In a male-dominated world of finance, there is a corner where women are in charge.
The UK’s largest pension fund, one of its largest local government pension asset managers, its pension lifeline and the investment strategy of its largest defined contribution “master trust” are all run by women.
In the United States, the top positions in three of the largest pension funds in the country: the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (Calstrs), the California Public Employees’ Retirement System and the Common Retirement Fund of the New York State are, similarly, occupied by women.
“Of all the parts of financial services, pensions strike me as the one where you feel you have the most direct long-term connection to the person at the end of the purpose. . . I just wonder if that appeals more to women because, on average, they are more relational,” said Carol Young, chief executive of the Universities Superannuation Scheme, the UK’s largest pension fund with £78 billion in assets under management.
A report from the Official Forum of Monetary and Financial Institutions last year found that the increase in women in pensions It’s having a snowball effect. Of the world’s 50 largest pension funds, 28 percent are now run by women, up from 24 percent in 2023. This puts pensions well ahead of the broader financial sector in terms of gender parity: in 335 financial institutions in the index, which also includes central and commercial banks and sovereign wealth funds, only 16 percent of leaders were women in 2024.
What’s more, the proportion of women In the last two years, the number of management positions in pension funds grew three times faster in funds led by women compared to those led by men.
“The real difference is that it is a much less aggressive environment,” said Liz Fernando, chief investment officer at the National Employee Savings Trust (Nest), which manages about 47 billion pounds of assets. “Longer-term decisions are made and the financial rewards are smaller and generally less incentive-based.”
Fernando added that it was “probably an environment where raw talent and skills can get you noticed. . . “In an environment where dog eats dog, you have to be more political.”
In a recent report, polling organization Gallup noted that while salary was important for both genders, women were more likely than men to be motivated by factors other than salary. Work-life balance and personal well-being was the top reason they gave when considering their next job, with 69 percent saying it was very important compared to 58 percent of men. The women also said they valued being able to do what they felt they did best and look for jobs that fit their talents.
Women who have reached the top in pensions come from different backgrounds, from consulting and investment banking to asset management and human resources.
But everyone who spoke to the Financial Times said they enjoyed the sense of purpose the role can bring and the potentially flexible nature of the industry.
“Pensions are a slightly more family-friendly version of a city job,” said Emma Douglas, chair of the Life Savings and Pensions Association Board. “I don’t want to imply that we’re all a bunch of lazy people and that it’s not hard work, I just think even before Covid there was a little more flexibility about how you can use your time.”
Douglas, who is also Aviva’s wealth policy director, does everything she can to lead by example and create an inclusive working environment.
“As a leader in the industry, I take my vacation, I don’t work on weekends, I come home at a decent hour and I hope that’s the same for everyone who works for me,” he said. “Once you start having a position where you manage people, you can model some of the behaviors that you would like to see and that you, as a manager, also benefit from.”
For Michelle Ostermann, who was appointed chief executive of the Pension Protection Fund, the UK’s pensions lifeline, last April, a sense of purpose was the deciding factor, and the prospect of giving back as part of an industry with “ important social benefits” in the last stage of his career.
“It is very rewarding for me to be able to apply my craft with such tangible benefits,” he said. In line with industry standards, Ostermann does not use gender diversity quotas among senior employees, but sets goals for gender balance on which the team has made “exceptional progress.”
In the United States, Cassandra Lichnock, the first female chief executive of Calstrs, which has $353 billion in assets, said the establishment of many public sector pension schemes also provided an opportunity for growth in a way that perhaps not existed in private companies.
“In my experience working in the public sector, there is a lot of opportunity for growth and moving up the ranks,” Lichnock said, adding that having senior women encouraging other female staff can be “challenging.” [them] to achieve greater things.”
Calstrs serves more than 1 million working and retired teachers in California, 72 percent of whom are women. About 60 percent of Calstrs’ 1,390 employees are women, and five teachers sit on the pension fund’s board of directors.
“We have an academic feel, which I think is something unique to Calstrs. . . the people we hire thrive in a collaborative environment and that could tend to have more female connectivity,” said Lichnock, who was paid more than $1 million in the 2023/24 financial year.
Paul Todd, chief operating officer at Nest Invest, says having women in leadership positions is also “incredibly beneficial” to the industry, especially given the diversity of people who depend on it.
“Diversity of thought and experience leads to more creative solutions and, in my experience, better decisions,” he said. “Nest has over 6 million women saving for a pension with us – having leadership that reflects their member or customer base creates a greater likelihood of offering products and avenues that meet these different needs.” Nest’s investment committee is chaired by Sarah Laessig and three of the other four members are women, she added.
However, despite the benefits, the growing presence of women in pensions is not reflected in other parts of financial services. The latest global statistics show that the proportion of female portfolio managers has hovered around 12 percent over the past four years, according to an industry publication. Urban cable.
“Becoming a pension actuary was just a brilliant match for a mathematician who enjoys people,” said Rachel Elwell, chief executive of Border to Coast, the fund set up to manage the assets of local government pension funds.
She said a key attraction of her current role was that it was based in Yorkshire, where she is from, and that she had two “young” children, so it meant she could be at home with them and have really meaningful work that contributed to the local community.
“If you look at the financial services industry, pensions are not all concentrated in London and Edinburgh and if we look globally we will see that pension companies may be less concentrated geographically and that is really useful if you want to have a slightly different lifestyle “. .