Whittaker was the first female CEO of a TSX listed company and during her career held senior positions at Electronic Data Systems, Royal Bank of Canada, CanWest Global Communications Corporation and Standard Life.

[3] Whittaker began her career as a federal anti-trust officer and gained her MBA at York's Schulich School of Business.

[7] In 1993, Whittaker joined Electronic Data Systems (EDS) based in Plano, Texas (now a part of Hewlett Packard Enterprise), at that time one of the leading providers of information technology services.

[citation needed]} She is also one of the longest serving independent directors of Imperial Oil, the Canadian subsidiary of ExxonMobil.

[9] As a result, Whittaker has been featured on the front of The New York Times as having broken the glass ceiling and been labelled ‘The Pioneer’ by The Globe and Mail in their ‘Women in Power’ series.

[10] While serving at both Cancom and Electronic Data Systems, Whittaker was appointed to several non-executive roles in North America and the UK.

[5] Following her move to the United Kingdom and subsequent retirement from EDS in 2005, Whittaker was appointed to the board of the insurance company Standard Life in September 2009.

[14] Mount Saint Vincent University described her as ‘an accomplished Canadian businesswoman with a history of breaking glass ceilings’.

[16] The boy's mother, Grace Gardner, and her sister Isabella was put on trial for the murder of the child as the only suspects in the crime.