Female-friendly: Why Singapore is the best place to be for women in finance

Hong Kong could be hostile.

More people in Singapore would recommend their company to a female friend than anywhere else in the world.

According to a survey by eFinancialCareers, Singapore is the most female friendly place to work in financial services.

The findings follow a survey which asked finance professionals if they would recommend their company to a female friend. In Singapore an overwhelming 87% said yes. This was the most positive response globally, with Australia (83%) the UK and the US (82%) close behind. The lowest responses came from professionals working in the Middle East (66%), Germany (69%), France (76%) and Hong Kong (77%).

The eFinancialCareers Diversity Survey polled nearly 5,000 professionals globally working in banking and finance, including 1,244 living and working in Singapore.

George McFerran, Sales and Marketing Director at eFinancialCareers said: “Singapore is a great place for female professionals in financial services. We are seeing many of the local and international financial services institutions here developing gender diversity initiatives. Flexible working hours, childcare benefits and mentoring programs are among the most popular. They are proven ways to improve the gender balance and they also help attract top female talent.”

Here’s more from eFinancialCareers:

While Singapore is making positive strides when it comes to creating a female friendly working environment, it appears that more needs to be done in terms of equal compensation and representation at senior levels.

While 89% of financial services professionals believe that women are equally represented at junior levels, only two thirds (66%) believe that women are fairly represented at senior positions. An improvement on 2012 here: where only 61% of respondents felt there was an equal representation of women at senior levels.

Only half (54%) of finance professionals who are women in Singapore think they are fairly paid. In addition over two thirds (68%) of women believe that ‘men are paid more than women in equivalent positions’. When asked the same question, only 29% of men said they think they ‘are paid more than women in equivalent positions in financial services’.

McFerran added: “getting more women into senior positions is a priority for many financial services companies, and while many are spending a great deal of time and effort on this there is no quick solution. Another crucial step will be addressing the perception of unequal pay, it is damaging both for the industry and the people in it.”

Of those who believed men are paid more than women in equivalent positions in the financial industry, most respondents (44%) perceive there to be an 11% to 20% gap; while just over a third (34%) evaluate the gap at 21% to 30%. Finance professionals have split views when it comes to the situation of the pay gap improving in the future: 44% think it will narrow, 41% say it will stay the same and 15% believe the gap will increase.