Women in finance

We wouldn’t have it any other way

From day one, we’ve set out to disrupt the banking sector. Our goal was to shake things up and create something dramatically different from the norm. But it wasn’t just about giving our customers a bank that was truly unique, it was about treating our people differently too.

That’s why we’ve designed our employment policies and roles to appeal to all. Every position in our bank, no matter the department, is open to everyone. Gender doesn’t even come into it when we’re making a recruitment decision; it’s about what you can bring to the table.

So, when the government reviewed the representation of women in senior managerial roles in financial services in 2015, we’re happy to report that we were already streets ahead of the competition.

The review made four recommendations to the industry:

1. Firms should have one member of the senior executive team who is responsible and accountable for gender diversity and inclusion

2. Firms should set internal targets for gender diversity in senior management

3. Firms should publish progress annually against these targets in reports on their website

4. Firms should have an intention to ensure pay of the senior executive team is linked to delivery against these internal targets on gender diversity

The HM Treasury’s Women in Finance Charter is designed to get firms to commit to implement these recommendations, and we signed up straight away.

Having created a culture of inclusivity at Atom, we’re proud to say that we are targeting all the important conditions of this charter.

What we’ve done so far

• We have brought recruitment in-house to take greater control over hiring campaigns, and increasing our reach into our local communities
• We’re supporting regional initiatives that drive an increase in gender representation across industries such as engineering, technology and physical sciences
• By actively promoting flexible working and family-friendly benefits we’ve become known as an attractive family-friendly employer
• We endeavour to ensure we meet the needs of our diverse workforce beyond gender
• We encourage and support our people in their careers
• We’re working on initiatives to help grow and promote women to move up the organisation
• We’ve nurtured close links with other challenger banks to support each other and attract more women into the world of finance

Since signing the Charter, we have seen our female representation at board level rise to 40%.

Overall, female representation at a senior level was steadily rising year on year, and is a stable metric at 32.56%. Though there are no active targets for this, we are constantly working to ensure we are increasing the number of females in senior level roles.

Currently, female representation across the organisation sits at 41.99%. Year on year, we have increased the percentage of females at Atom. However, due to planned (limited) organisational growth — which has allowed us to prioritise and drive our business forward, alongside minimal attrition — we have not made as much progress as we had anticipated. We have, therefore, made the difficult decision to delay the deadline for achieving this target by one calendar year — until March 2026.

We will continue to prioritise our Charter targets. This is evidenced by Atom having met two Charter targets early and the increases in female representation organisationally.

We believe a more diverse and inclusive business leads to better outcomes and experiences for our customers. And to support this, we have a targeted programme of work to address the gender imbalance in our sectors. This focuses on not only the workplace but also in encouraging more females to study STEM related subjects. We have just successfully completed our second internship programme, which directly supported students based in the North-East of England. This has subsequently led to the piloting of our first graduate programme.

We plan to launch further internship and graduate programmes, which includes staying connected with students throughout the duration of their studies. We know that the output of activities will take several years to materialise, however, it will have a positive impact on our industry.