Each year, on 11th October, Inspiring Girls International runs a global online campaign to celebrate International Day of the Girl – This Little Girl Is Me.
To celebrate, we showcased some of the inspirational Women who are driving forward and supporting the Women in Bus Coach:
Claire Mann, Chief Operating Officer, Transport for London (TfL)
My dad said to me when I was 24 “I didn’t know you wanted to be a train driver when you grew up?” Nor did I…
As a 9-year-old going to my local village school in west Dorset I had no idea what my future would bring. Living in a village where the railway had been closed and there was one bus a week to town, I never expected I would take up a career in transport but what a rewarding career it has been.
I loved languages and having dropped out of Polytechnic thought I may work abroad one day. I started my career in transport at 19, I didn’t know what to expect but what I did know is that my dad had always been clear that working hard, doing what you enjoy, and treating people with love and respect were the most important things in life.
If he were here today, I think he would be proud of that little girl who became a train driver and has continued a career in transport in Bus and Rail, and now as Chief Operating Officer at TfL.
Every day I am grateful for the opportunities I have had and am proud to work in transport helping people to connect with each other and to support many young women who want to grow in the industry.
My daughter Daisy knows that to be happy in life and have a great career you must be true to yourself and your values, work hard and be kind.
This little girl is me
Anne Marie Purcell, C’Suite Strategic Advisor, in Transformational Change, Delivery, Transport Transformation and Bus Franchising
This little girl grew up in central Liverpool, one of five in a poor household. Her dad became disabled when she was a toddler, and her parents struggled to make ends meet. She had meningitis at 8 and nearly died, she was called the human guinea pig in the papers as they tested medicines on her from the University of Liverpool Labs.
But she was surrounded by strong women. Her mum one of eight siblings was part of a matriarchal force: four working sisters, three with big families. And her Aunty Alice Davidson OBE travelled the world as a missionary. Her dad, despite his disability, volunteered rather than sit still. The backdrop was clear: women who could take on anything and your background and poverty shouldn’t hold you back.
Her career path wasn’t. She started a fashion degree but couldn’t afford to finish. Instead, she ran a nightclub, worked in a bank, then joined HMRC.
At 28, with two young children and little left to lose, she stumbled into projects. Within 18 months, she left employment, set up her own company, and became self-employed.
Over the next 12 years, she took on bigger and bolder work. For the first time, she had money and with it, the freedom to leave an unhealthy relationship.
She delivered major programmes across sectors. Then came the Bee Network, leading the delivery of which was complex, challenging, and relentless but it left a legacy she’s proud of. More than that, it opened the door to a world of transport she now loves, filled with brilliant people.
There were moments she thought she should change soften the accent, tone down the approach, hide the roots. But she didn’t. She’s proud of where she comes from.
Integrity and authenticity are the heart of good leadership. They’re what make people want to work with you and go the extra mile.
If she could speak to her younger self, or her daughter, she’d say:
Nothing’s perfect, stop searching and start enjoying.
You’re capable. Challenge yourself.
Take opportunities, even if you walk away, you’ll learn.
Stay true. Integrity matters.
This little girl is me….
Elizabeth McKay, Director & CEO London Transport Museum
My younger self would have never imagined the trajectory of my life and career would include London, museums or transport – let alone all three.
I first visited London as a tourist when I was seventeen and absolutely fell in love with the city. My first proper job was in commercial advertising in New York City but I managed eventually to wrangle a two year post in London. That was three decades ago.
In hindsight, my career moves had a certain logic although there wasn’t a master plan. I took a break after advertising to study for an MBA, joined the BBC to be ‘more creative’ and when my department moved to Manchester in 2011, I pivoted into the world of heritage and Museums. I didn’t have the typical background to become a Museum person so I am grateful various leaders who took a leap of faith and hired me.
I joined the London Transport Museum in 2018 as the Deputy Director and began my journey into the wonderful world of transport and how it has shaped London – past, present and future.
I became Director and CEO in 2023 and have the immense privilege to lead this amazing organisation and our wonderful people. I had many incredible female role models in my family growing up: my mother was spurred to become an entrepreneur to support two kids after a divorce; my grandmother earned a PhD and worked as a social worker and raised three children (including my Dad). These women had grit.
I hope I have set a good example for my own children and other young people – never give up and go after your dreams.
This little girl is me…
Koli Begum, Recruitment Administrator, C9 Recruitment
You know the dutiful sister in the film Bend It Like Beckham, the one smiling through her scripted role while the rebel takes centre stage?
