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Westpac makes gender diversity in business front page news

Westpac New Zealand, with the help of FCB Media, is tackling the issue of gender diversity in business leadership roles with a message about women’s underrepresentation in the New Zealand Herald that’s hard to ignore.

“The media idea was conceived by the team at FCB Media and all assets were developed and produced by NZME in partnership with the FCB Media team,” says FCB Media managing director Rufus Chuter. 

This morning, readers woke to find a bare-looking paper with only 29 percent of its content on the cover. There were no images and no byline to the cover story that was also missing chunks of text.

The 29 percent of content is equivalent to the percentage of women business leaders in New Zealand explains one of the few pieces of text and coloured in Westpac’s red, white and black. Page A11 received a similar treatment as part of the campaign.

The finding comes from a study by Deloitte, commissioned by Westpac New Zealand, that asked 500 businesses to share their thoughts on women in leadership.

Further findings have been shared in an online video including that nine percent of businesses say they would never reach gender balance in leadership and 27 percent of businesses say a lack of affordable childcare was a barrier. 

If the numbers aren’t enough to make the audience consider the imbalance, Westpac New Zealand chief executive David McLean has shared his thoughts on the matter in an article on Westpac’s website.

As well as explaining the research, and Westpac New Zealand’s own focus on women in leadership, he wrote about the benefits of women being in leadership roles:

“Many companies are doing great work to achieve greater parity, but many others are lagging. The good news is that great benefits await companies which commit to increasing the number of women in leadership. As part of its analysis, Deloitte worked out the economy could benefit to the tune of $881 million if men and women were equal in number in management. It also found that increasing the proportion of management positions held by women would increase a company’s profitability.”

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