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Women in Finance: Figures, Facts and Feelings

In 2022, 51% of BNP Paribas Personal Finance employees in the Nordics are women. One of them is Eirin Skøien Runsjø, who started her career path in the food- and fashion industry in Norway and ended up in our IT department in Denmark.

Meet Eirin and discover how she connects a high level of diversity with business success.

What was your path into the financial industry?

Well, I do not have a banking education. My career path started in the food- and fashion industry in Norway, where I was born and raised.

I moved from Norway to Denmark 12 years ago and started working in our Customer Service. Throughout the years, I transferred between different teams and areas of expertise such as customer care, granting, collections, controlling, back office, and today I work in IT as a Quality Assurance Analyst. Here too it applies that I do not have a formalised education within IT, but thanks to my seniority and knowledge of our business, I meet the job requirements, and I am happy in this position.

 

In 2022, 51% of BNP Paribas Personal Finance employees in the Nordics are women. How do you feel that it contributes to BNP Paribas Personal Finance that there is a fairly equal distribution between men and women?

I do not think that gender balance is the most important critical success factor. In my opinion, a high degree of diversity and mix of personalities are far more important to run a successful business. By that, I mean that you need a variety of personalities, skills, strengths and assets to be successful.

If 70% of your colleagues have the same characteristics, you will not achieve the same results as if you had a more diversified mix of colleagues, who can complement each other.

Too many of one kind is not necessarily a benefit. A presence of 70 % women in a company is not an asset by default. It depends of the characteristics of these women and the variety of their personalities.

However, I think it is positive that we have an equal share of men and women. With a sound gender balance, we increase the probability of being a more diversified mix of people with a greater variation compared to if we had a less gender-balanced composition of colleagues.

 

Only five of 57 Danish banks have a female CEO, and one of them is ours. How do you feel that having a female CEO contributes to BNP Paribas Personal Finance?

Having a woman as CEO is a statement. It is a statement that gender is not a decisive factor when you recruit or promote a CEO or a manager in our company. We look at qualifications and personality, not gender.

Nevertheless, referring to my previous answer, if you look at the fact of having a female CEO isolated, it does not tell the story about how an organisation works. I do not think that CEOs lead in gender specific ways. I think we have a strong leader in Annika Olsson as our CEO, but I do not necessarily feel the presence of a woman. And I do not have to either. Management style does not depend on your gender. It depends on your personality.