“Accelerate Action”, the theme of 2025 International Women’s Day, challenges us all to drive rapid progress towards gender equality. But where to begin?
Financial advice, undergoing its own accelerated Renaissance in 2025, is a good place to start.
Financial empowerment for women begins with literacy, education and goal setting. Which is why we sat down with Madden client and friend, the wonderful Melody Edwards. Mel is a Senior Financial Adviser and Aged Care Specialist at Sydney-based Evalesco. We asked Mel the important questions regarding obstacles women face, and how she works directly to lift her female clients to greater heights.
Closer to home, we also feature insights from our own Penne Madden, a quiet influencer behind the scenes of the financial services and communications industries within Australia.
Our beloved Penne has a long career in client-facing professional roles, witnessing firsthand some of the imbalances facing females. Penne explores the underrepresentation of women in our media and shares a few hard-won tips from her network of high-achieving women doing great things – from money management to casting a bright light on the social, health and wellbeing stigmas suffered by women enduring symptoms of menopause and perimenopause.
Here are some of the highlights from our conversations.
Melody Edwards on Advancing Women in Financial Services: Challenges, Progress, and the Path Forward
Madden: Has female representation changed since you began your financial advice career, and what progress do we need?
Mel: To Accelerate Action, the industry must implement structural changes, such as adjusting regulatory requirements to better support part-time work, job sharing, and locum work, enabling more women to remain and progress in the profession despite career interruptions.
Since I started in 2006, women’s representation in financial advice has unfortunately seen little progress. Although women advisers increased to 30% at one point, it has now dropped back to just 22% in 2024. Although women make up 29% of new entrants to the profession, the numbers decline as tenure increases, suggesting systemic barriers, such as career breaks and part-time work due to caregiving, prevent women from advancing.
Across financial services more broadly, women make up 53% of the workforce but only 36% of top earners, highlighting a significant leadership gap.
Madden: What role do financial advisers play in closing the wealth gap for women?
Mel: By improving access to advice and providing more inclusive financial strategies, we can help women build wealth, close the superannuation gap, and achieve long-term financial security.
Financial advisers are critical to addressing the gender wealth gap. Despite this, only 13% of Australian women use a financial adviser (Finder’s 2022 Financial Advisor Report), meaning the vast majority are missing out on tailored guidance to improve their financial wellbeing.
According to the Financy Women’s Index Report (Sept 2024), gender equality in financial outcomes is still 22.1 years away—far too long for those currently building their wealth. Women are more likely to seek financial advice from female advisers, yet with women making up only 22% of the profession, there is a clear need to increase the number of female financial advisers.
Madden: How can advice firms like yours create a more inclusive and supportive environment for female clients?
Mel: There are several steps firms can take:
- Actively attracting and developing more female financial advisers, ensuring greater representation and fostering trust with female clients.
- Creating a culture that prioritises client outcomes over revenue targets fosters trust and a client-centric approach.
- Training advisers in interpersonal and communication skills to better engage with diverse clients is essential.
- Firms must offer tailored services that address the women’s unique financial needs in different life stages, such as career progression, family planning and women’s health, and retirement.
By embedding inclusivity into their workforce and client experience, firms can build long-term, meaningful relationships with female clients.
Madden: What misconceptions do you think still exist about women in finance, and how can we challenge them?
Mel: An ongoing misconception is that women aren’t as suited to roles in financial advice with technical and analytical skills as well as investment knowledge, typically seen as more ‘male’ characteristics. However, competence is not gender specific.
There is also persistent bias that women will leave to start families or at least not be able to commit to a long-term career, which has more to do with regulatory requirements and rigid workplace structures than women’s goals and ambitions. To Accelerate Action, we must challenge these biases by celebrating women’s achievements in finance, increasing visibility of female role models, and pushing for systemic changes that support career longevity for women.
Madden: What policies or initiatives would you like to see more of in the industry to support women’s financial independence?
Mel: Financial literacy is a key driver of women’s financial independence. We need to Accelerate Action by improving financial education, especially for younger women as they begin their careers. This allows them to leverage their long investment time horizon, which is one of the most powerful tools for wealth-building due to compounding.
