Women in banking: How far we’ve come and how far we still have to go

Globally, gender inequality in the workplace has widened due to Covid-19. Now, more than ever, companies need a comprehensive plan to support and advance women in business, with a focus on accountability and results. By achieving gender equality in the workplace, the entire ecosystem benefits.

Meet Sasha Cook from Standard Bank:  life events and that fork in the road in a woman’s career

For Standard Bank’s Sasha Cook, this certainly rings true. The mother of two told that after having her children, she was not sure if she wanted to continue pursuing her career as her priorities had changed after she met her little girl for the first time.

At this juncture in her life, she acknowledged that not many companies make allowances for women to manage the different turning points in their lives while still being able to do their job. But with the right support structure and a comprehensive plan with viable options from the bank, she was able to keep her job and keep going.

Today, she is the group’s Head of Investment Banking for the Western Cape, and an Executive in the Sustainable Finance team. A massive achievement for her considering that only 36% of Standard Bank’s executive management were women.

“We have certainly come a long way since the days when I first started out in banking – the sector is a lot more inclusive, diverse and supportive. But, we still have a long way to go.

Only 36% women in executive management

“According to our gender stats report, 58% of our junior management posts are occupied by women. But as we get to executive management levels, that number drops to 36%. This means that we have no problem attracting females into the sector, but our ability to retain them is somewhat telling.

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“I think it is because women in the executive level age group generally reach a fork in the road where they have to make a number of personal decisions with regard to their careers and their families,” she said.

The workplace could offer greater flexibility

Cook suggested that this was where the working world needed to potentially offer greater flexibility. “Covid offered us the option of remote and hybrid work. This is something that didn’t exist for years. This offered so much to the working woman, as it opened our eyes in corporate space to a more inclusive way of working for women,” she said.

Cook said she was glad to see how much the banking sector was changing to level the playing field for women. She said that there was even a difference in the way women treated each other, which was so important in the endeavour to achieve gender equality.

“We have found that authenticity is so important between senior and junior women in the sector. For the younger generations just entering the work space, they need role models with authentic stories, to help guide them.

“It helps so much to have a mentor who has just come through those life-changing events to be able to sit and speak to her younger counterpart who is just going through that same experience, and offer her viable alternatives to the extreme change she is considering such as just quitting her job,” cook said.

Sasha is paying back the kindness to the next generation. “I was involved in my capacity as an executive in the Sustainable Finance team in the Standard Bank Social Bond issuance, which raised financing to support homeloans in the affordable housing sector, with a focus on women borrowers. I have also attended and presented at a number of leadership programmes the bank has in place, targeted at women. I have also mentored other women, as part of our mentorship programmes,” she said.

Introducing FNB’s Palesa Mabasa: Gender pay gap issues need be a thing of the past

FNB’s Business Development Head for SME Funding, Palesa Mabasa, recalls that having a great mentor was what helped her to navigate through the challenges she experienced at the start of her career in investment banking. 

Mabasa told that it was only with the guidance of a good mentor, that she was able to understand how and why her role was needed.

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But, Mabasa affirmed that in terms of equality for women, the playing field is still not where it should be.

“As more organisations have more females overall, we find that the representation is usually at lower levels and not at senior leadership. I think this is because women tend to navigate careers differently especially if we choose to have a family,” she said, echoing Cook’s sentiments.

Society must embrace dual income household set-ups

“We have come a long way, but there is still a lot of work we need to see done. We really want to see the gender pay gap issue being a thing of the past. Pay should be equal across all roles, especially if roles are comparable – which is not something the sector sees everywhere.

“We have long moved away from single income families where a man is the bread winner to double or multiple income households – that rely very much on that dual income. But even in that construct, women still carry ‘traditional gender roles’. Society still needs to address that thinking,” she said.  

As such, Mabasa said that she was, therefore, passionate about seeing more women in spaces they traditionally have not been allowed to take up.

“I currently mentor other females, and I am driving this with other passionate colleagues in the organisation through a Women Leadership Development programme. Being the only one or last one is no longer palatable. We need to leave organisations better than we found them,” she said.

Mabasa explained that FNB currently assists women with regional strategic partnerships as they try to add value in the communities they operate in.

“In addition, we run mentorship programmes and networking opportunities that our female clients can use to leverage. Fundamentally, we assist them with opening news access to markets and widening networks,” she concluded.

Presenting Absa’s Tshiwela Mhlantla: today exclusion happens not by design but by oversight

Tshiwela Mhlantla has been at Absa for 18 years now, and she is grateful for the way the industry has changed to include women.

“There were so many challenges women faced when I first started out in this industry,” she said.

“I came in from insurance to banking, and you immediately learn that banking is a lot more structured, governed and organised, and requires a more structured, governed and organised lifestyle. Something that is easy for men to maintain in the traditional sense of the family set up, but not so easy for women – for we have that job after our job to report to.”

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Today Mhlantla is the bank’s Managing Executive for Physical Channels in Absa Everyday Banking, something she says that took strategic patience and a lot of courage in a space where there was a perception that the playing field was level for women, when in fact it really was not.

She said that corporates often host golf days. “It is generally at these events where those important informal conversations are had where people align with their thoughts on a matter. There was also the notion of men getting together after work at the pub for a drink and there again, they align with their thinking.

“Women don’t always have that freedom. We have to get home to kids and to the family – these were not inclusive settings for the women on the team and in that sense inclusion becomes evasive,” she said.

The female endeavour to find their own version of golf days

Mhlantla said that it is often that even today, exclusion happens not by design but by simple oversight and this was something the sector still needed to guard against.

“Currently, we are encouraging women to be brave enough to engage with each other before the formal meeting; to find their version of the golf course and have those discussion on issues around the agenda to align before the formal meeting. It’s the absence of this practice amongst female counterparts that has seen them left out of the greater conversation. But we are working to change this,” she said.

Cook spoke of golf mentorship programmes that she was initiating at Standard Bank to teach women how to play golf in order to feel better included at the company’s golf days, while Mhlantla said she was working on creating events and spaces for women to be able to speak to each other, align their thoughts and encourage each other in the field.

“I offer myself a lot to coaching and mentoring the younger women coming into the industry. I believe that the days of celebrating the first woman to do this and that is long gone – we should feel uncomfortable if we are the only women in the room.

“Being able to sit at the table where decisions are being made goes beyond just being a privilege – it is a responsibility. A responsibility to make space for the next woman, and the next, and the next,” she concluded.