Speaking at the annual Fortune Most Powerful Women International Summit in London alongside Jude Kelly, Artistic Director of Southbank Centre, she explained that “even though women have reached that age, they have no idea how to be able to save money or be able to look after themselves if something goes wrong”. She compared this to men, who will have “five times more money in their pensions for their retirement than women”.
Jude Kelly said: “When we started talking about this territory - financial literacy for women - I began to be terrified as you taught me about the statistics. I realised in talking to friends and my own daughter – women who would think of themselves as movers and shakers in society – that so many women are still in the situation where their male partner is doing all the finances. When you describe the idea that women would literally fall off the edge of a financial cliff because they haven’t got anything saved, it’s quite frightening.”
When asked how we were going to change this attitude to finances Inga explained there are lots of changes that would help. She said: “One is we get more women working in the financial services sector, or a career where they can build up their own world – so we have got to do a lot more in encouraging women to get professional careers and retain them”.
“We have also got to start and do much more in helping women understand financial literacy. Women control 70-80% of consumer spending globally and yet when it comes to it they are looking after the household finances but they are not looking after that attention to the future and savings aspect. We have got to do a piece around helping them understand how to look after themselves. Fundamentally, we have also got to look at ways of providing more infrastructure, whether that’s childcare… we have got to find the support”.
Inga joined Lloyd’s in 2014 as Chief Executive Officer, the first female CEO in the insurance market's 328-year history. When asked about taking on this role she discussed bringing her life experience and how she relates to the younger generation at work. She said: “They do not want to see this CEO sitting up on an ivory tower, they want to really be able to relate to you…If you want to engage with that younger generation, being yourself, coming out and just being natural at work is going to be the winner”.
As an openly bisexual women and a strong defender of LGBT rights, she discussed the impact this has had on her life and career. She said: “It takes courage to speak out about it every single day. It’s not easy and I think many women in this room would feel perhaps under a certain amount of pressure to not talk about kind of topics that is gender and LGBT related as we don’t want to be seen as campaigning for a cause”.
“When I joined Lloyds what I wanted to do was to really get the whole topic of diversity and inclusion on the table”.
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