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.
This seems like a good initiative. I started with the NAB 33 years ago and at the time there were little to no women that made it further than a teller. In 1986 I got married, I knew it would be detrimental to my career, as the NAB merged with the CBC in 1983 and around the time policy in the CBC and the NAB was that the Branch Manager had to interview a female’s prospective husband to find out if they were “suitable” to be married to a female bank employee. If they were found to be “unsuitable” the female employee had to resign from the Bank, if they were found “suitable” then they were allowed to stay on. I was lucky enough to be part of the bank’s “affirmative action” programme called “Women in Management” in 1985, however, when I then got engaged and married in 1986, my career progression stopped/ I was placed on NSW relieving staff where I stayed for nearly three years. I then got a really good job at Ryde, then Eastwood. Then I was transferred to Dural at my request, and then I got pregnant, which was really the end of my career with the Bank, as the Bank in 1989 had no place for women with children. I told the bank I would be going on maternity leave for 3 months, they told me why not take 6 months. I actually returned after 2 months maternity leave as I was very centered on my career, and my pregnancy was not really planned, but it was very welcome! My job was given to someone else which was really difficult as I lived at Dural and I could walk to work and return home at lunch time to breast feed. I was told I had to go to Galston which was not far from home but far enough that I couldn’t breast feed, so I had to give that up and wean my son. I was then transferred to Pennant Hills only 8kms from home, but because of traffic and road works it took over 2 hours some day to get to work. I had to get up at 5.30 am to get ready to leave at 7.00am and I would sometimes get to work at 9.00am because of traffic. I asked not to be transferred as I had by that stage secured childcare at Galston very close to work and I could leave home at 8.00am drop my son and still make it two work by 8.30am. My career just stagnated after that, so I found another job as a Relief Senior Personal Banker with Barclays Bank Australia Ltd Private Banking at Pennant Hills now St George Private Bank.
I suppose the short story is that it is wonderful how time have changed. As a quozi St George ex-employee, it is nice to see the bank have this initiative for women.
At 50 I am still working in finance, working for an ex-employee of the NAB whom I worked with as a Typiste/Clerk typing up loan applications for the Manager, he was the Accountant.
I am till doing the same thing, but it a different way, applying for loans on line. I am also in the process of doing my Certificate IV in Mortgage Broking, I could have applied for prior learning but chose to do the full course, to be up to date.
In the meantime I have qualified as a Licensed Conveyancer, and had my own practice, however, I still have to do the course.
Having been a woman in the finance industry for over 33 years, it is nice to see this change, perhaps younger women don’t appreciate how many changes have been made over the past 30 or so years for women in finance and this is why women are so under represented. It was not easy to forge a career in this industry and perseverance was required to do so.
2013, is a new era, i believe and I welcome this initiative to attract and retain quality women finance professionals, I think perhaps in the past it was just given lip service, something to put on your 1985 affirmative action report, to meet the banks quotas!
Catherine Robson is an exceptional talent as an Adviser and as a leader in the truest sense of the word. Well done to her for so clearly spelling out the benefits of leave on performance, productivity and creativity for ALL and, most importantly, acting on it – what an excellent idea Affinity has implemented under Catherine and they will no doubt reap the benefits. From all of us working to make changes such as this happen, thank you Catherine for your inspiration! Wishing you all the best.
Kudos to Catherine Robson for recognising that it is not just about keeping and attracting female planners/ advisers it is about keeping and retaining quality professionals regardless of gender.