Women in Finance Charter: 2024 update

Starling is a proud supporter of the Women in Finance Charter, having become a founding signatory in 2017. We believe that this voluntary commitment made by HM Treasury and signatory firms to improve the gender balance in the financial services industry has the potential to create lasting change.

We report on our progress every year to demonstrate our continued commitment to equality, ensure transparency of our efforts, and prevent any unravelling of the advances made since the Charter’s creation.

Equality in financial services is particularly important to us. Of the hundreds of banks founded in the UK over time, just one was founded by a woman; that’s Starling Bank, which Anne Boden set up in 2014. 

In addition to our initiatives that advance women’s careers at the bank and the sector, we focus on equality in other areas too, like trying to close the financial literacy gap between girls and boys, levelling the playing field in women’s football, and focusing our engineering talent on building a first of its kind feature for people experiencing economic abuse.

Our target

When we signed up to the Charter in 2017 there were 27% of women in senior roles. We then set a target of 40% of women in senior positions, which we met early on and continue to hold. We now want to be even more ambitious and have set a new target of 50% of women in senior positions by 2027.

Our 2024 data

Starling’s 2024 gender equality data shows that women make up:

• 44% of our total workforce (3,580 as of August 2024).

• 36% of our Executive team.

• 44% of our Board.

• 43% of our senior managers.

Growth and gender diversity

Since our last update Starling has continued to grow. We have over 3,500 employees. We are proud of our gender equality initiatives, particularly:

• Our With Women network, which aims to nurture an environment where women can bring their true selves to work. With Women hosts regular talks with inspiring female leaders and women’s charities, runs a book club that shines a spotlight on critical women’s issues, and promotes awareness and action for the issues that are important for our women employees.

• Our charity partnership with Smart Works, which supports women to further their careers with expert interview coaching and clothes that boost confidence. Our partnership with Surviving Economic Abuse also saw us raise the bar for people, usually women, experiencing economic abuse, by creating an industry-first tool that lets people hide abusive payment references while still receiving money, such as child support, that they’re rightfully owed.

• Our support for women’s football. We’ve given away £750,000 of free kit, equipment, and coaching vouchers for girl’s and women’s grassroots teams. We’re also the front-of-shirt sponsor for Southampton FC Women, and together we’ve launched our ‘Coaches of Tomorrow’ programme which aims to get more women into coaching, and the ‘Scout School’ which supports the growth of identifying talent in Hampshire.