Interview with Jaspal Bindra, CEO, Asia, Standard Chartered Bank - Building Gender Balanced Business

“One of our roles as a responsible player in these markets is to create that development within the wider communities in which we operate. And we think that getting gender diversity right in those markets is economically quite powerful. So there is at the end our own interest as well.”

Which are the more important benefits of gender diversity: the impact on the company or the impact on society at large?

I think the impact on society is the big benefit and then there is a corollary benefit of that too on the business in the long run.

How high a priority is gender diversity to you?

It is absolutely a top priority for the senior management of the Bank. For instance, I chair the Group Diversity & Inclusion Council and I sit on the Group Management Committee of the Bank. And we regularly discuss gender and other related issues such as flexible working. We also periodically present on diversity and inclusion to the Board. It gets that level of attention.

Earlier in January, we had a session on diversity and inclusion at a global country managers’ meeting where country CEOs from 70 markets came together to meet. And each country manager went back with a pledge on what he or she would do throughout 2009 to further diversity and inclusion in their country.

What other initiatives do you have?

We have, for example, a programme called Fast Start which is for all middle and senior level external hires and we have two of those programmes every year. One just concluded yesterday in Singapore and we had a three hour session for these new hires on diversity and inclusion. So, it’s very much a part of our corporate DNA. We are also involved in driving the agenda externally. Our Group Chief Executive, Peter Sands, is a key member of the World Bank Private Sector Leaders’ Forum which focuses on gender diversity and I am a member of the Board of a Washington-based NGO called Vital Voices, which is committed to furthering women’s empowerment. We are also, as an institution, part of the Global Banking Alliance, a group of financial institutions who are recognised as market leaders in serving female customers. We come together to share best practices, and Standard Chartered is hosting the 2009 Summit in Singapore in October.

What are the specific programmes?

There are different strands of diversity that we are focusing on and the two main areas we started off with are gender and ethnicity. In several of our markets, we are also looking into disability because people with disabilities represent a large, potential workforce that we’d like to ensure are included. Again, we think it is positive for society. But it’s also in our interest as an employer. As we move into new countries through organic growth, we are also running up against the challenge of language so we are providing incentives to encourage international assignees to learn the local language as well as incentivising local staff to learn English.

What are you considering in terms of work-life balance?

We are quite active in this space. We are looking at a range of measures including part-time working and flexible working hours so that not all employees have to work standard 9-5 days. We also have a large number of people who now work from home.

Until two years ago, some of our biggest markets still had six day work weeks. We’ve now brought almost the entire group to a five day week. This is kind of passé in markets like the UK. But until recently, both India and Hong Kong, for example, had six day weeks and we’ve brought both to a five day week. We’ve also introduced an initiative whereby employees are encouraged to leave work at an earlier hour than normal and avoid scheduling late meetings every Friday (called “Happy Friday” or, for the Middle East, “Happy Thursday”).

Can you get flexibility into the more extreme jobs?

Clearly, as a Bank, there are some roles which are not suitable for flexible working, particularly working from home. We’re being practical about that. We’re not going to expect it to take place across the board where realistically there are situations where it won’t work. But there are many jobs which can be carried out in a more flexible manner, and people have to make the right decisions for them around the kind of role they take up.

“It is absolutely a top priority for the senior management of the bank. For instance, I chair the Group Diversity & Inclusion Council and I sit on the Group Management Committee of the Bank. And we regularly discuss gender and other related issues such as flexible working. We also periodically present on diversity and inclusion to the Board. It gets that level of attention.”

How do you ensure your identification of high-potential leaders is fair to women?

Our biggest issue in this area was around mobility because we had such a geographically diverse company with no home base. Mobility was a very important criterion in furthering your career and we used to have international mobility listed as a requirement to be “high potential”. Because of family circumstances or the fact that men’s careers often come first in some cultures, women were more vulnerable to this. Also, the women were probably far more honest in admitting they were not mobile whereas the men would tend to say they were mobile even though they may not have been at the time. The combination of these factors didn’t support women’s progression within the Bank and this was a big issue for us 10 years ago when we had only two to three big markets. It was hard for an individual who didn’t move around to develop his or her career in one relatively small market. But now we have 12 big markets and they are of such a size that you could significantly progress your career the without having to go to another city.

So the need for mobility is no longer a barrier to women’s advancement?

As we’ve grown, mobility has become less of a challenge. And also having functional and business mobility within the same geography is now possible. Previously, we had specific centres for each business and function. But now employees can gain broad experience within the same city. Many global roles can also be done in different locations. So the mobility barrier has largely been removed and what we have seen is that the number of women who were classified as part of the high potential category significantly increased.

What’s the effect of a change like this?

You now have more women labelled as high potential. Now they have more visibility in discussions around promotions and career moves. As they see themselves progressing more quickly, they give more consideration to their career decisions and the trade-offs around family responsibilities become far more balanced. So you are seeing a chain reaction. A significant proportion of the increase in women at senior management has come about as a result.

