How can we promote diversity in the credit sector?

Is finance - particularly the credit sector - as male-dominated as it was? While there have been significant improvements over recent years, there is still a long way to go to reach real equality.

Across the finance industry, women are paid 30% less than men, which is over double the average UK salary gap of 14%. It would, perhaps, be a straightforward issue to fix if there was just one factor to explain this discrepancy.

Unfortunately, this imbalance is the result of many, deeply ingrained issues that have been at play for decades – from bias within education, bias within the workplace and bias within society.

Ultimately, this leads to significantly reduced career progression for those women who have pursued a career in financial services.

Corporate to start-up - navigating the change

I have worked in finance for over twelve years, starting in consulting and banking operational roles. In 2019, I joined Creditspring as the head of operations, Creditspring’s first hire of its operations team. It was a big risk for me to leave a large corporate environment to join a small start-up, but one I was excited to take.

I was Creditspring’s first operational hire, tasked with recruiting an effective and successful team to meet our ambitious business goals. Four years later, I look at the diverse and talented team we’ve built with enormous pride. 43% of the Creditspring team is female, including 40% of our senior leadership at the C-suite level.

Diversity is vital to our business strategy; after all, how can we truly know the needs and challenges of our diverse customer base if our team is not reflective of the society we live in? Having a range of genders, ages, ethnicities, faiths, and beliefs in our team gives us a greater understanding of our customer base and helps us to make business decisions with them specifically in mind.

The risk of moving from a sprawling corporate to start-up was one that challenged and inspired me. I believe that the willingness to take risks unlocks new opportunities.

It pushes you out of your comfort zone and allows individuals to develop new skills. I believe we need to take risks to succeed, and although it can be daunting to adapt this attitude, I think it’s an important lesson to learn. The opportunities I’ve had access to at Creditspring are ones that would not have been possible in my previous life within large corporates.

My experience of being a woman of colour in credit

My career path hasn’t only been defined by my roles, it has also been defined by being a woman of colour. Coming into a consulting role initially, I’ve had to trust my own expertise to battle the resistance to change of predominantly older, white men. It was clear early on that I needed to trust my expertise and my gut.

I developed strategies early on of working hard, building my confidence, and most importantly, believe in myself. These strategies got me into the C-suites and allowed me to share my ideas without the constant resistance I once faced.

Women of colour are consistently underrepresented and under-hired at every step in their careers. Between entry-level positions and C-suites, the number of women of colour drops by more than 75%. Change is slow.

So slow that in the last three years there has been no improvement in the proportion of women of colour in senior positions. With fewer women of colour in senior positions, the opportunities for women to progress in their careers also drops. The next generation needs senior mentors to build a network and learn from.

We often tell younger generations to seek support and set-up a network of people that can help them. Without women in senior positions, the ability to grow this network and find support isn’t there.

Diversity in credit

Organisations in the credit sector need to have strong values – this is vital in attracting and retaining the best talent, growing their customer base and scaling rapidly.

For Creditspring, diversity is vital to how we operate. Diversity allows us to better understand out customers and their needs. It also allows us to focus on diversity on all levels of the company, from entry to C-suite. Gender balanced leadership gives younger generations the chance to network with people like them, as well as leads to a happier and more productive workforce.

For the financial and fintech industries to become gender diverse, it is crucial for individuals to see people they can relate to in the most senior positions. Leadership should represent employees, society and - most importantly -customers to ensure the business makes the best decisions whilst considering the diverse needs of its customers.

Luckily there have always been trailblazing women in business- Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg and Starling Bank chief executive Anne Boden are two of my biggest professional influences. These are women we should be celebrating and using as examples to women who are early on in their careers.

Showing others that success in a male-dominated industry is possible will hopefully inspire others and help to grow those networks that are so important. We know that gender-balanced senior leadership leads to a happier, more productive workforce – which is absolutely vital at SMEs.

We know when women are in C-suite positions it inspires younger generations to pursue industries, even if they are male-dominated. Now we need to get together and break the bias. We need to create and foster a finance industry that is diverse and inclusive for all.