Key takeaways from the Women in Finance Charter Annual Review 2024

The financial services industry is making modest but consistent progress towards gender equality in senior leadership, according to the 2024 HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter Annual Review.

As 36% of senior roles are now held by women – an increase from 35% in 2023 - the latest report reflects the commitment from signatories while highlighting a need for an accelerated approach to meet targets. 

Sarah Speirs, Executive Director of Member Engagement and Communications at ICAS, reflects on the momentum: 

“Change doesn't happen overnight, but the commitment we see through the Women in Finance Charter is driving real results. We’re proud to be part of this movement and to hold ourselves to account alongside other signatories.”

We’ve been part of the Women in Finance Charter for a couple of years, showing our strong commitment to improving gender diversity in senior roles. By following the Charter’s principles, like setting clear goals and targets, we’re proud to join over 450 organisations working to create change in UK financial services. 

The 2024 review highlights both achievements and challenges: 

• 36% of signatories have already met their targets for female representation in senior management. 
• 44% are on track to reach this goal in the future, while 10% just missed their 2024 targets by slim margins. 
• Female representation is steadily growing at a modest rate of one percent per year, suggesting equality won’t be reached until 2038 unless strides are made to accelerate the progress. 
• 56% of firms with 2025 deadlines are predicted to meet their goals, suggesting a potential breakthrough in the year ahead. 

The review also emphasised which strategies are having the most impact - organisations leading the way are making inclusion a part of their everyday culture and are using data to inform decisions. 

However, there’s a call for signatories to still do more, due to growing concerns that business restructuring seems to disproportionately impact women. 

For us and other signatories, this report sends a clear message that setting targets is just the first step. Our goal is to continue championing women in leadership roles – and with 67% female representation at the senior management level, we surpass industry averages and have committed to ensuring this figure never drops below 50%. The challenge now is to turn slow progress into sustained acceleration across the board ensuring women not only reach senior roles but thrive in them. 

As Sarah adds, 

“It’s about sustainable progress with real measurable change that shifts the culture of our institutions and opens the door to nurture and grow the next generation of female leaders.” 

Since we signed the Charter

We signed up to the Charter in 2023 to demonstrate our commitment to developing and harnessing female talent in the finance and accountancy profession.

Our focus under the Charter is upon ensuring that the percentage of female senior managers within ICAS does not fall below 50% representation.

• 2023: 67% of our senior managers are female versus 33% male. Our Executive team is 60% female and 40% male.  
• 2024: 67% of our senior managers are female versus 33% male. Our Executive team is 60% female and 40% male. 
• 2025: 71% of our senior managers are female versus 29% male. Our Executive team is 60% female and 40% male.