There is no reason for there to be a gender divide in the financial advice sector, a director at M&G has said.
Tom Hegarty, director of The Advice Partnership at M&G Wealth, told FTAdviser the whole profession should “raise an eyebrow” at the number of women in the profession.
"Clearly at a very basic level, there is inherently a male bias within financial advice,” he said.
“This has been gradually changing over the years and the number of females has increased in the profession, but still not to the level that we should expect to see.”
The ratio of men to women in M&G’s academy is around 3:1, which Hegarty said was “pretty much the norm” in the industry.
“I certainly see no reason now for there to be any such divide at all.
It’s not just one business, large businesses have the requirement to do thisTom Hegarty“The knowledge, skill and behavioural competencies required can all be achieved regardless of gender, so we all need to do more as a sector to promote women into financial advice and ensure there are no barriers to entry.”
Data from the Personal Finance Society has previously showed of the 7,578 chartered financial planners, 1,638 were women - nearly 22 per cent.
Benefits all round
Hegarty said there are really positive reasons for women to get into financial advice, and it is of benefit to the advice firm too.
“The advice gap is huge so there is plenty of demand for advice and some customers looking for advice may feel more comfortable discussing their finances with a female adviser.
“At least this gives clients more choice when looking for an adviser.”
Hegarty highlighted the opportunities for advice firms who have more female advisers on their books.
He mentioned the advice gap specifically for women who were divorcing their husbands, or whose husbands had died, and were looking to appoint a female adviser.
Research from Schroders has previously shown that 70 per cent of women leave their financial adviser within one year of their partner passing away.
“And for female advisers, they may like the flexibility of working and running their own businesses,” he added.
Adviser academy
M&G launched its adviser academy in 2021 with the aim of attracting new and retaining existing advisers in its advice partnership.
It can take up to 24 trainees each quarter, and arranges the training part-time so participants are not out of pocket.
So far, 23 per cent of the academy's intake is female, and women make up 26 per cent of M&G's in-house advisers.
Hegarty said there is only so much M&G’s academy can do.
“It’s not just one business, large businesses have the requirement to do this.
“Even if our academy recruited 100 per cent women, it would only shift the dial [of gender balance] in the sector maybe one or two per cent.
“So we really have to do this across the industry.”
sally.hickey@ft.com
