Mark.Freed / 28 Jan 2020
Why it’s time to drop the stereotypes I am a middle-aged man. At some point, though I’m trying not to think about it, I’ll have to start dropping the ‘middle’ and replace it with ‘old’. As a white middle-class...
Read moreMark.Freed / 21 Jan 2020
The “old boys’ club” is still going strong Four years ago, the report by Jayne-Anne Gadhia that led to the launch of the Women in Finance Charter, now widely signed up to by the industry, pointed to the old boys’ network as a factor inhibiting...
Read moreMark.Freed / 02 Jan 2020
It’s now 1:30 in the morning. I am not often up this late, but when I am, it’s usually because I’m partying with my wife, Tina. Tonight is different, though. Something is keeping me awake, which is rare. I have a task in the...
Read moreMark.Freed / 16 Dec 2019
Is the tide starting to turn? I’m sure most people reading this blog post have heard about (and maybe even taken part in) the criticism of the recent Peloton ad. It’s quite something for a company that makes exercise bikes to have produced a short video...
Read moreMark.Freed / 16 Dec 2019
One step forward, one step back I’m really not sure how to react to the recent news coming out of TSB. Their leadership team is having its bonuses cut for failing to hit its own gender balance goals for senior roles. That’s a positive sign that...
Read moreMark.Freed / 10 Dec 2019
Need to improve your gender balance? Here’s an instant solution Lots of research and analysis has focused on gender diversity. A recent Harvard Business Review article, for example, goes in to some detail about how to recruit more women to your company. It starts by citing LinkedIn research...
Read moreKatie.Dix / 10 Dec 2019
Taking diversity seriously: gender identity While the gender balance at all levels of an organisation is an important, and measurable, element of a company’s diversity policy, it is by no means the only one. Creating an inclusive environment is also significant if you want to help everyone work...
Read moreMark.Freed / 04 Dec 2019
Good news for Davids. Bad news for women. I saw a great statistic from Morning Star, a couple of weeks ago where they had run an analysis on UK-listed open-ended funds to explore the gender balance. I doubt you’ll need me to tell you that women were...
Read moreMark.Freed / 04 Dec 2019
One of the most important things in fund management, from a manager’s perspective at least, is their investment record. Analysts, and many investors, like to see long fund tenures without interruptions, but this works against anyone who takes a career break. For many years, this would have mainly...
Read moreKatie.Dix / 03 Dec 2019
Location: London Start date: March 2020 Programme: 8 month returner programme Applications open: Monday 2nd December 2019 Applications close: Friday 3rd January 2020 We are delighted to see our partners Janus Henderson launching their Returner Programme, another demonstration of the commitment our clients have made to diversity and support women to continue and...
Read moreMark.Freed / 27 Nov 2019
I was very interested to read an article in Bloomberg earlier this month about women deserting trading floors as they are blocked from the path to management. It seems that for all the enthusiasm that financial companies show about bringing more women into their workforce, there is significantly less desire...
Read moreMark.Freed / 27 Nov 2019
Latest FCA research: Little change at the top Recently published research by the FCA paints a sorry picture for women at senior levels in the financial services industry. If you wanted to be generous (though why would you?), there would be a temptation to highlight the rapid growth in the...
Read moreMark.Freed / 18 Nov 2019
On the 12th November an amazing group of industry leaders in Recruitment, HR and D&I from leading CIB’s and Asset Managers, got together with business leaders and Julia Hoggett, Head of Market Oversight and Kevin Trainor Head of Resourcing & Talent from the FCA, to...
Read moreKatie.Dix / 18 Nov 2019
Man Group are kindly hosting an E2W event on the 2nd of December around the theme of Resposible Investing. Elena Vydrine, a member of E2W, will be publishing a series of blogs in the run up to the event on the topic of ESG....
Read moreMark.Freed / 13 Nov 2019
This week I have met a number of people, separately, from a major investment bank here in London. I shall not name the bank as most readers will recognise the problem at their own banks. The bank’s gender pay gap report statistics are not dissimilar to...
Read moreMark.Freed / 13 Nov 2019
As we are preparing for our round table with Julia Hoggett, Director of Market Oversight at the FCA, we were interested to read a new report from the FCA. “Despite businesses facing ever greater scrutiny and criticism over gender diversity – with few industries more in the spotlight...
Read moreKatie.Dix / 04 Nov 2019
We are delighted to see that Investec have launched a market leading return to Work Programme. Not all careers in financial services are the same: It is possible to combine professional success with the entrepreneurial spirit and genuine relationships that bring an organisation to life. The answer lies in...
Read moreMark.Freed / 30 Oct 2019
Congratulaitons to Standard Life Aberdeen Congratulations and big well done to Standard Life Aberdeen who this week announced a new, market-leading parent leave policy that sets a new precedent across businesses in the UK. From 1 January 2020, all employees in the UK welcoming a child into their family will be...
Read moreMark.Freed / 29 Oct 2019
The Diversity Project and PWC have recently issued a new report “Diversity and inclusion in investment management” The report gives gender pay reporting praise for bringing the lack of diversity within the industry into sharp focus and added weight to the voices calling for faster change. ...
Read moreMark.Freed / 16 Oct 2019
We get many emails from members of our community sharing their frustrations and challenges. We received this one this week following up on some work I had done to call out some bad practice at a bank. Do you feel like this? Does it highlight the challenges faced by...
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