The Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) wants to inspire women from across the financial advice industry, while Westpac and St George Financial Planning aim to double the number of female planners by 2015.
AFA chief executive, Brad Fox, says the Inspire – Connecting Women in Advice initiative will provide a network and professional community for women so as to inspire them to make the very best of their abilities. It is aimed at women in all facets of financial services.
“We want to encourage all women in our industry to progress and achieve personal fulfillment throughout their financial services careers,” said Fox. “It’s a broad-based initiative that is consistent with the AFA culture around collaboration and inclusiveness.”
Making it easier for women to work
Fronting the campaign is Deborah Kent, a financial adviser and owner of Integra Financial Services, who was a finalist in the AFA Female Excellence in Advice Award in 2012.
“We are creating a program where participants can choose the level of support that is right for them,” she said. “We will be giving them a range of tools to help them plan their futures through both career and personal-life stages.”
The program will offer support for career development through networking, coaching, mentoring and leadership.
Westpac and St George Financial Planning are thinking along the same lines, recently announcing they aim to double the number of women working in planner roles by 2015 to over 700 planners.
The initiative will see current female representation in Westpac Financial Planning and St George Financial Planning increase from 26 per cent to 45 per cent over three years.
“We know women make great financial planners and it’s time we made it easier for women to work in our growing industry,” said Mark Spiers, general manager of advice at BT Financial Group.
“By looking at our own work practices and listening to the changes women need to make the profession more attractive, we are making real change to the way we attract and retain women to the profession.”
Leave equality
While structural change has already been made across the businesses to improve the flexibility of the employment offer and to increase the level of planner support, Professional Planner asked Catherine Robson, principal of Affinity Private, how she went about creating a great work environment for women.
One of the initiatives that Affinity Private has committed to under Robson, pictured right, is the provision of six months’ paid leave every five years for all employees, regardless of gender.
“This partly steams from a comment made by a gay colleague some years ago as I embarked on maternity leave,” she said. “With no aspiration to have kids, he implored me to enjoy the three-month ‘holiday’ for him as he was never going to get that entitlement.
“At the time I thought that it was just sour grapes, but in the years that have followed I have come to recognise that he had a point.
“I found the period immediately after returning from maternity leave the most creative and productive periods of my career to date.”
Robson believes that having a genuine break from work was an amazing boost to engagement and satisfaction.
“Now as an employer, I want to turbo-charge the engagement and satisfaction of my team, and lots of research suggests that more money is not the best answer,” she said.
“Having an extended break from work benefits the organisation not only by invigorating the individual taking leave, who brings back fresh ideas and perspective to the workplace. It also benefits those who are given the opportunity to grow and develop in their absence.
“Creating a great work environment is not just a gender issue. We believe that it is good business practice and men benefit just as much as women when they are given the opportunity to think creatively, and bring ideas from multiple disciplines drawn from their own experience.”
For more on successful female planning practitioners, click here.
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