Gender Representation at Preqin

Our 2023 Women in Alternatives report found that 21.3% of people working in alternative assets roles identify as women. While this represents a slight increase from the previous year, women are still significantly underrepresented in our industry. It’s even more evident in senior and board-level roles, where the percentage drops to just 13.6% and 10.3%, respectively. 
 
At Preqin we are committed to advancing gender equity, and compared with the wider alternatives market, we have stronger female representation than the industry average, at 38% of our global workforce. In the last year (December 2021 to December 2022), we increased the representation of women at the senior leadership level from 29% to 32%. 
 
While we’re proud that we’re making steady progress, we recognize that we need to continue building on this foundation. Having a gender-balanced workplace is an important step toward wider diversity within our organization. 
 
Gender representation at Preqin UK 
 
Below we look in detail at the gender representation and our pay gap at Preqin UK, in line with UK’s Gender Pay Gap Regulations. These require all private and voluntary sector companies with 250 or more employees to publish their gender pay gap data by April 4 every year. 
 
As of December 2022, our UK-based team was 63% men and 37% women, illustrated by the chart below. The chart also shows that 35% of our managers and 19% of senior leaders were women. 
 
We’ve seen a decline in the number of female senior leaders compared to December 21 (from 25% to 19%). This was driven by the fact that there are limited senior roles in the region and a small number of women in these positions left Preqin in the last year. At the same time, we’ve improved gender representation at the manager level by nine percentage points (from 26% to 35%).  

The second chart shows that, of the top 25% earners at Preqin in the UK as of April 2022, 23% were women and 77% were men. While these figures represent a five-percentage-point improvement on last year, we recognize that they are still not satisfactory. We are committed to continuing our efforts toward a gender-balanced workplace at all levels.

The two slides below look at the gender pay gap from two other angles.

1. Difference between men and women
2. Percentage receiving bonus payment calculates the percentage of women and men receiving any bonus payment in the year preceding April 2022
   
   
   

The hourly pay gap at Preqin is driven primarily by the fact that women are underrepresented within our UK teams at manager and senior leadership levels. The bonus pay gap shows a higher discrepancy and is largely a result of a larger proportion of men in senior and sales roles, with the sales function traditionally receiving a higher percentage of pay as earned bonuses. Preqin is committed to equal pay and the above chart does not compare individual pay for men and women in similar roles and levels of seniority.

The small gap in the percentage of women and men who received a bonus reflects the fact that we hired a higher percentage of men from December 2021–April 2022, and these employees were not eligible for an annual bonus within the timeframe of this report.

Having gender-balanced teams is an important step toward achieving wider diversity within our organization, and we’re making tangible steps toward increasing women’s representation. 

Our internal gender diversity agenda is focused on hiring and retaining female team members. We have put several things in place to achieve this. We train our hiring managers to recognize inherent bias and ensure that our hiring processes are based on merit. We have transparent and clear processes around promotion to ensure everyone is given fair and equal opportunities to aspire to management and leadership roles. What’s more, we support our team members through coaching and mentorship programs, flexible and gender-neutral family leave following the birth or adoption of a child, and hybrid working.  

We have also publicly committed to reaching 45% women in leadership by 2030, and have signed HM Treasury's Women in Finance Charter.

We aim to set the standard for gender equity in our industry. We regularly publish content and hold events that promote the crucial contributions of women in alternatives, and highlight the success of female leaders. 

Read our latest Women in Alternatives report

We believe that showcasing role models is a great way of attracting more female talent into the industry. That’s why we partner with a number of non-profit organizations to support more women embarking on a career in financial markets, including SEO London and SEO US. 

At Preqin we’re committed to reducing barriers to growth for everyone in our organization. We recognize that gender is only one facet of diversity and are committed to ensuring equal employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or any other factor. 

You can find out more about our different DEI initiatives in our Impact Report.  

We want everyone at Preqin to feel empowered, visible, and heard. Together, we believe Preqin can be a force for change.

Declaration

We confirm that Preqin's gender pay gap calculations are accurate and meet the requirements of the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017 - Christoph Knaack, CEO, Preqin