Investec is committed to partnering with women as they rise and is celebrating women who are at the top of their game – in business, education
Investec South Africa is using this year’s International Women’s Day, Friday 8 March, to launch its ‘Women on the Rise’ Campaign which salutes and celebrates its year-round partnerships with women in business, education and sport.
For the weeks leading up to and post International Women’s Day, 10 women – from a chief economist to a senior aviation finance consultant – will be sharing their expert insights on the issues they deal with every day in the workplace. These stories, and others, can be viewed at www.investec.com/women. The goal, through the content, posters and twitter campaign, is to inspire the 3,511 women who work at Investec to rise to the top of their game and to create awareness, among men and women, about the importance of addressing gender parity and to inspire future businesswomen.
It was recently announced that two females have been appointed to Investec’s Group Management Forum: Devina Maharaj CA(SA) (head of Digital SA) and Marle van der Walt CA(SA), who was also appointed Specialist Bank CFO. This brings the number of women represented in this team to eight divisional heads* in the Investec Group Management Forum (SA).
“At Investec, we are about celebrating diversity and inspiring inclusion. We focus huge energy on our culture, and gender inequality in the workplace has always been on our agenda; culturally, individuality is essential for us to innovate and adapt. Embracing diversity and embodying inclusion is part of Investec’s culture, and one of our key values,” comments Lesley-Anne Gatter, Investec South Africa Human Resources head.
“And that’s what this campaign sets out to achieve. We live in a world where the 21st century workplace is fast-changing, competitive, pressurised and complex – a challenging environment for anyone. For women working in traditionally male-dominated industries, like banking and investment, these challenges can be even greater. We believe that a cognitively diverse, female, representative workforce emboldens creativity; it enables potential and encourages greater contribution to our achievements. We also know that, while we have worked to address greater representation of women, we have more to do.”
Fani Titi, Investec joint CEO, says, “It’s encouraging to see South Africa in the top 20** of a global report of this nature, but we must acknowledge that South Africa and Investec have some way to go. The state of workplace gender equality, diversity and inclusion has far-reaching effects on everything from employee wellness and retention, to innovation and business outcomes, to real connections with our clients. It’s undoubtedly something organisations must view with utmost importance.”
“To this end, various programmes form part of Investec’s gender agenda. We are proud to announce that, in recent weeks, we have created more opportunities for women to be in more senior positions and higher levels within the organisation. We are particularly proud of our employee initiatives around talent mobility, full-scale wellness, more flexible-working patterns, employee empowerment and better recognition mechanisms. We believe this will go a long way towards retaining talent, especially women who are looking to find more balance. We are hosting a number of events and campaigns during the year to give women a voice and be true to the organisation’s Out of the Ordinary positioning,” explains Fani.
Investec is equally invested in women from broader communities, whether in the classroom or sports field. The bank is committed to numerous education, mentorship and sports programmes that help unlock brilliance, amplify confidence, and support the economy.
Setlogane Manchidi, Investec South Africa CSI head, champions Investec’s contribution within society with a particular focus on education and entrepreneurship: “We offer bursaries to learners, teachers and university students and graduates, support entrepreneurs, offer career guidance, and fund nine Promaths centres. Over the last six years, the Promaths programme has seen 1,850 female learners benefit. These women are now in a position to study further and some are gainfully employed, thanks to their exceptional performances in Maths and Science.”
Through sponsored initiatives in the ‘women in sport’ arena, Investec is committed to championing the conversation around gender – aimed at shining a spotlight in supporting sportswomen on their rise to the top.
“Investec supports hockey development with the Investec Hockey Academy, which helps to produce champions in South Africa. We partner with the St Mary’s Investec Hockey Festival, which gathers the country’s top hockey schools each year to promote and grow South African women’s hockey. Women’s golf is bolstered by Investec through our sponsorship of Investec South African Women’s Open and individual female golfers. We create opportunities to support women in sport to be more internationally competitive by creating platforms to compete with the best and help them through biases that stand in their way of success, such as prize money earnings,” says Danni Dixon, Investec South Africa marketing head.
“These powerful partnerships with women in business, sport and education envision a world where women are empowered to live their full potential and inspire the change they want to see,” concludes Danni.
For further information, please visit www.investec.com/women.
Notes to the Editor:
*Investec South Africa head of marketing, head of digital, head of HR, head of investor relations, head of compliance, head of company secretarial and CFO for Specialist Bank positions are all held by women.
**Globally, gender parity is improving, but too slowly. According to the 2018 Global Gender Gap report, it will take a staggering 108 years for women and men to be on completely equal footing. South Africa has for two years in a row managed to retain the 19th spot out of 144 countries assessed.
Investec is pleased that 55% of its South African workforce is currently female. Of this number, 42% are leaders and 36% are in divisional management roles.
Investec was ranked 27th in the world and 4th in the UK for gender equality and reporting by Equileap in 2018. During the last two years, 51% of delegates on the Developing Team Leaders’ programme and 50% of the CA Programme trainees were women.
About Investec:
Investec is an international specialist bank and asset manager that provides a diverse range of financial products and services to a select client base in three principal markets – the UK and Europe, South Africa and Asia/Australia as well as certain other countries. The group was established in 1974 and currently has approximately 10,146 employees.
Investec focuses on delivering distinctive profitable solutions for its clients in three core areas of activity, namely Specialist Banking, Wealth & Investment, and Asset Management.
In July 2002 the Investec group implemented a dual listed company structure with listings on the London and Johannesburg Stock Exchanges. The combined group’s current market capitalisation is approximately GBP4.93 billion.
