Governance, risk & compliance Governance, risk & compliance
CFOs have long been taking a more active role in business development – anyone simply expecting to just keep the lights on will soon be disappointed. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that more and more fi nance directors are recognising that strong DEI initiatives can play a part in creating long-term value for shareholders. Elly Earls talks to Lena Shishkina and Alexandra Bjertnæs, the chief fi nancial offi cer and chief strategy offi cer at global SaaS provider Meltwater, to understand how CFOs are pushing to make diversity and inclusivity reporting more transparent – and to probe whether better reporting can succeed without more practical changes to hiring and pay.
hen Lena Shishkina and Alexandra Bjertnæs joined Meltwater as chief financial officer and chief strategy officer
on the same day last year, the diversity mix of the C-suite jumped immediately. But that’s not the only way these two women plan to improve diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at the global SaaS provider. From refining KPIs to encouraging parenting Slack groups, their initiatives may still be works in progress, but all coalesce around a single idea: financial results are important, but they can’t come at the cost of your colleagues. In fact, a company can only be competitive if employees take care of each other, from upper management to the newest recruit. Nor is Meltwater, which provides media intelligence and social analytics, by any means alone. If nothing else, this is clear from the
statistics. In its North American CFO Signals survey for the second quarter of 2021, Deloitte found that 72% of CFOs noted their company had a formal DEI programme – an increase from 67% in the first quarter of 2019.
Stronger together W
At the same time, the survey found that 60% of CFOs represented companies that either had, or planned to have, a defined budget for DEI over the next year, suggesting a growing recognition that diversity can play a part in creating long-term value for shareholders. A Wall Street Journal analysis found that the 20 most diverse companies in the S&P 500 have an annual stock return of 10% over five years, compared with the 4.2% achieved by their least diverse counterparts. This makes sense. A strong DEI policy, with reduced biases in recruiting, hiring and
36 Finance Director Europe /
wwww.fi nancedirectoreurope.com
Meltwater
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