles, Melissa was the chief people officer for a fast-growing international security consulting business. Before that, she led global talent and culture teams in aviation, consumer, and cybersecurity, with responsibility for the entire talent lifecycle. She has led multiple talent transformation agendas, acting as a trusted advisor to executives navigating turbulence and change.
Education
Warwick Business School, Executive MBA, with Distinction
Manchester Business School, MSc, Organizational Psychology
University of Manchester, Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology, 2.1