Diversity, equity and inclusion
International Women’s Day is an opportunity to recognise and celebrate the tremendous achievements of women and girls around the world and consider how we accelerate the further change needed to build a future where everyone is empowered to deliver to their full potential.
This year we celebrated in different ways across our global offices, enabling our people to join the conversation on how to attract, retain and support women to succeed in their careers. Discussions were supported by our gender Employee Network Groups which connect our people from across the businesses in each region to support them in collaborating and learning from each other.
Our CEO Shemara Wikramanayake was joined by guest speakers Liz Ellis, Chair of Netball Australia and media commentator, Stephanie Graham, Managing Director of Construction at Lendlease, and Fiona Balfour AM, a professional non-executive director across the IT/digital, aviation and logistics sectors, to discuss the ways we can come together to support women to succeed and make an impact.
We recognise that the diversity of our people is one of our greatest strengths. An inclusive workplace enables us to embrace diversity to deliver more innovative and sustainable solutions for our people, clients, shareholders and communities.
Everyone at Macquarie is responsible for ensuring our culture is inclusive. Our EMEA Management Committee works closely with the EMEA People and Culture team and our operating groups to enact in the region and drive change.
We encourage our people to self-identify across a broad range of diversity dimensions including cultural and racial diversity, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, and parenting and caring roles. This data enables internal and external benchmarking, as well as measurement of progress and equity in our people processes.
We are committed to achieving more balanced gender representation at all levels across our organisation and are proud of our progress. We employ more women and gender diverse people than ever before, but there is always more we can do.
Our focus continues to be on strengthening the internal and external pipeline of women and people from under-connected groups at all levels of our organisation and enhancing our recruitment and talent practices to help facilitate this.
We have a range of initiatives to drive more balanced gender representation and support women to succeed. By embedding inclusion into our culture and our people processes, from recruitment to development to progression, we hope to enable and empower everyone to thrive.
We continue to invest in and support our people to shape their own unique career paths. We provide a wide variety of role and business-specific training, and have multiple development offerings including:
Investing in our current and future talent is a key priority at Macquarie. We are continuously enhancing our approach to recruiting, to remove bias and focus on casting a wide net, accessing the widest talent pool possible, which in turn, builds a more diverse workforce.
We also provide a range of Early Careers Programmes:
We are committed to helping our employees manage their care responsibilities and provide a range of benefits and support for parents and carers.
Shortlisted as a Top 10 Business of the Year at the 2025 Metro Pride Awards.
Awarded the title of 2024 Exemplary Employer by Investing in Ethnicity.
Recognised as a Top 10 Employer at the Investing in Ethnicity Awards 2023.
Our Cultural, Ethnicity, Race & Faith Employee Network group was awarded Highly Commended Network Group at the European Diversity Awards 2024.
Our Gender Equity and Neurodiversity networks were also shortlisted for the European Diversity Awards 2024.
Recognised as a Top 10 Employer at the European Diversity Awards 2023.
Listed in the Top 50 Glassdoor Best Places to Work 2024 in the UK
In January 2022, we achieved our UK Women in Finance Charter Target of 25 percent women in director roles 18 months ahead of our 2023 schedule. We then set ourselves an ambitious target of 35 percent women in director roles by August 2026. As of 31 August 2024, the representation of women in director roles is 29.4% vs. 22.8% in 2019 when we first signed the Charter.
Whilst market factors this past financial year have challenged our efforts, we remain committed to enabling everyone to be included and to reach their full potential.
Our Women In Tech network was awarded the Best Mentorship Programme at the UK Women in Tech Employer Awards 2022.
Number 1 on the Stonewall Workplace Equality Index, celebrating LGBTQ+ inclusive employers and best employer for LGBT+ people: Stonewall Awards 2022.
Our LGBTQ+ network Pride was awarded Highly Commended Network Group in the Stonewall Workplace Equality Index 2022.
Recognised as a Top 10 Employer by the British LGBT Awards 2022.
Pay gaps are not the same as unequal pay. Equal pay considers work of equal value. A gender pay gap is the difference between the average earnings of all men and women across an entity or organisation. Our gender pay gap is driven by not having enough women in senior roles, which we are working hard to address through various initiatives and actions.
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