 Sharon Harroun Peirce has extensive experience in business
development, leadership education, post-conflict reconciliation,
event management and fund-raising.
Educated in Virginia and Georgia, Sharon began her career as a
teacher and also worked in the fashion industry. In 1982, she
co-founded an award winning advertising and public relations agency,
where for fifteen years she took the lead on business development
and handling client relationships. Later, she helped the City of
Londonderry in Northern Ireland with its business development
objectives in the US, and also worked with UK-based Churchill
Leadership, a company headed by Winston Churchill's granddaughter.
For sixteen years, Sharon was actively involved with the
Children's Friendship Project for Northern Ireland (a non-profit
organization that brought together teens from two factions of a
divided country), serving as a board member, regional coordinator,
host parent and from 2002 to 2004 as Chairman. Committed to peace
building in Northern Ireland, she also took an active role in
networking with national and local governments, politicians,
officials, community and business leaders, academics, non-profits
and other organizations in the US, UK, Ireland and Northern Ireland.
She was on the organizing committee of the 1998 Vital Voices
conference in Belfast, which promoted the role of women in
leadership, and in 1999 brokered a training partnership between the
Marriott Corporation and the Northern Ireland Department of Training
and Labour. In 2007, she was a featured speaker at a University of
Southern California conference, which focused on the role of
unofficial diplomacy in building peace in Northern Ireland.
In 2000, in recognition of her contributions in Northern Ireland,
Sharon was one of only 32 recipients of the US State Department's
Millennium International Volunteer Award for outstanding achievement
in the voluntary sector. Sharon's other voluntary work has included
founding and directing an ESL (English as a Second Language) program
in Herndon, Virginia. A longtime active member of the Rotary Club,
in 2005 she was awarded a Paul Harris Fellowship of Rotary for her
extraordinary contribution to community work in that state.
Since her husband's 2005 appointment as British Consul General in
Los Angeles, Sharon has played an active role in Southern California
business, charitable and youth programs, coordinating numerous
business development, fundraising and other events for the Consulate
and other organizations. She is a governing board member of
LA's BEST, an
after school program for 30,000 school children in the most
challenged neighborhoods of Greater Los Angeles. She has been
instrumental in involving many British and American companies,
organizations and celebrities in the work of LA's BEST. |
