The motto for this year’s event for International Women’s Day was “Think equal, build smart, innovate for change”. Accordingly, in her keynote speech Dr. Doris Aebi (founder and owner of aebi+kuehni AG, specialists in executive search and board consulting) talked about “Economy in flux – what does it mean for gender diversity?”. She explained why Switzerland remains a laggard in the equality of women and men at work and what effect digitalization might have on gender equality. In addition, Dr. Doris Aebi provided some tips for career planning.
The issue of “Gender diversity – from awareness to action” was taken up by the panel discussion that followed. Susanne Berger (SIX, Chief HR Officer) led the debate between Yvonne Seitz-Strittmatter (AXA Winterthur, Head Diversity & HR Business Partner Distribution and Internal Audit), Paula Langer (Credit Suisse, Diversity & Inclusion) and Dr. Doris Aebi. The focus was on management skills of the future and how management culture needs to change to make gender diversity possible.
“I am delighted that on International Women’s Day we at SIX are demonstrating both internally and externally through this event that gender diversity is an important issue for us that we seek to continue to promote,” said Susanne Berger at the end of the event and just before trading was opened by the participants.
For the fifth time in succession, the bell rang for International Women’s Day at the Swiss stock exchange. More than 75 stock exchanges around the world join together to draw attention to the issue of gender diversity on this day. “Ring the Bell for Gender Equality” is a partnership between the International Finance Corporation, the Sustainable Stock Exchanges Initiative, the UN Global Compact, UN Women, the World Federation of Exchanges and Women in ETFs.
The organization Women in ETFs, initiator of the event, was established in January 2014. The aim of this global initiative is to bring together women and men in the EFT ecosystem around the world with the objective of furthering the careers of women by utilizing their shared skills and ambition. In the fifth year of its existence the organization is represented on 5 continents in 11 countries with around 4,000 members (15% of whom are men).