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White Marble and tml Partners: All roads lead to culture- takeaway points from ESG roundtable · Two in Twenty

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: So we were lucky enough this morning to meet with leaders from the investment and wealth community to discuss the topic of sort of building authenticity into ESG marketing and indeed corporate visions within the sector.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: We definitely sort of felt that there were different areas that are challenges we face, whether that's regulation, corporate responsibility, culture.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, culture was the main focus of our topic today.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: We were lucky enough to be joined by Benji and the team at White Marble, and Benji, it was wonderful that you set the scene with your presentation.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what key takeaways you found from today.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I think universal agreement around the room of the importance of culture in itself, that's not a unique thing to say, but I think a recognition that we face a very regulated, very congested, saturated market.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: And when groups are thinking about ESG, it's very difficult to compete on some of the environmental topics.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: The reporting is the same, there's a lot of consistency, there's a lot of box ticking.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: Social issues, and particularly diversity, really relate to the very fabric of your business, and they allow you to think about themes like corporate diversity, responsibility, purpose, mission, and probably connect to your investors in a more human and more engaged way.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was interesting to hear more about not only the importance of culture and when you embed that in your potential employees and existing employees through an interview process as well as actually on their first three months of joining the business.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: But actually, longer term, the metrics, how do we measure culture?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: I don't really think we are able to conclude on that or find a perfect solution, but there's definitely an element where CMOs need to be working with chief people officers and collaborating with HR and other leaders on the board to collaborate and agree a top-down approach that if they are emulating, whether it's showing a higher emotional intelligence and awareness of staff, various flexibilities that are important to their individuals, then that will then ultimately feed down to the rest of the business.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: What you stand for matters internally and externally as much as what you don't stand for.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: And finding those metrics to support that is hard because social topics are based on standards and values and cultural norms rather than on specific data points.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: But it doesn't mean you've got to you can't avoid it.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to try, you've got to try and find proof and find the evidence to give the people in your business a voice, I think, as much as anything, and allow topics like diversity and culture to flourish because they will be how you differentiate from your peers given the direction our industry is going.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: The need to be client-centric requires your engagement and your employees to be so engaged around demonstrating intellectual property because that's all we have as an industry.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: We have our people without that, there's nothing.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: So they're a crucial aspect from a retention and a recruitment perspective, but they're a crucial aspect in the terms of the delivery of our products and services that we actually have.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and thinking of that ultimate end consumer, we need to make sure that as a as an industry we're humanising the message, the marketing, both internally and externally, so that our voices is heard by the man or woman on the street, and that's escalating down through your institutional clients, your big pension funds, actually thinking about the beneficiary at the end of that chain, I think will really help businesses stand out and get that sense of culture ingrade externally, increasing their brand as well as internally.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think you know a couple of things I found really interesting from today were exactly that point, recognising that the industry is very good at talking to itself and getting caught up on taxonomy and language and the way that we describe things to each other, which doesn't make sense always to the external world.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: So we always talk about education, but we don't seem to necessarily move the dial on it.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: And how do we find the things that matter to our clients and stop talking about being client-centric but being client-centric?
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: And how do we recognise within that being brave as a business and understanding what clients we truly want to engage with and not trying to appeal to to be all things to all men, which I think which I think is another thing our industry is guilty of?
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: So, where is marketing's accountability and that and responsibility for delivering it?
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: How does it play through all of the regulatory challenges, the need to innovate, the need to balance the short term and the long term, and react to change?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: There's so much happening from an external perspective.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: How do you retain your consistency of identity while these challenges are being thrown at you right left and centre?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Completely, and on the point of customer centricity, you know, it was raised and agreed that it it rather needs to be spoken and said, it just needs to be an intrinsic part of your fabric as a company, and making sure that comes through, I think, is going to be immensely valuable because you can say you focus on the client, but where's where those are words?
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: Where are the actions in in the industry to make that happen?
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: Where are the actions, particularly, and it is a battle that has been hard for, but around gender diversity?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: Because for all the work, all the initiatives and everything we do, there's still a startling lack of female fundraisers.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was 11% someone said across the entire industry.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: That's a real problem.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: Any minority needs to get to 30% share representation in order to be given a sufficient voice.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot of work to do there, and I think a lot of people around the table recognise our role and responsibility in that without necessarily having all the answers.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: Completely, I I know girls who invest was mentioned, which is one fantastic programme, um, but there is a lot more girls who code, etc.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot more programmes that need to come through because yeah, you're right, and some of the leading fund managers often get very high profiles in the in the financial media, but it needs to be for the right reasons and profiling in the correct way.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Benji, thanks as always to you and the team at White Marble.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a pleasure partnering with you again, and um, yeah, we very much looking look forward to see how this landscape develops in the years and months to come.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Anna.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.