Karren Rita Brady (born 4 April 1969) is an English sporting executive, television broadcaster, newspaper columnist, author and novelist. She is the former managing director of Birmingham City Football Club and current vice-chairman of West Ham United. Her appointment with Birmingham City began in March 1993, when only 23 years old, and in 2002 became the first woman to hold such a post in the top flight of English football when the team was promoted. She was responsible for the company's flotation in 1997, thus becoming the youngest managing director of a UK plc. She left the club in October 2009 after it was sold for £82,000,000.In January 2010 she was appointed vice-chairman of West Ham United following a change of ownership of the club.She is currently Lord Sugar's assistant on the BBC 1's TV show The Apprentice and writes regular columns for Woman & Home magazine and The Sun. She has also published four books including two novels.

Early life

Brady was brought up in Edmonton, London,and the family house was near to the Tottenham Hotspur football ground.Her father, Terry Brady, was once chairman of Swindon Town and a director of Portsmouth.He made his fortune in printing and property development. Her mother is Italian,and she has an older brother, Darren.She attended Poles Convent, a boarding school in Ware, Hertfordshire and Aldenham School, Elstree, a boys' school which accepted girls in the sixth form.

Career

Birmingham City

Brady's first job was working at Saatchi & Saatchi the advertising agency. She left to join the London Broadcasting Company (LBC) where she managed an account for radio advertising with several clients, who initially did not spend much money; one of the clients, publisher David Sullivan, encouraged by Brady, spent more than £2,000,000 on advertising in six months, which earned Brady more commission than the rest of the sales team put together.Sullivan offered her a job with his firm, and she became one of the directors at the age of 20. While in Sullivan's employ, Brady spotted an advert for the sale of Birmingham City F.C. in the Financial Times, when the club was in receivership,and persuaded Sullivan to buy it and let her run it. Sullivan later commented that he agreed to the deal because such a young, female director would attract publicity to the club, and also because Brady was a "sacker".Brady was 23 when she started work as managing director of Birmingham City F.C. in March 1993.She is also chairman of EMAP's Kerrang!, and has a seat on the board of Sport England. She is a non-executive director of Mothercare and Channel 4 television. In September 2010 she joined the board of Arcadia with Sir Philip Green.

In 2008, Sullivan and Brady were arrested by City of London Police, interviewed and released on bail, as part of the investigation into the 2006 allegations of corruption in English football, which also involved similar actions against players and officials from other clubs; club chairman David Gold was interviewed as a witness. the club stated that no charges had been brought, that Brady denied any wrongdoing. The investigation involved only tax and national insurance offences relating to two players. Gold said that it was "utterly wrong that this highly professional businesswoman has been made a victim in a witch-hunt against football". In August 2009 it was confirmed that no further action would be taken.She left Birmingham City two months later, after the club was taken over by Carson Yeung. The same month she was appointed Chairman to the England 2018 World Cup bid advisory board.

West Ham United

In January 2010 she was appointed vice-chairman of West Ham United by new joint chairmen, David Sullivan and David Gold. Writing in her newspaper column Brady said "To West Ham fans I'll make a single pledge - while we are on the board, we will hang in the Tower of London before your club again goes through the financial turmoil which so nearly brought it down". Brady said she liked the idea of changing the club's name to West Ham Olympic. David Gold subsequently said that the club shall always be West Ham United under his chairmanship but "What you might do is call the stadium West Ham Olympic stadium. I can make a case for that."

The Apprentice

In March 2007, Brady appeared as a celebrity contestant on Comic Relief Does The Apprentice and was team leader for the girls' team, winning £1,000,000 for Comic Relief. In June 2008, Brady was a guest interviewer in series four of The Apprentice – interviewing the final five. After the show, it was revealed that Brady had fulfilled a promise she made to Alan Sugar on screen, and offered a job to Claire Young, who finished as runner-up in the series, after being impressed by her interview. In 2009 she interviewed candidates again in The Apprentice Season 5, as seen on BBC 1. On 30 August 2009, she was revealed as Alan Sugar's new assistant in the sixth series of The Apprentice,replacing Margaret Mountford, who had left the series (and who returned in series 6 and 7 as a guest interviewer, the same role that Brady had fulfilled in her first appearance in the main UK apprentice series).

Personal life

In 1995 Brady married Canadian footballer Paul Peschisolido, who played for Birmingham City for two seasons, 1992–93 and 1993–94. About one year later, she had her first child, a girl named Sophia. She had about six weeks off work after the birth of her second child, a boy named Paolo.Karren lives in Birmingham with her husband and children and they also own a holiday home in Canada.

In 2006, Brady underwent a full-body MRI scan as part of a medical screen, which unexpectedly discovered a potentially fatal cerebral aneurysm.In February 2006, at the age of 36, at very short notice, she underwent neurosurgery to prevent the aneurysm from rupturing, and was back at work about one month later, fully recovered.

Awards

* In 1995, she was voted the 98th sexiest woman in the world by the readers of FHM magazine.


* In 2006 Brady was Cosmopolitan magazine's Woman of the Year, and named in the category of 'Woman Who Has Changed The World'.

* In 2006 when she attended The Queen’s lunch for Women Achievers and Business Leaders.

* Brady was named as Business Woman of the Year 2007.

* In December 2008 she won the NatWest Spirit of Everywoman Award for services to women in business.


* In November 2010 she was listed in the business category of The Sunday Telegraph’s ‘100 Most Powerful Women in Britain’ and was included in the Evening Standard’s list of ‘London's 1000 Most Influential People 2010’. second to David Beckham in the category of sport.

* She was awarded an honorary doctorate in business from the University of Birmingham in December 2010.

* In 2011 she was awarded Britain's Most Inspirational Women by the Breakthrough for Breast Cancer Inspiration Awards.




Karren Brady National Television Awards in London 25.01.2012 (x7)