Have you done anything else to increase the women candidates for new hires at this level?

In the past, we’d tell the head-hunters to get us the best shortlist in the marketplace. And we just took that as it came. Now, we insist that if you are going to show us ten people on the shortlist we expect at least three or four of them to be women. There are 30-40% women available for most jobs in our industry for these roles, whether it is human resources, corporate affairs, transaction banking or our credit card business. So we’re being far more demanding. Similarly in the selection process, there is a tendency for a recruitment panel to choose people who resemble them. We insist that there must be a senior woman who sits on the selection panel as well, so that supports greater diversity.

Can the head-hunters deliver?

Yes, when you push them they can because there are women out there. It’s just that their databases are filled with people they have dealt with in the past, so it’s much easier for them to produce the traditional candidates. In the long run, I’m sure, the head-hunting firm benefits because it then has the choice of a much richer database from which to draw for the next client.

Do women bring something different to leadership positions?

Absolutely! The way they look at problems, the way they address issues in the company, they often have very different perspectives and their communication style is quite different. So, it just brings richness to how we approach a decision. And I think that is a great strength.

What is different about their communication style, for example?

It’s been established that men and women express different emotions in their communications. When it comes to a people agenda, women are often more passionate. When it comes to some of the P&L-related issues, women are often far more composed. And you need both emotions in these situations, so having men and women ensures a good balance.

“In the past, we’d tell the head-hunters to get us the best shortlist in the marketplace. And we just took that as it came. Now, we insist that if you are going to show us ten people on the shortlist we expect at least three or four of them to be women.”

Do male managers understand women?

It’s a learning process. We have many senior people who are women in the Bank. Now, those women are in very important positions and they have lots of men working for them. The men working for them are quite happy and most are very used to the idea. And if you look at the Middle East or Africa or Asia, there have been plenty of female leaders. Maybe not so much in business, but many of the political leaders in these markets have been women. I also think there is a cultural shift taking place. In the past, for example, women in the Middle East didn’t have as much education, so they often couldn’t secure a leadership position. But I think that is all changing. For example, you now see female government ministers in the UAE and Jordan.

What do managers have to understand better?

Many of the initiatives we’ve introduced for our people also support the business. With flexible working arrangements for example, we can provide our people with much more choice in how, where and when they work, and this benefits not just the employee but also the Bank as it supports recruitment, engagement and retention.

Is this a big change for the company?

Yes, we are changing people’s mindsets. There is an old view that if someone has a flexible working arrangement or works from home, then they are not serious about their career. There are still a large number of managers around the world who are impressed by input and hours worked, instead of focusing on the output. I think as soon as you can get that mind shift changed then some of these things will become irrelevant.

What other mindset issues are there?

There is another issue around women having full-time careers and also families. Even if they are working well, balancing family and life, managers often assume they will eventually leave, to spend more time with their children or because their husbands get transferred.

What are women doing in all this?

Women are getting far more serious about their careers and the myths are being challenged. Women are often having babies later on in their lives, by which time they have established greater credentials and credibility in the company. Secondly, they are not necessarily moving with their spouses or they are making sure that a transfer benefits both of them. It is not a given that if the spouse gets a job in another city or another country, that they are going to go too. There are lot of women who are happy to take a two-year assignment on a single basis, something which was unheard of in places like Asia and the Middle East not long ago.

How would you rate Standard Chartered Bank in terms of attractiveness to women?

One thing you are almost resigning yourself to if you work for Standard Chartered is that you are going to be working in the emerging markets. That applies just as much to men and women.

But we are ahead of the local banks that compete with us for talent in our markets. The local banks just don’t have a perspective on diversity and inclusion issues yet. And they haven’t had the need to. They are operating in a single country, they’re large employers and they get most of the talent they want. So women often find us more attractive. We are thinking about diversity and inclusion, we have policies around it, there are focus groups going on, there are committees and there are country champions and councils.

Also, we celebrate International Women’s Day across our markets.

These kinds of things make people feel good, that we are a company with a soul. And that’s what we want to be. It fits in with our culture and our geographic diversity, and we think we should be leading the way in our markets.

A lot of this work stands out and differentiates us. When we talk to our graduates and new hires, the thing they say they love about this company –- why they chose to work here and why they choose to stay –- is largely because of our sustainability programmes and our approach to diversity and inclusion. People are thrilled about us having all-women branches. Also, we have crèches in many of the large cities in which we operate. We give up a part of our building so that women can continue to work with us and see their children throughout the day.

Have you improved your retention rates for women hires?

Yes, very much so. But now is not a fair time to judge this because we are one of the banks that is relatively unscathed in the economic crisis. Therefore, we don’t know if people are staying with us because of our initiatives or for other reasons. But we do have wonderful comments when we open a new crèche or when we open a new all-women branch.

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