You can see from the links below why Q3 has been so busy, with me popping up on podcasts and on panels left, right and centre. The most recent one being HomeGame 5 by the lang cat, which was focused on New Blood. Firstly, I’d like to say that I really enjoyed them not shying away from using the term ’new blood’. I know people worry it’s a tad vampiric but, as their opening video explained clearly, new blood is essential for all living life forms. And if we think of financial services as a living, breathing form then the injection of new blood is something we are going to wither and die without (not even sorry for the dramatics!)
The whole day was around why finance is a fantastic career, demystifying the sector to those outside of it, talking through some of the blockers we have and helping to create ideas for more people to join us, with effort required from all sides of the fence. This is something which is very close to my heart and has been for a long time, through:
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The Grad Scheme, our own recruitment programme at Verve, bringing fresh talent into finance and our business
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The Art of Finance, our B2C website, designed to showcase careers in finance to those outside of our bubble and set them on their path to getting their little toes in the door
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We Are Change, our funded programme via the Verve Foundation, covering the costs of a Diploma plus some training support to get more people to choose careers in finance and get them on the first rung of the ladder.
Through these various initiatives, over the years, we have directly contributed to literally hundreds of people coming into finance, who maybe otherwise wouldn’t have known about it as a career option or, did know, but couldn’t afford to make the change. Hundreds. And, we’re tiny. There’s huge corporations in finance with way, way deeper pockets than we have. If we can have this much of an impact through just being scrappy and grafting at it, imagine the impact that could be had if more firms directed some of their extensive resource to it?
I posted recently (you can see below) about the fact we have 10 x as many applications as we have funded spaces on our Foundation programmes. That has always been the case on The Grad Scheme too; literally hundreds of applications for each cohort we bring on. Don’t believe that people aren’t choosing a career in finance - I promise you, they are. But it’s on us an existing eco-system to make space for them. To find them room and give them the freedom to apply their fresh approach, new skills and ability to mix things up. We will all be better off for it.
Other links include a fascinating new AI paper from AdvisoryAI who are absolutely on a roll right now, as well as
loads of CPD from us (in person and online) to round off the year and keep your compliance teams happy. And, speaking of compliance, for Verve Members the
Dextera™ dashboard is bursting with more compliance updates 🤓
Wine recommendation of the week; as I have been travelling so much recently, some of my “tastings" have taken the form of wine in a can (fancy, I know). But they are genuinely getting better and better and
these ones are pleasantly drinkable and, apparently, can match your outfit to perfection.
Have a wonderful weekend all,
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