The situation

Masthaven’s ambition was to provide a high-quality leadership programme that responds to the needs and ambitions of their female talent and their inclusion strategy. Masthaven recognised that in the banking sector, there is considerable ‘noise’ about how to respond to D&I challenges, and an absence of useful and beneficial solutions that drive inclusion for diverse and underrepresented communities.

With this in mind, Masthaven’s D&I strategy was to focus first on gender balance in 2020. Their ambition was to deliver value for their female managers and leaders, enabling them to bring their ‘whole selves to work’ and confidently access their own authentic leadership style to achieve their career aspirations.

Masthaven believe that this ‘talent led’ approach will strengthen their talent pipeline, enhance retention and build a cohort of female role models within the firm who have a high profile internally and externally. This strategy will also strengthen their employer brand and ensure that they strongly represent the markets in which they serve.

Through WDI’s online women’s leadership programme, Masthaven sought not only to increase gender balance but also influence the wider D&I landscape; including mindset and cultural shifts.

The challenge

The financial sector is under-represented for female leaders so developing, retaining and progressing female talent is critical. Building a diverse team at all levels is a priority for Masthaven, and ensuring the progression and retention of their female talent is critical for the business success, reflecting their client demographics as well as to ensure they continue to attract a diverse workforce for the future.

Tricia Halpin, Chief People Officer expressed: “As an organisation, when specifically looking at gender balance we were diverse to a point. We had a very good gender balance through to our Heads of department but once we got to director level and ExCo level this was clearly not the case. Building a diverse workforce across all levels and creating a pipeline of female talent was hugely important to me and I didn’t just want to set statistical targets; I wanted something much more than that.”

The solution

In 2020 a cohort of female leaders were invited to complete the first six months of WDI’s online women’s leadership programme. This comprised both launch and enrolment modules, followed by Purpose and Connection modules. At the end of the 6 months, based on the value they had received from the programme, Masthaven confirmed their commitment to the next two modules of Transformation and Inclusion.

Over the course of the year, participants complete:

• 24 weeks in the online classroom. This includes multiple media learning content such as videos, audio, digital workbooks and surveys.

• The online classroom content is released in 6-week terms that include weekly live webinars.

• To ensure immediate transfer of learning, after 6-weeks in the online classroom, participants have 6-week integration and apply periods where they are further supported with individual coaching sessions (12 coaching sessions throughout the year).

• Throughout the programme, participants access their cohorts networking page, where WDI coaches and participants share additional learning materials, achievements and experiences.

Each module has clear learning objectives and focused skill development that is generated through a two-part approach to learning to generate:

• Insightful leadership; building leadership style, awareness and resilience

• Impactful leadership; building capabilities and skills for effective application of learning in their role.

The blend of live facilitation, self-directed learning and community ensures a depth of learning that moves to immediate impact and application.

The results

Overall programme results

The goal to retain and progress female leaders through a high calibre leadership programme were surpassed, with the programme delivering a measurable positive impact through;

• Multiple participants achieving promotions after the first 9 months of the programme.

• WDI programme measurement, (participant survey feedback and programme ratings, alongside tracking programme completion rates) showed programme consistently receiving high ratings on all aspects of the programme content.

• Profiling of women leaders in the business through internal speaker opportunities with board members has increased the visibility of female role models within the business.

• Publication of leader profiles in finance sector press through the success of the programme.

• Engagement of external stakeholders/ client by participants utilising principles and learning from the programme as added value sessions for the wider industry.

• Establishment of a strong community of senior female leaders within Masthaven who are role modelling and actively supporting the progression of women in the wider business.

Participant outcomes

There are key themes arising from the participants on how the programme has had tangible benefits and impact for them as leaders:

• Increased visibility and confidence in senior, often male dominated, environments.

• Established and enhanced personal brand through developing their own authentic leadership style and approach.

• Developed and leveraged strategic leadership perspective for business innovation and influencing.

• Supported to manage their teams in highly disruptive periods with enforced remote working.

• Created a high valuable network of female leaders who are supporting each other to be bolder and braver in their ambitions and actions.