Stockbroking faces 'perception problem'

Experts at the Stockbrokers and Investment Advisers Association's (SIAA) 2025 conference have told the industry it needs to work to improve its public perception, particularly around the profession of stockbroking.

Morgans Financial chief executive John Clifford said just a simple Google search of the term "stockbroker" will elicit photos of men on Wall Street and images of Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street, while the term "adviser" is met with friendly conversations between a professional and their client with more female representation.

As a result, Clifford said it was important to encourage more female representation in the industry.

"We've been coming at it from a recruitment and a diversity perspective, from an industry and a working group sort of approach," he said.

LGT Crestone chief operating officer Michelle Inns said while the industry does great work at adding value to clients, the perception from the average person on the street is starkly different, and encouraging more women into the industry would help.

"Not only is there a perception out there in the world, but there's a perception in our businesses today, and that suggests that actually there's an issue with culture in our industry," Inns said.

"We've really struggled to attract and retain women into our businesses, and we're all facing that issue. So, the two really go hand in hand. There's the perception issue and the cultural issues that we need to tackle as well."

Inns added that there is a large business advantage to being more inclusive of women in the industry too.

"If perception is the smoke, then culture is the fire. That there is something that we need to take a look at, but the first thing to really understand is the business case," Inns said.

"We know from a number of reports that in Western economies women are going to be controlling more wealth than men by the end of this decade, and some reports locally are saying that's going to be up around 60-65% of wealth to be managed by women in 10 years' time. That's mind blowing in a lot of ways.

Inns encouraged businesses to take note of the language they use when hiring and try to be more inclusive.

"Having inclusive language around roles is really important when we're recruiting people. Are we recruiting guys for their potential and women for their administrative skills? These are things that I think we can see have happened over time," she said.

"Rather than hiring your client's son, we could be recruiting with more inclusive language, having panels that have a diverse group involved in that recruitment process. These are really simple things that have been very effective in other industries as well."