In 2017 we launched our Women's Empowerment Programme which aims to create a flexible and supportive environment, ultimately enabling more women to reach leadership positions.
It is widely recognised that a more diverse leadership team is good for business. We want to better represent our people and our clients, believing that smart decisions today will create lasting value for our Crowe team and their clients tomorrow.
Workplace studies show that where at least 30% of leadership teams are female, the impact on the business is greater. Currently Crowe’s female partners represent 25% of the leadership team and in addition, make up one third of the Executive Board.
In March 2019 when we signed up to the Women in Finance Charter as a commitment to improve gender diversity among or people, we had 24% female representation at partner level. At Crowe we are actively working to have a balance of 30% women at partnership level by 31st March 2024. We believe that we are on track to achieve our Charter target by this deadline.
We aim to create an environment which is collaborative, supportive and promotes talent from across the whole firm.
To do this we set out key objectives in our Women's Empowerment Programme business plan. While none of these initiatives are gender exclusive, they have be designed to tackle the main barriers facing women in finance.
We aspire to develop strong diverse leaders and have invested in a mentor training programme to support this. Potential mentees are invited to apply to participate in the programme, giving them access to the experience and expertise that the mentors have to offer. The mentor training has been extended and is open to all employees, giving all our people access to a mentor should they need it and the same time increase their prospects for advancing to leadership positions.
Since we signed up to the Charter, we have made good progress against our key objectives. All areas have been implemented and have been embedded into the organisation.
"I want to encourage our people, whatever their gender, to be the best they can be. I would like us to identify our future leaders and make sure they have a strong support network to achieve their own success".
"Challenges have always been juggling work and home life but Crowe has always been hugely supportive in allowing flexibility. It’s not a competition between work and home life and if you are happy in both, your output will be greater".
In this episode Rebecca is joined by Lucy Noone-Blake who has spent her career working in the hospitality and food industry, and has recently set up her own marketing and experience consultancy. Rebecca and Lucy discuss the challenges Lucy faced in setting up her own business – including having spent over 50% of its existence in lockdown – the stigma faced by female entrepreneurs, and what business advice she has been giving her clients throughout the global pandemic.
In this episode Rebecca is joined by Lucy Noone-Blake who has spent her career working in the hospitality and food industry, and has recently set up her own marketing and experience consultancy. Rebecca and Lucy discuss the challenges Lucy faced in setting up her own business – including having spent over 50% of its existence in lockdown – the stigma faced by female entrepreneurs, and what business advice she has been giving her clients throughout the global pandemic.