That was never me. I was Jess, the girl with grass-stained knees and a heart full of fire, football was my first language, my passion. But I was the middle child of six, watching my mother wage war against racism and poverty, I became the inconvenient truth-teller in a family that just wanted quiet compliance.
At nine, I learned grief before I learned long division. I remember that day like it was yesterday. The day the dinghy nouka came slicing through floodwaters to our doorstep, I heard my mother’s wail “Gita!”, through the monsoon rain that hammered the tin roof. My mother’s cry split the world in two. Cancer took my father mid-fight. The man who taught me kindness, fairness, integrity and mercy was gone. But his lessons stuck like sweat to skin: “Principles aren’t poetry. They’re the bones you stand on.” This became my compass, my quiet rebellion.
I was the girl who danced when no one was watching, whose body understood freedom even when my life didn’t. The first to hold a university acceptance letter like a grenade as news of my dance degree hit like a bad audition. The aunties’ whispers cut through dinner chatter ‘Footloose instead of medical school? Shame.’ The aunties’ silence was worse than their screams. “All that potential…gone kathak crazy,” they murmured, their disapproval clinging like monsoon sweat. But I’d rather blister my feet than my soul. Until they realized education wasn’t about respectability, but revolution. Suddenly, my sharp tongue wasn’t so charming anymore.
They shipped me back to Bangladesh to fix what wasn’t broken. To learn obedience, to remember my place. But you can’t un-teach a mind that’s learned to think. Can’t un-feet that have already danced on forbidden ground. They left me in a land that was supposed to be ‘home,’ but felt like a stranger’s house, and in that loneliness, I grew a spine of steel.
Little did I know that same spine would one day become the scaffolding holding up my disabled son’s world.
But you can’t un-grow the grit of a girl who’s survived borders, backhanded compliments, and the weight of a child’s future on her shoulders.
Here’s what they didn’t understand: I was never just the good girl. I was the quiet strategist, the one who sold her lunch tickets to buy her sister snacks while whispering, “Poverty is a season, not your name.” The one who folded her rage into pleats and smiled right until the music changed. And oh, how I dance now.
Bus driving? “Well, I never,” they gasped.
Or so they thought.
Me, the quiet middle daughter who once folded her dreams into samosa triangles, now manoeuvring a double-decker through London’s roads through rush hour chaos. The same hands that were supposed to clutch wedding henna now palming a gearstick; the obedient Koli who was meant to stay in her lane, literally changing routes.
The irony tastes sweet: After a lifetime as the bridge between worlds, Bangladesh and Britain, duty and defiance. I ended up driving one.
And the little girl in me?
She’s not just in the driver’s seat, she’s rewired the damn engine!
Still dancing, still defiant, still authentically me, taking the long way home.
“Because some of us were never meant to fit inside the frame.”
So I built my own damn gallery and so can you!
Emma Hignett, Voiceover Artist
I grew up in Lancashire, the youngest of three girls, and remember my mum telling me that leaving home was non-negotiable, that there was no job for me there. I did well at school but dancing was my passion and at 15, after O levels and after pestering my parents for a long time, I went to dance school in Chester. Three years later, I was a qualified dance teacher but wanted to perform … so set off on a few years of travelling around the world joining different companies as a dancer.
It was during this time that my dad said to me that he could see me ‘reading the news on telly on day’. So, I concluded, I’d dance while I could and then become a television presenter. When injuries stopped me dancing, I duly signed up for amateur radio in London. Radio fast became my love! I still look back on my time as cohost of the Red Dragon FM breakfast show in South Wales as the best radio job ever. I didn’t ever read the news on TV, but I was a TV weather girl alongside my radio work for some time.
I was in a radio sales office when they received a call from TfL asking for a selection of voices to test for the new iBus scheme. The person who took the call suggested I put my voice tape forward. Many months later two voices recorded the route 149, one male and me, and then in January 2006 they put one voice (mine 😊) on the buses for a 6 week test. All went well, and I went on to record, initially, 20,000 announcements in batches of 2000.
Over the years, to London buses was added London Overground trains, recorded when I was 39 weeks pregnant, Riverbus, Go North East, East Yorkshire, Transpora, Midland Classic, and The Elizabeth Line.