Additionally, ensuring that both partners in a household are equally engaged in financial decisions—rather than defaulting to one primary decision-maker—can help shift dynamics and empower more women to take control of their financial futures.
Madden: What is one piece of advice that you would give to women entering the industry?
Mel: Find a mentor – or multiple mentors! Talk with as many people as you can to help shape your approach and the type of adviser you want to become. Celebrate your unique strengths and think about what you bring to the table – for young women, it seems like the odds are stacked against them to build credibility and trust, but having confidence and conviction in your skills and knowledge will go a long way.
Penne Madden on female Representation in Media: Obstacles, Achievements, and her hero network!
Madden: Are women gaining equivalent airtime across media, and in financial media specifically?
Penne: No! My observation is that, ironically, while the PR world is predominantly female, men still dominate media coverage at a proportion like the numbers quoted by Melody. Absurd! For financial and corporate Australia, we know it’s a clear and persistent problem that the female presence in media is disproportionately low. The imbalance means that our sector is deprived of a richer level of diversity and expertise. But it is an opportunity also! We encourage grass roots change – from basic media training of great female talent to then representing awesome women across the full spectrum of leadership and change agent scenarios.
Madden: So, what can we do to Accelerate Action?
Penne: Support and uplift one another! I worked part-time in my early days in the fashion industry where the female presence was mostly a male muse of the media and advertising industry, and where the struggle for women was to get past the daily hurdles, and occasionally the formal ‘positive discrimination’ policies that were well intended but ultimately failed. It starts with awareness.
But change is created by acts of leadership and grass roots barrier removal. You can’t legislate for positive social change, but you can make a difference at your personal level of influence. I talk passionately with my daughters about this subject as they make their way into the adult world and the workplace.
In media, we have seen a positive but gradual shift to feature more female talent and spokespeople. Madden will often source a female voice outside of its regular clients on a pro-bono basis because we believe that this one simple act will help to Accelerate Action.
Madden: What role does media training play for your spokespeople?
Penne: The thing I love most about the media training work we do with clients is the honest conversation about authenticity. Not shying from the realities facing us, and certainly not trying to ’spin’ a story. Educating female spokespeople is not just about boosting representation, it’s also concerned with bringing legitimate issues to the fore being felt for real by half of the population! If 75 per cent of what we see, hear, and consume in media is from a male perspective…well, you get my point. Shout out here to a good friend of mine who bravely entered the world of TV media to highlight the trauma and stigma she and many women endure with menopause. She is putting herself out there for a cause, she is a trained medical professional, and her representation on that subject especially is a genuine shift. Bravo!
Madden: What are the main barriers that women face in advancing their media profiles in financial media?
Penne: Many of the senior female leaders we work with are time poor and are juggling multiple responsibilities. One amazing woman has small children at home and is often tucking the kids in while doing a Zoom call to London on mute. We’ve all been there as working mothers. You know, sadly we’ve seen some great female talent turn down media opportunities because they don’t have the time or the support network to take on the media work outside of their regular responsibilities. Sometimes doing media work doesn’t rank highly in the strategic stakes for women. But in the long term it pays an important social and personal dividend.
Madden: Any advice for those that are interested in building a media presence?
Penne: Dive in, speak up, and always back yourself in the process! Reach out to me, we’re here to help. I love a good cup of Earl Grey tea and a chat about these issues particularly the equitable representation of women, and yes, more women of diverse backgrounds, and more leadership voices and perspectives that are female…This is a vital job that we take seriously at our firm. There are plenty of opportunities out there and media is keen to feature you. We will work with you to find the right opportunities that make sense and, importantly, are authentic to you.
As our conversations with Melody Edwards and Penne Madden reveal, financial empowerment for women is about more than just access – it’s about visibility, representation, and tailored support. While progress is being made, there’s still much to do in ensuring women have the confidence, resources, and voice they need in financial decision-making.
“Accelerate Action” isn’t just a theme; it’s a call to push forward with real, meaningful change. Whether through inclusive financial advice, or fostering industry-wide awareness via media representation, the time to act is now. By championing these efforts, we can help shape a more equitable financial future for all.