Financial advice firms can do a lot to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace, Amy Irvine writes in InvestmentNews.
A Call to Action
Irvine — who’s the founder of Irvine Wealth Planning Strategies and a member of the XY Planning Network's diversity committee — began her financial services career with an insurance company rep telling in 1994 her she was "cute" but wouldn’t make it because she was a woman, she writes.
She’s had other run-ins with colleagues in the industry making comments about her gender, at some point coming close to pressing charges against one man, Irvine writes.
The claims against Harvey Weinstein and the advent of the #MeToo movement in social media means sexual harassment is happening in many industries, according to Irvine. To stop it, she writes, it’s essential to make it clear that it won’t be tolerated. Being part of the XY Planning Network, whose mission is to develop a more diverse environment in the financial planning community, gives Irvine confidence that someone would have her back if she were to experience harassment, she writes.
But the rest of the industry should take the recent sexual harassment claims as a call to action too, according to Irvine. She suggests that people who’ve never been discriminated against support those who have, and to step in when they witness it. In addition, advisors should become mentors or supporters to colleagues of other genders and races in order to prevent them from being victims, Irvine writes.
