Last week, Alliance member Banco Pichincha graciously hosted 42 institutions from across the Americas in our first All Stars Academy of 2020. Hailing from Canada to Argentina, over 100 students learned from each other and our expert practitioners how to be the financial services provider of choice and the employer of choice for women.
Looking ahead to 2020, we are pleased to be able to offer an increasingly robust set of peer learning opportunities and knowledge products to our members while building awareness of what works to fully include women in the economy. This includes two more All Stars Academies, which will take place in Q3 and Q4 – details to be announced soon.
Our Annual Summit, hosted by Alliance member Mastercard, is taking place in the FinTech hub Singapore June 2-4. The focus will be on the ways technology is driving opportunities to serve the female economy, and it will bring together major players from both the tech and financial services ecosystems on an unprecedented scale to create a space for collaboration and advancement for all. We will also recognize the exemplary work of our members with our newly enhanced awards program.
Last year the Alliance welcomed 12 new bank members and our first FinTech. This year we hope to at least double that growth, with half of it coming from FinTechs, insurance companies and asset management companies. The Summit will reflect the exciting and new ways these players are supporting the female economy. Click here to find out more.
Working Groups consist of 8-10 monthly webinars during which members and stakeholders share and discuss approaches to solving for a specific topic. In 2020, these will include the continuation of Payments for the Women’s Market, in collaboration with Mastercard, and of the Communications Task Force, which focuses on winning strategies for communicating with the female economy. A new Working Group on key building blocks for successfully targeting Women of Wealth kicks off in February, and following the huge member interest in building diverse and inclusive workforces, a third working group on this topic will kick off mid-year. This will be complemented by a new solution tool, a how-to guide on “Becoming the Employer of Choice for Women.” Like its sister — the how-to guide to “Winning The Women’s Market” — this is being written by members for members and will be an interactive roadmap with case studies, key insights, checklists, KPIs, worksheets, video links, etc.
Our monthly open-office-hours service, Ask the Expert, where members can get questions answered live by an expert practitioner from the Alliance’s pool, kicks off this week. This month’s expert is Rachael McKenzie from Westpac, who will discuss the bank’s Life Moments strategy.
This year we continue our focus on encouraging members and the industry at large to get more and better data to measure the performance of their women-centered programs. Members should look out for an enhanced cloud-based data request in February. Meanwhile, the Alliance is gearing up for deep work in several countries to encourage national production and use of sex-disaggregated supply- and demand-side data as it is so vital to closing the gender gaps in access to and use of financial services.
As we look toward a full year of enriching activities, a shout out to achievements in our network news roundup and a warm welcome to our newest member, Banco GyT Continental Guatemala. In this interview, Maria Lucrecia Monge Arango, Director of Women’s Banking, shares their plans to serve the women of Guatemala, building on the bank’s success in El Salvador.
We acknowledge that none of our work would be possible without the extraordinary generosity of both our members and our stakeholders – in terms of funding but particularly in terms of their time and commitment. This month we especially thank Banco Pichincha for so graciously hosting the All-Stars Academy Americas and Westpac, Itaú Unibanco, Banistmo, BHD León and the IFC for openly sharing their expertise.
Sincere thanks to all of you and wishing you great success in 2020!
