PGGM to hire 30 women to improve gender balance

Dutch pension asset manager PGGM wants to increase the share of women in its workforce by 2 percentage points this year, across its organisation. This amounts to about 30 additional female employees, as PGGM had 1,509 full-time employees at the end of last year.

The target was announced as PGGM became the first Dutch investor to sign the CFA Institute’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Code (DEI Code) last week.

“We want to increase the proportion of women working for us this year, now 39%, by 2%,” said Cécile Rozé, sustainability manager at PGGM.

The DEI-Code, an initiative of the CFA Institute, has been in place since 2020. Asset managers that sign the code pledge to work towards equal opportunities for all within their organisation and in the investment industry.

The code has so far been signed mainly by Anglo-Saxon investors, and is now being rolled out in continental Europe.

Although the intention of the code is broader than just promoting gender equality, PGGM is initially focusing mainly on this. “The 2% increase in the proportion of women has to happen throughout the organisation, so in every single unit,” according to Rozé.

PGGM is deploying “various means” to attract additional women, a spokesperson for the pension provider told IPE.

“We do that by looking closely at whether vacancy texts are written inclusively enough when vacancies are posted and by establishing how unconscious bias can be avoided among recruiters and the manager posting the vacancy.”

PGGM is also making extra efforts to retain existing female employees, he added.

One of the promises further made by signatories to the DEI-Code is to search more broadly for talent. PGGM is already working on that too, according to Rozé.

“We used to require young people to have done extracurricular activities during their student years, but realised that when you request that, you almost automatically end up with a certain type of people. After all, not everyone has the luxury of taking an extra year to study,” she added.

Career breaks

PGGM also wants to become more inclusive by offering better opportunities to people with ‘career breaks’, such as women who have not worked for a while after having a child. The firm is also working on cultural inclusion.

“In the Netherlands, all holidays are Catholic holidays. That’s not very inclusive. That’s why, since this year, employees can take some holidays at times of their own choosing, so they can take time off on days that are important in their culture,” Rozé continued.

The CFA Institute hopes that more Dutch asset managers will soon follow PGGM’s example.

“Once one sheep has crossed the dam, more will follow, as the Dutch saying goes,” said Inge van den Doel, president of the Dutch branch of the CFA Society and managing director of pension fund PMT.

The CFA Institute expects at least another 10 Dutch signatories to sign up to the DEI code this year.

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