Camilla Cavendish is a Financial Times columnist and author of Extra Time: 10 Lessons for an Ageing World. She previously led the No. 10 Policy Unit under Prime Minister David Cameron, where she developed the sugar tax. Her work examines the implications of AI, automation, the future of work, and the challenges of an ageing population. She advocates for managing multigenerational workplaces, a career 'lattice' model, and the importance of emotional intelligence in healthcare.
Before her role at the Policy Unit, Camilla was a columnist and Chief Leader Writer at The Times and its Sunday edition. She has also worked as a consultant for McKinsey, at Pearson, and served as a Non-Executive Director of the Care Quality Commission. During the 2020 pandemic, she advised the Secretary of State for Health and made recommendations for social care reform. After leaving Downing Street, she became a member of the House of Lords and a Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, focusing on demographic challenges. Camilla addresses the political and social impacts of a divided population and the generational divide in the workforce in her speeches.
She frequently appears on broadcast media, including Question Time and BBC Radio 4, and writes a weekly OpEd column for the Financial Times. As a crossbench peer in the House of Lords, she serves on the Advisory Committee of Phoenix Insights for Better Longer Lives and is Patron of Frontline, which places graduates in social work. She holds degrees from Oxford and Harvard.