Aegon Asset Management increases female representation in UK senior roles to 35%
Aegon Asset Management has increased female representation across its UK senior management team to more than 35%, exceeding its 2021 target, as part of its commitment to HM Treasury’s Women in Finance Charter.
Aegon AM became a signatory to the Charter in April 2018, pledging to work with the UK Treasury and other signatories to address gender balance across all UK financial services firms. At the time of signing it had 22% female representation in senior roles and committed to a target of 30% by the end of 2021. As of end-August 2021, Aegon AM had increased female representation to 35.7%.
To achieve this Aegon AM introduced a number of policies and actions including:
- Holding itself to account through a transparent diversity scorecard
- Introducing enhanced gender-neutral parental leave in the UK
- Refining its hiring practices with a focus on Inclusive Recruitment and gender balanced candidate slates and interview panels
- Building seven new internal I&D communities, including one with a dedicated focus on advancing gender equality, with Board-level executive sponsorship
- Partnering with organisations focused on building a pipeline of female talent, such as early careers programmes
- Supporting its people through the global pandemic with the wellbeing needs and work-life balance
- Continuing to work with The UK Diversity Project, which aims to accelerate progress towards an inclusive culture in the investment and savings industry www.diversityproject.com
Stephen Jones, UK CEO and CIO of equities and multi-asset & solutions at Aegon AM, says: “Inclusion and Diversity is core to our culture and we are working across all locations including the UK on initiatives to improve our gender diversity at our senior leadership level. We have this year embarked on an Inclusive Leadership programme of training for 100 leaders across the business and Inclusion and Diversity education is mandatory for all existing employees and new joiners. We recognise that more needs to be done but we are pleased to have already exceeded our 2021 target for female representation at senior management level and look forward to making greater progress in the months and years to come.”