I'm here today with Roshni Bakshi,
Managing Director and Head of Impact at Ever Student Capital.
Roshni, thanks so much for taking the time and it's really great
to have worked together on our recent research, looking into diversity
and inclusion in the fund industry in Singapore and Southeast Asia.
Lots of really interesting insights from that research.
What was your top pick?
First of all, a pleasure.
And it's been fantastic working with BCG.
If you remember, we went into this with some hypothesis.
some of it we
we saw happening in front of us,
not enough senior women as you go through when you meet people,
women doing a lot more functional roles
as opposed to active investing and operating roles.
We wanted 50% and 60% in functional roles.
Wow. I mean, it just shows that,
you know, fashion, maybe the fund industry is bringing in women,
but putting them in areas which the rest of the fund
industry feels comfortable doing.
So that was, you know, one, interesting piece that we took out.
The second one, if you remember, was in terms
of firms awareness to putting the AI in place,
which I was very positively surprised with, I did not expect it.
In fact, they've we spoke to the HR managers.
They in fact have the centers that they follow, policies and compliances
and rules ensuring that there is and, you know, no discrimination,
that there are enough women in the in the in the firms that they, that they have.
But when we spoke to the women,
what was what came through was that there's a big gap between what they expect
and what's there as policies and processes.
So why didn't you tell me some of the stuff that you saw?
Actually, I felt that there was quite some discrepancy between
what the companies are focusing on,
which was a lot around policy, is making sure there's
equal representation in senior levels,
but at the same time, to, female employees on the ground
really wanted
and felt was practically helpful, which was much more around very practical
things like more flexibility on working hours, more flexibility
on where and how to work, which are all very practical things.
Apparently moving much more the needle for individuals
than some of these policies that are up there.
And I was really encouraged by that on the one side, because I felt there's
a things that are very easy and practical to implement,
but at the same time, we
haven't seen funds doing so much of that, or at least not in a structured way.
So definitely something the companies can work on.
But yet very practical.
Women have different life stages, and the most important one
is when you support her.
When she's had her first child and I think if she goes through that hump,
she's able to climb further.
So I think that's that's an important one for firms to take.
The other thing that we put together was the seven pointers.
If you remember at the end, which was our analysis of what can be done
practically for the industry to really bring on board and retain more of them.
It's not about bringing them on board,
but to retain them and enable and encourage them to grow.
One of that was actually finding
senior mentors for younger women because there are questions.
They don't know whether you know
what they're doing is right or wrong, what should where should they go?
How should their career grow?
Because I think men have a lot of that continuously,
mentors, colleagues, others, alumni that they can reach out to.
Women don't have so many.
And that's what the data showed, right?
Like almost 70% of the survey respondents were actually
looking for a more structured talent management approach.
Yes, in the companies and particularly more senior mentors
and could be male and female.
And what I found interesting was
that it's not about the availability of mentors, right.
So there's a lot of seniors who are actually willing to take on that role.
But somehow the match doesn't really work today.
And I think that's really where firms can help with in the more structured May
to bringing talent and mentors together and really kind of make that work.