Financial Services HR Leaders Gather At Kaizen Luncheon

A number of key issues facing human resources leaders were discussed at Kaizen’s HR luncheon held this week. The session was chaired by Johanna Neilsen, Head of People at VFMC and former Executive Manager People and Culture at Cbus.

The luncheon drew together representatives from a range of financial services organisations, with the aim of providing a networking forum for senior professionals and an opportunity to share and examine common challenges.

We would like to thank executives from AustralianSuper, BankVic, DPM Financial Services, IFM Investors , Invesco, Legg Mason, Netwealth, Vanguard, Vison Super and Zenith Partners.

Thank you to all who attended; it was a very valuable and enjoyable discussion.

Key themes discussed

ATTRACTING TALENT

• Attracting the best people is challenging when competing against employers with deeper pockets.
• Enhancing the employee value proposition is an increased focus.
• Workplace flexibility is sometimes a challenge to get buy-in from executives who hold the belief that people must be in the office and at their desk to work effectively.
• Senior leaders who utilise flexibility practices e.g. working from home one day a week can create acceptance that working remotely can be beneficial for both the individual and the organisation.

DIVERSITY

• Diversity was discussed as gender, education, previous experience, culture and more parameters.
• Employers are seeking diversity of thought across their teams.
• If turnover of employees is below 7% there are not enough new ideas, new perspectives or new energy being injected into the organisation. Industry average turnover ranges between 13-15%.
• The group found a common challenge in sourcing and attracting senior female professionals.
• HR strives for equal representation on applicant shortlists and on selection panels.
• Because female applicants are scarce, some employers have chosen to employ particularly talented females even if the timing was not quite right and it meant moving budget around.
• It is beneficial to have internal male champions of gender diversity to assist challenging resistant attitudes and support the importance of gender diversity when it is dismissed or down played by senior executives.
• It is beneficial for HR to emphasise the diversity message by utilising internal and industry statistics and research on diversity.
• It is helpful to change attitudes with concrete numbers and comparisons to which goals and quotas can then be applied.

PAY PARITY

• Pay parity exists and can be overcome by assessing all pays against one another and bringing underpaid female employees up to salaries received by their male peers.
• This can be an very positive exercise for the organisation, but naturally has to be executed with care.
• Pay parity can be reported upon every six months to uphold a credible transparency program.
• Female applicants can understate their successes and typically submit lower salary expectation ranges than males.
• This can unfortunately perpetuate pay disparity because women are willing to accept less pay and the organisation elects to save money instead of offering what they were willing to pay.

CANDIDATE ENGAGEMENT THROUGH THE APPLICATION PROCESS

• If the application and interview process takes too long, prospective candidates can lose interest or move on to other opportunities that came to fruition more quickly.
• It is vital to educate applicants from the outset around what is required of them and how long the process will take.
• It is vital to educate the selection panel that interviews and decisions must happen in a timely manner.
• The selection panel must be asked to provide useful feedback to unsuccessful applicants not just “it wont work” or “they are not the right fit”.
• If constructive and specific feedback can be given to the applicants, applicants are more likely hold the employer in a positive light and will be more open if called upon in future when another opportunity presents.

FUTURE TOPICS MAY INCLUDE

• Talent acquisition strategies, What is new? What is working?
• In-house and / or vs agency. What model works?
• How does your organisation promote career development?
• What is new in the world of ATS / CRM? What is best practice?
• How effectively are you using social media to attract talent and communicate your companies EVP?
• What currently are the hardest skills to attract?

Kaizen Recruitment sincerely thanks the human resources leaders who participated in the luncheon for
their generous input and candour.

Best regards

Matt McGilton – Director

Kaizen Recruitment specialises financial services recruitment across funds management, wealth management, superannuation, investment consulting and insurance. We are based in Melbourne and Sydney. For assistance or further information please telephone our office at +61 3 9095 7157 or submit an online form.

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