Nicola Sturgeon will leave office as the longest-standing and first female First Minister since the creation of the Scottish Parliament.
After joining the Scottish National Party at the age of 16, she entered the political arena at 21 in a losing effort at the 1992 General Election.
However, she would go on to become one of the first tranche of MSPs to be elected to the Scottish Parliament in 1999.
READ MORE: Nicola Sturgeon resigns as Scottish First Minister — LIVE
The SNP became the second-largest party and sat in opposition to the Labour-LibDem coalition.
Ms Sturgeon served as shadow minister for children and education in Alex Salmond's shadow cabinet from 1999 to 2000, before later taking shadow minister roles in health and justice.
She rose through the ranks of the SNP, seeking the leadership in 2004 after the departure of her future deputy, John Swinney.
But when Mr Salmond stepped back into the contest, she became his running mate and upon the announcement of the results she became deputy leader of the party.
As the leader of the opposition in Holyrood, she often clashed with then-First Minister Jack McConnell over a range of issues at FMQs.
Ms Sturgeon led the SNP at the Scottish Parliament until the 2007 election when Mr Salmond was elected as an MSP.
The election also saw the SNP emerge as the largest party and Mr Salmond became the First Minister of Scotland with Ms Sturgeon as his deputy.
Ms Sturgeon took on the role of secretary for health and wellbeing and her overseeing of the swine flu epidemic would foreshadow her later stewardship of Scotland through the coronavirus pandemic.
In 2011, the SNP returns to power with an overall majority and Ms Sturgeon continues her role as deputy First Minister.
During a reshuffle Nicola Sturgeon is appointed as Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Capital Investment and Cities, leaving her role as Health Secretary.
As part of the role, she pledged to build a high-speed railway line between Glasgow and Edinburgh by 2024 - a plan which was abandoned in 2016.
She is also put in charge of the SNP's Scottish Independence Referendum campaign.
In 2013, Ms Sturgeon and Mr Salmond launched Scotland's Future - the Scottish Government's prospectus for independence.
READ MORE: Possible SNP leader and First Minister candidates
The campaign thrust Ms Sturgeon to the fore as she took to the streets to build support, speaking at venues across the country and culminating in a speech to 12,000 people at the Hydro in Glasgow.
In the wake of the Yes campaign’s 55%-45% defeat in the 2014 referendum, Alex Salmond resigned, setting the stage for his long-time deputy to step up.
On Salmond's resignation, she said: "The personal debt of gratitude I owe Alex is immeasurable. He has been my friend, mentor and colleague for more than 20 years."
"I can think of no greater privilege than to seek to lead the party I joined when I was just 16," she added at the time.
She was elected unopposed as SNP leader and backed by her MSPs to become First Minister.
Sturgeon was formally acclaimed as the first female Leader of the SNP on November 14, 2014 at the Autumn Conference in Perth
In the first election at the helm of the party, Sturgeon led the SNP through a landslide victory in the 2015 UK general election - winning 56 out of 59 seats at Westminster.
This momentous victory saw the SNP overtake the Liberal Democrats to become the third-biggest party in the UK.
In 2016, the SNP loses its overall majority at the Scottish Parliament election but remains the largest party.
After Scotland backs remaining in the EU in the same year, Nicola Sturgeon confirms that the Scottish Government was looking to draft legislation for a second referendum.
The following year, in the UK General Election the SNP loses 21 although they remain the biggest party in Scotland.
Ms Sturgeon’s close relationship with Mr Salmond fell apart and would go on to become a key point in Ms Sturgeon’s career.
The fall-out came after sexual harassment allegations were made against Mr Salmond – who was later acquitted.
The Scottish Government was forced to pay more than £500,000 towards Mr Salmond’s legal fees for their handling of the complaints.
Following his acquittal, Mr Salmond claimed there had been a “deliberate” attempt to damage his career by leading SNP figures, a claim which Ms Sturgeon strongly denied, saying her former mentor was angry at her refusal to make the allegations “go away”.
An investigation later found Ms Sturgeon did not breach the ministerial code in her handling of the issue.
Ms Sturgeon’s historic leadership oversaw a challenging health crisis as she announced a string of restrictions to curb the spread of coronavirus in 2020.
During this time, briefings became commonplace amid constantly evolving restrictions.
Ms Sturgeon will stand down from the top post without realising her key political ambition – securing Scottish independence.
Her government has also been facing criticism as the NHS struggles to recover from the impact of the pandemic, with soaring waiting times in emergency departments.
Sturgeon’s main political ambition was to lead Scotland to independence – but after the Supreme Court ruled last year that Holyrood could not lawfully legislate on the constitutional issue, her party will meet next month to discuss treating the next UK election as a “de facto referendum”.
In recent weeks, Ms Sturgeon has also been quizzed on the origin of finances used by her husband, Peter Murrell, to loan the SNP more than £100,000 to assist with cashflow.
Ms Sturgeon married the SNP chief executive in 2010. It emerged in December that Mr Murrell, the SNP chief executive, made the load in June 2021 – however, the First Minister has said the funds were entirely his own.
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