Leeann Dempster is a Scottish football executive. She is the Chief Executive (CEO) of Queen's Park, having previously held the same position at
Motherwell
Motherwell ( sco, Mitherwall, gd, Tobar na Màthar) is a town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Historically in the parish of Dalziel and part of Lana ...
Dempster worked in advertising before becoming sales and marketing director for
Zoom Airlines
Zoom Airlines Inc. was a Canadian low-fare scheduled transatlantic airline with its headquarters in the Place Bell Canada building in Ottawa, Ontario. Zoom operated year-round scheduled services to Europe, and charter services to South Am ...
for two years.
After the airline's collapse, John Boyle, co-founder of the airline and owner of Motherwell FC, recruited Dempster, first as general manager, then chief executive. In her time at Motherwell, the team finished second in the Scottish Premiership twice, and third once, reaching the qualifying rounds for the
2012–13 UEFA Champions League
The 2012–13 UEFA Champions League was the 58th season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 21st season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League.
The final was p ...
.
She moved to Hibernian in June 2014. The club won the
Scottish Cup
The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,2016, for the first time since 1902. They achieved promotion to the
Scottish Premiership
The Scottish Premiership, known as the cinch Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is the top division of the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL), the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland. The Scottis ...
in 2017, and subsequently finished in the top six twice.
On 26 November 2020, it was announced that Dempster would step down as CEO of Hibernian, after six years. On 12 January 2021, Queen's Park announced Dempster was to join the club as Chief Executive.
Personal life
Dempster was brought up in the East End of
Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated pop ...
by a
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...
mother and a
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
father. Her family supported
Rangers
A Ranger is typically someone in a military/paramilitary or law enforcement role specializing in patrolling a given territory, called “ranging”. The term most often refers to:
* Park ranger or forest ranger, a person charged with protecting and ...
. Before her professional involvement in football, Dempster had been a Rangers season ticket holder but had long since let her attendance lapse.
Dempster has spoken about realising she was gay in her 20s. She entered into a civil partnership in 2007.