Name: Anna Brailsford MBE
Company: Code First Girls
Position: Co-founder and CEO
Website: https://codefirstgirls.com/
About Anna Brailsford MBE
Last year, Anna Brailsford was awarded an MBE for services to women’s equality and diversity in coding, reflecting her commitment to breaking barriers and fostering inclusivity in the tech sector. As CEO of Code First Girls, she is on a mission to close the digital skills and gender gaps in technology, ensuring more women have access to the training and opportunities needed for successful careers. Under her leadership, the organisation has become a global leader in delivering tailored training solutions, equipping individuals and businesses with essential digital skills.
Since taking over Code First Girls in 2019, Anna has made empowerment a core focus. Women have historically been underrepresented in tech, and she has worked relentlessly to address this imbalance by connecting women to real job opportunities. Under her leadership, Code First Girls has taught three times as many women to code as the entire UK university system, offering accessible, industry-relevant training that directly leads to employment. By forming partnerships with major employers, she has helped thousands of women secure high-paying jobs in companies looking to diversify their tech workforce.
In 2024, Code First Girls secured £4.5 million in funding from angel investors and investment funds, marking a major milestone that will help the organisation scale its impact. This funding supports the ambitious goal of training 26,000 women through the CFGdegree, a specialised programme that equips participants with in-demand tech skills and guarantees job placements upon completion. Over the next five years, this initiative aims to bridge both the gender divide and the overall skills shortage in technology, providing direct pathways for women into the industry.
Code First Girls is expanding its mission to address the broader digital skills gap across the workforce. It recently launched Code First Teams, an initiative designed to help businesses reskill and upskill employees, including men, in high-demand areas such as artificial intelligence, data science, and software development. As AI and automation continue to transform industries, companies must ensure their employees keep pace with technological advancements. Code First Teams is positioned at the forefront of this effort, reinforcing the organisation’s role as a leader in the digital skills revolution. By broadening its training programmes, Code First Girls ensures that businesses and individuals alike have the tools to succeed in an evolving job market.
Anna’s career prior to Code First Girls showcases her expertise in education technology and digital learning. She was the CEO and co-founder of Frisbee, an EdTech startup incubated by Founders Factory, where she developed innovative solutions for learning and skills development. Before that, she played a pivotal role as Commercial Director at Lynda.com, a global leader in online learning. She continued in this role following Lynda.com’s $1.5 billion acquisition by LinkedIn in 2015, one of the largest acquisitions in social media history.
Anna is driving meaningful change in tech. She is making digital skills more accessible and paving the way for a more diverse and inclusive future in the industry, inspiring the next generation of women in technology.
