Sexism in the city: ‘No matter how hard I work, they will never recognize me’

In spring 2021, Selena*, a city executive, got a surprise when she logged into a Teams call with five senior male colleagues.

She spent weeks warning bosses that the London-based investment firm might breach European regulations. She collected data and provided supporting evidence, but was repeatedly rejected. “No one wants to listen,” she said.

So when a male coworker raised the issue that afternoon, her jaw dropped and she received immediate support from the boss who had ignored her. “I had to stop the meeting,” she recalled. “I said: ‘Why does it take a white, middle-aged man to deliver the exact same message that I’ve been delivering for the past few weeks?'”

It was the final straw when her comments were dismissed and described as “egregious”. “What I realized was: No matter how hard I work, how talented I am, how dedicated I am, it doesn’t matter. They will never recognize me,” she said.

Selena, now in her 40s, later resigned, bringing her decades-long career to a temporary halt, while another City executive acted out of control.

Her story was one of more than 40 women in financial services shared at a closed session of the House of Commons Treasury Committee’s city sex discrimination inquiry, whose report and recommendations are due to be released this week.

The investigation is designed in part to determine whether meaningful progress has been made on sexual harassment allegations against hedge fund boss Crispin Odey. Committee’s last review in 2018. But shocking investigative stories recently shared with members of Congress — ranging from office bullying to serious allegations of rape — show that the post-#MeToo focus on diversity and inclusion has failed to combat widespread misogyny.

Instead, according to the committee’s interim report, the “old boys’ club” has been pushed into the shadows. The committee explains that sexual harassment may be less prevalent in the office, but more common at meetings and work trips, and that bad behavior is simply becoming “more insidious and harmful.”

“We are very surprised by how little things have changed in the last five years,” Conservative MP Harriet Baldwin, chair of the Treasury Committee, said before the report was released.

It is hoped that this may change, thanks to a post-pandemic boom in flexible working, mandatory gender pay gap reporting and voluntary acceptance of the gender pay gap. Women in Finance Charter – Companies that sign up must set goals for promoting diversity at the top.

Unfortunately, when 26-year-old Victoria* joined a major global bank in 2019 through a graduate program, little had changed. She studied computer science and watched her parents develop, and she felt ready for a career in a male-dominated industry. role in the city. “But I don’t know if I fully expected it to be so alienating,” Victoria said.

She found herself frequently dodging her boss’s comments about whether a male coworker was her boyfriend and being criticized for being “talkative.” But she pushed on and was hired as one of three women on a 60-person quant team, which involves banks using complex mathematical models to price financial products.

Despite her enthusiasm and requests to attend regular meetings to understand team goals, she repeatedly felt shut out. “I was told to just sit there and be quiet. That’s not something women want to be told.” Victoria’s role was later made redundant, and she has since moved out of the field.

Experiences like Victoria’s have left MPs wondering whether an excessive focus on promoting female leadership – while an important part of the puzzle – will prevent businesses from addressing other harmful employment practices.

“A lot of people who want to improve things think that if only there were more women it would get better,” said Angela Eagle, a Labor MP and committee member. “And they don’t think about power relationships, and how revenues and incentives work in specific areas of the industry…so I still think there’s a fault in the analysis of what needs to be done.”

There are also concerns that smaller firms such as boutique investments and hedge funds will be able to evade scrutiny because they are immune from pay gap reporting and proposals to force larger firms in the City of London to report on diversity strategies and targets.

That puts smaller companies at greater risk of harboring the worst offenders, Baldwin said. “You would have a harder time recommending your daughter to go work for some of these companies as opposed to working for some of the big companies,” said the congressman, who herself was a target of misconduct early in her career. at JP Morgan.

Julie, a 40-year veteran of the insurance industry, said non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) and cease-and-desist orders, which protect the reputations of companies with the worst offenders, may be a simple solution.

She spent the first decades of her career driving through bullying, was dropped after maternity leave and felt forced to sign The NDA prevented her from challenging an employer’s dismissal. But Julie didn’t expect further discrimination when she joined a new agent in 2018.

Her team leader was a young man, but any hope that he would take a more progressive approach was quickly dashed. The requirement to work from home came under scrutiny and she was forced to make up time to attend hospital appointments. When she was diagnosed with a brain tumor, bosses sent Julie’s husband helpline and hospice leaflets. “He was terrible,” she said.

She then watched him get hired by another company and serve on the diversity committee. “There’s still a long way to go. Men get away with a lot.”

Any significant changes are likely to depend on whether Baldwin’s Treasury Board is willing to lend some support to its report’s recommendations for government and city regulators.

The committee, led by its former chair Nicky Morgan, released a 2018 review of the prevailing “macho” culture in New York City and how bonus pay structures and a focus on presenteeism were holding back the financial sector. women and putting them at a disadvantage, raises concerns worthy of attention. But, in hindsight, it was more about its omissions.

The article made no mention of the scandal that occurred a few months earlier at a dinner at the men-only Presidents Club, in which invited businessmen and bankers allegedly groped and sexually harassed hired waitresses. Nor was the impact of the #MeToo movement, which accelerated in 2017 as women from all walks of life around the world began sharing personal stories of sexual harassment on social media.

Baldwin promised that her report would make “actionable recommendations”: “It will be a summary of some progress, but very much a ‘work in progress.'”

But Eagle added that the committee’s ultimate goal is that this will be the last report of its kind. “I hope in five years we don’t have to do this anymore,” she said.

*Not her real name