Years ago, I was at a turning point in my career. After spending more than a decade in the audit department at PricewaterhouseCoopers, I was ready to move on. With the help and guidance of a senior-level partner, I was able to find that path forward and, ultimately, a new opportunity at a global customer experience company.
What I remember most about this time was receiving a call from this partner asking if I knew what I was going to say during the job interview. I replied, “Yes, I'm going to make sure they can't figure out I don't know the first thing about running an accounting shop." His response: “No, you're going to make sure they're worthy of having you."
What a mindset shift as I headed into interviews with a CEO, CFO and vice chairman of a more than $1 billion public company. And I got the job. The person hired was no more skilled than the person who doubted her own abilities. But she had confidence.
In many ways, this story came to mind when I saw the findings from our recent Modern Finance Careers study. At first glance, the data uncovered some stark gender differences. Men were three times more likely to say they wanted to aim for the CFO office than their female counterparts. Men were also 40% more likely to have a professional financial qualification than women. But looking closer, there’s hope the balance will shift.
We found that women are more likely than men to be newer professionals, with less than five years of experience (21% to 13%). Clearly, there isn’t a lack of females entering the profession. In addition, more than a third of female respondents said they were heavily influenced by their current or past managers. And here is where the opportunity lies.
We can see there is plenty of talent in the pipeline, and we also know from our data that internal promotion is the preferred way to get ahead. Yet there are barriers, whether perceived or real, and many in our industry are telling us it’s too hard, too much or they’re not sure how to get there. If we want to see more women in leadership roles and greater diversity overall, it's up to us to actively mentor and coach the next generation. We must help them be heard, remove the barriers in their way, guide them in finding their next role and show them the path to the c-suite.
Over the years, I’ve been fortunate enough to have various female mentors set the example of how they’ve made their career moves. They also served as a sounding board for me and an advisor through my own career decisions. Now, as CFO, it’s important to me that we’re creating a workforce filled with diverse voices and building up tomorrow’s leaders. I encourage my fellow CFOs to join me in doing the same.
The impact just one person had on me changed the entire trajectory of my career. Though perhaps, even more simply, it was their belief in me that helped me see what I could achieve. I hope that you, too, will be inspired by our findings to help shape the finance office of tomorrow.
Take a look at the latest insights from our Modern Finance Careers study or get a quick glance with the infographic.