Programme studied and graduation year: Executive Global Master’s in Management, 2020.
Leadership, entrepreneurship and a commitment to creating lasting impact have shaped Lubna Kayyali’s career since graduating from LSE. From leading governance and compliance advisory work across international markets to launching her own fine jewellery brand inspired by heritage, memory and sustainability, she has combined strategic expertise with a passion for building something of her own. In this Alumni of the Month interview, she reflects on her career journey, the lessons she has learned from balancing multiple ventures, and her advice for aspiring entrepreneurs.
What are your current areas of focus, professionally or otherwise?
Two things, mostly. I lead governance and compliance advisory at Damerdji Holding, where I design governance frameworks for cross-border holding groups and regulated entities across the UAE, GCC, US, and EU. The work covers delegations of authority, board charters, escalation protocols, and regulatory alignment across CBUAE, SCA, DIFC, ADGM, and VARA.
In parallel, I founded illi Collection, a fine jewelry house specializing in sustainable materials and bespoke commissions. The brand draws on the tradition of jewelry as memory and inheritance, set against a contemporary, architectural sensibility. On the side, I co-host a podcast called Unscripted with Lubna & Hawa, where we explore identity, culture, and the questions most of us are still trying to answer.
Tell us about your career journey since graduating from LSE?
I came to LSE after almost a decade across Qatar Investment Authority and consulting work in New York. I was a corporate governance specialist trying to understand the management side of the institutions I was advising. The programme gave me that bridge.
After LSE, I spent four years deepening the governance work: building AML/CFT controls for a multinational venture group across three continents, then a stint in fintech and digital assets law in Washington, DC, then I obtained my Juris Doctorate in law from Georgetown University.
In 2024, I joined Damerdji Holding to lead group governance and compliance, and to head its advisory practice serving external clients across the region. Illi Collection began quietly in 2021, I had been investing in gold jewellery for years. I see gold (and precious metals) as a vehicle for building financial independence. The decision to create illi as a business came from the same instinct that pulled me toward LSE: a need to make, not only to advise.
What skills have you learnt along the way?
- Strategic Communication & Translation: Ability to bridge the gap between regulators and operators, legal requirements and practical business needs, translating complex concepts into clear, actionable decisions.
- Strategic Thinking & Framework: Applying governance and management frameworks to real-world challenges, with the ability to understand, articulate and teach strategic concepts effectively.
- Precision & Attention to Detail: Developed through both governance advisory work and jewellery design, where accuracy, careful judgement and a focus on what matters most are essential.
- Critical Judgement & Decision-Making: Balancing technical requirements with human insight to make sound decisions, ensuring governance structures work effectively in practice, not just on paper.
What inspired you to set up your own business?
It started with a word - illi is Aramaic for what belongs to me. After fourteen years designing governance frameworks for other people's companies, the obvious question became impossible to ignore. What would I make that was mine. Jewellery was not a pivot. I grew up around women who treated gold the way other cultures treat letters or photographs: as a way of carrying memory forward. A piece of jewellery in the Levant is rarely just decoration. It is dowry, inheritance, a celebration of important moments in life. I wanted to build a house that honored that, while making pieces matching the aesthetics of today.
The skills transfer more than people assume. Provenance, sourcing, supply integrity, customer data: these are governance questions before they are brand ones. illi is what it looks like when those instincts make something instead of advising on it.
Has your career worked out the way you envisioned?
No, and I am glad. The version of my career I imagined at 22 was narrower than the one I actually have. I expected to make partner somewhere. Instead I built a regulatory practice, a jewellery house, and a podcast, and the three feed each other in ways I could not have planned for.
What were the most valuable lessons you took away from studying at LSE?
That the best management thinking is not separate from culture, ethics, or history. The programme treated companies as social objects, not just balance sheets. That stayed with me. When I write a board charter today, I am thinking about power and accountability, not just the legal form.
The second lesson was the cohort. Executive students bring fully-formed careers into the room. The conversations in seminars (and the friendships outside the classroom) taught me as much as the syllabus.
What’s the greatest challenge you’ve had to overcome?
Building two distinct businesses, advisory and illi, while the world insists you choose a lane. The pressure to be one legible thing is real, especially as a woman in regulated industries. I have learnt to let the work answer for me. Clients come for the rigor. illi customers come for the eye. The same person can do both, even if it takes a while for the market to catch up.
If you had one piece of advice you could give your younger self, what would it be?
Start before you feel ready, but build the governance early. Most founders I know who hit a wall later did so because they treated structure as something to handle once the business was big. The opposite is true. Good governance from the start makes everything that follows simpler: hiring, fundraising, partnerships, exits. The companies that grow fastest are usually the ones that put the scaffolding in place early.
Share with us your fondest memory of the Department of Management.
The Executive cohort itself. Lawyers, founders, bankers, doctors, all mid-career, each bringing distinct perspectives of practice and experience into one room. The conversations were diverse, wide-ranging, and genuinely informative. That is what I remember most.
If you would like to be our Alum of the Month or if you would like to nominate a Department of Management alumni, please email dom.alumni@lse.ac.uk.