That first contract to record for TfL changed my career, and led to the build of a studio in my loft at home. Now I voice most days, and whilst I’ve put my voice to everything from the ‘how to guide’ for Amazon Fire TV stick to the ‘how to’ guide for pilots, to advertisements for washing machines, airlines and care homes, I will always be most proud of my transport announcements. I’ve stopped counting how many I have done, but I guesstimate that by now it must now be topping 75,000.
Jennie Martin, Chair, Bus Users UK
This little girl was never much of a little girl but there is more than one correct way.
She was born in 1961 in small-town Sweden, the first child of parents who had both been the first in their families to go to university, and were finding their feet living lives very different from their own parents. She was always a serious, thoughtful and bookish child – hardly a little girl at all by some standards, with not a frilly pink anything in sight.
She hated school but did very well at it – that Protestant work ethic isn’t wholly a myth. There was never any question of not doing one’s best at whatever task, no matter how boring. With hindsight, the hatred of school was simply a strong desire for freedom and self-determination, things in short supply with a timetable and homework ruling the days.
The family spent long holidays in the UK every year and she loved the faster pace of life, the big cities, and the feeling of being connected to the rest of the world. When she finally escaped education at 19, she came to England on an au pair visa to spend a year becoming fluent in English. 19 is a tricky age and within a year she was going out with an English young man and had some decisions to make – get married and get a visa to stay, or split up and go home. Those were simple days in terms of immigration.
End result: a very young marriage, indefinite leave to remain, and studying at Kings College London which finally showed her that learning can be a passion, not a drag. Three hours of formal tuition a week really was freedom. But when she graduated with a first and tutors talking about masters, she knew that she needed to connect with her husband’s life and get a job. He had worked since the age of 16 and was never going to join the world of academia, so she needed to join the world of work, if they were not going to drift apart.
The first graduate scheme she was offered was with British Rail in the station catering division and so quite by accident she found her world – the transport sector. Working on railway stations with their history and their never-ending big and small dramas was more than a job, it was like a home. She slid towards the engineering and technical side, moving into the bit of the business that built and maintained the catering outlets. She travelled all over the UK on site visits and her work fate was sealed. The institutional misogyny of the railway sector in those days was remarkable, but maybe helped by growing up in light-years ahead Sweden and knowing in her bones that it didn’t actually matter whether men liked her or not, that was not a big thing. It must have been excruciating for women brought up differently.
Now it is thirty years later and she has retired from paid work, after many years leading the UK’s association for transport technology. She has letters after her name and people come up to her and tell her about things she did way back which changed their working lives for the better. She sits on boards, does a bit of mentoring and speaks at events, hoping to give back to a sector which provided her with the best working life she could have hoped for.
Kathryn Pulham, Consultant for Go-Ahead & Director, BluClarity
The daughter of a farmer and B&B owner, I grew up living a simple, sheltered life. Holidays were rare — usually on another farm in November when things were quieter!
From a young age, I wanted to help others. At just seven, I was taking bookings, serving breakfasts, cleaning rooms, and even helping move the cows and feed the pet lambs. Surrounded by adults, I learned early how to communicate and connect with people.
Work has always been second nature to me. I thrive on being busy, purposeful, and making an impact.
At 22, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. My tumour was large and had spread, and the outlook wasn’t good. After months of chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and surgery, I came through it, supported by my family, with renewed resilience and a deeper empathy for others.
Initially, I planned to become a clinical psychologist, but an unexpected opportunity led me to join Andy in his family business, Pulhams Coaches. I’ve always believed I could turn my hand to most things — and I did. Together, we built a thriving, award-winning company, achieving Guild membership and DVSA Earned Recognition.
I’ve project managed a new depot, launched a driving academy, developed wellbeing programmes, written policies, and introduced new tech and systems. Working in a male-dominated industry has been challenging at times, but I’ve learned to rise above the bias and prove my worth.
Today, using my knowledge and experiences, I’m proud to help shape the future of our sector through my work with BluClarity, Women in Bus and Coach, and the CPT Presidency — continuing to inspire others, just as that little girl once dreamed.
When I look back, I could never have imagined where that little girl from the farm would end up. The bus and coach industry has given me a career full of purpose and connection, and it needs more women with passion, empathy, and determination to help drive it forward. To any woman wondering if she belongs in this industry — you do!
Kerry Turner, Director, Women in Bus and Coach
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Never be limited by other people’s expectations of you
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Be unapologetically and authentically you
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You are enough
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Never stop challenging yourself
