Loretta O'Donnell, CTI country head, Citi Ireland
Citi’s Irish base has become the first to launch a dedicated Women in Technology Group to address the issue of gender balance in the company’s fin-tech divisions.
“Citi itself is kind of a fin-tech company, really, and we have a lot of technology here in our Dublin site,” said Loretta O’Donnell, CTI country head at Citi Ireland, at the recent launch of the Women in Technology Group.
At the Dublin office, embedded in the International Financial Services Centre (IFSC), the number of women working in Citi’s fin-tech departments and its Innovation Lab is on par with figures from the technology industry – which is not an acceptable level by O’Donnell’s standards.
“Our female representation is not where it should be. It’s within the industry, but we want to grow it. We feel that there’s a big need there in the market and we think women can fill that role,” she said.
As Citi’s fin-tech services and teams grow, so too should its female representation thanks to initiatives such as the Women in Technology Group and unconscious bias training, which helps interviewers to identify and overcome any unconscious biases they may have when reviewing candidates.
In an interview with Siliconrepublic.com, O’Donnell discussed how more support is needed to both attract and retain women in the tech sector and, though a cultural shift is taking place, this also needs to be reflected in policy.
“Society is changing completely, but I think we need to see that more at a Government level and we need legislation around that,” she said.
Women Invent Tomorrow is Silicon Republic’s campaign to champion the role of women in science, technology, engineering and maths. It has been running since March 2013, and is kindly supported by Accenture Ireland, Intel, the Irish Research Council, ESB, Twitter, CoderDojo and Science Foundation Ireland.
Inspire 2015 is Silicon Republic’s international event running 18-19 June in Dublin, connecting sci-tech professionals passionate about the future of STEM with fresh perspectives on leadership, innovation and diversity. Buy your early bird tickets now!
