Corporate social responsibility
How we support women in finance
We strive to ensure that all of our customers and staff feel valued and included. Accordingly, we closely monitor our staff gender balance and focus on ways in which we can adapt our recruitment, training, benefits and employee support mechanisms to help us achieve our aim of increasing female representation at senior management level.
Women in Finance Charter
In June 2017, we became a signatory to the Women in Finance Charter, a government-led initiative designed to encourage gender balance across the financial services sector.
By signing up to the Charter, firms:
- indicate their commitment to support the progression of women into senior roles;
- set targets and implement the right strategy for their organisations to achieve those targets; and
- publicly report on progress to deliver against their targets to support the transparency and accountability needed to drive change.
When we signed the Charter in June 2017 we had a 28% female representation in senior management, and last year we were pleased to report that we had far exceeded our original Charter target with 37.1% of our senior management being female.
We have since narrowed our definition of the senior management population, as well as setting a new, more ambitious target. Our aim now is that 35% - 40% of our Senior Management will be female by the end of 2023.
As of June 2021, we have 26.8% female representation at senior management level. We believe we are on track to meet our Charter target by our deadline, and will be continuing with our efforts to attain that level.
What we have done so far
Maternity & Paternity
We have enhanced our maternity, paternity and shared parental leave pay policies, and refined our maternity buddy scheme.
Leadership development
Our annual leadership development programme continues to offer our pipeline of female senior managers the opportunity to develop.
Training
We have been training managers in interview techniques designed to reduce the likelihood of unconscious bias by managers who recruit ‘in their own image’.
Gender Pay Gap
The aim of gender pay gap reporting helps organisations understand the size and causes of their pay difference between men and women in their organisation and identify any issues that may need to be addressed
Key initiatives from our 2020 report
- Working with diversity-orientated recruitment firms, including those that support a return to work women and senior female hires
- Facilitating a company-wide shift towards a more flexible way of working• Participating in the 30% Club, a global campaign to increase gender diversity at the senior management level
- An in-house Leadership & Development programme to support career progression
- Offering in-house mentoring and buddies