THE ALICORN LEADERSHIPSUMMITCelebrating one year of WinPE
Overview
About WinPE
WinPE is a not for profit, pioneering platform for the private equity (PE) industry, to bring about transformation of mindsets in favour of gender diversity, while helping to create more opportunities for women in PE.
Overview
Private equity and venture capital lag other industries in diversity statistics
WinPE is a pioneering, not for profit platform to bring about transformation in the investing world in favour of gender diversity.
WinPE aspires to be the forum where stakeholders come together to set the diversity agenda and lead collective action to create gender balance in the investing ecosystem. WinPE is committed to catalysing action in increasing participation of women as investors, capital allocators and as recipients of investment capital, through a well-rounded and holistic approach that engages key stakeholders of the investing industry.
Although women make up roughly half of the available talent pool, they continue to be significantly underrepresented among the investment decision-makers at private equity and venture capital (PEVC) firms, as well as in the leadership of companies that receive this investment capital. Gender balance in investors is a powerful agent for driving diversity in boardrooms, in the c-suite, within the workplace and within business linkages. Gender and diversity is a top-down agenda and the dialogue has to start at the very top of the capital structure, where corporate ownership resides and where all key decisions originate.
Gender diversity within the investing ecosystem is within the influence of each constituent of this ecosystem and the change that WinPE aims to catalyse is best led by these constituents.
The WinPE Vision
WinPE believes change can only be witnessed when we combine dialogue with action. Based on this philosophy, WinPE engages with the leaders and influencers to drive culture change, while providing a suite of powerful resources to support women who are part of this industry or who aspire to be.
#Engage
Engage with firms within the investing ecosystem and their decision makers in a constructive and open dialogue on the opportunities of gender diversity with an intent to drive collective action on a mutual agenda.
#Empower
Empower the women who are part of the investing industry with a set of training, networking and mentoring resources designed to help them thrive and succeed.
#Enhance
Enhance the participation of female talent in the investing ecosystem, foster an environment and working practices make it an attractive career option for women.
WinPE Partner Manifesto
WinPE mission partners have collectively identified the following priorities for their joint action towards enhancing gender diversity within the investing ecosystem:
WinPE partners will step up efforts for diversity in hiring by pushing for a diverse talent pipeline and incorporating a blind screening process (including redacted CVs removing names and other indications of gender, case studies). The diversity targets for inward talent pipeline will be set on a confidential basis to maintain merit and credibility in hiring.
WinPE and its partners will support mid career women professionals from the industry through a structured mentorship program to be run by WinPE.
WinPE partners will introduce a conversation on diversity within their firms and portfolio companies, enhancing awareness and sensitization within the ecosystem.
WinPE partners will seek for their portfolio companies to measure appropriate diversity metrics and report annually.
WinPE partners will ask for commitment and measurement on Equal Pay at KMP level in portfolio companies.
WinPE partners will support outreach at campuses that are hiring grounds for the industry to champion awareness among female candidates.
Initiatives
WINPE has developed six flagship programs in multiple formats for enabling conversation between different constituents of the PE industry for exchange of ideas, networking and knowledge sharing on diversity.