Julian Ide

Well, so we know because we have lots of inquiries coming from all around the world. We have over 80% now of our questionnaires that we get or RFPs [request for proposal] and have questions about ESG. For example, in them, part of ESG is also about equity and inclusion. And if we were to turn up now at Institutional finals pitches with a 100% male line up, we explicitly would have challenges in that regard. And in some ways, I think that's worked well because it's forced us to think about things in a different way and it's had a dramatic impact on our business.

Five years ago we couldn't imagine how we were going to get senior female portfolio managers. Today we have two desk heads who are female, plus many more females within those investment teams. And that's partly driven by pressures within the business, but also, in the industry generally. But I think also we just need people that think differently about the problems and the challenges that we're facing as an industry.

So that's why I think it's an exciting environment and I'm delighted, of course, to be handing on to someone who can carry that torch, if you like, for the next however many years that's going to be. It's very exciting for me.

But I actually think, asset management is an ideal environment for all sorts of different reasons for women as well as men to be working in. But I think one of the complex issues at the moment is in the investment teams themselves. the client base likes continuity. And so when you're trying to bring change, you can't just change leadership in a way that you can in some other types of business and in some other areas of business.

We have been able to make demonstrable progress. And I think, it's going to take time. I think other parts of investment management, it may not be such a challenge and say passive management, for example, because what clients are looking for is different.

I have become more convinced that targets matter because I think they set an expectation and a direction of travel. I used to think they were not because I think the risk is that they drive behaviours which actually aren't supporting the very thing you're trying to do. But I think as long as targets are used in the right way, I think they are.

I think they're a very good and important part of building more diversity within an organisation.

I don't think there are set pathways. I think there are improvements in the way these work and as such more consciousness and understanding about the benefits creating those pathways. I think in our case, we began to understand that it was the pathway that was important and not just a decision that was made at a certain moment.

But I think there's so much further for us to go to build that more into our HR and development plans in general. But, we have an under-representation in distribution. We have an under-representation in investment management itself, those portfolio management teams. And we probably have an overrepresentation in the other services of central support services that sit alongside those.

So there is a lot more to do. I'm hopeful that because of the changes that have happened already, things accelerate because it becomes less of a “should we be doing this” and “how should we do this” becomes the real question.

Everybody says it's [executive gender balance] a given. This is a really difficult thing to do. Supposing you just say it's just not that difficult. How are we going to do it? And I think to me that's where organisations like 25x25 come in. And certainly the way we began to think about it, it's not should [it] is much more how are we going to do this?

So I think understanding how other organisations in different industries have managed to achieve change demystifies how difficult this may in reality be, dealing with the threats that people think it might bring to established ways of working. Sometimes these issues are not as big as people think they are. And I think it's having that network and of understanding and community, which helps us understand that more.