6 in 10 S'pore SMEs have women CFOs

Vincent Wee And Janice Heng

12 January 2007

Business Times Singapore

Most are family-run and see women as meticulous, thus better suited

(SINGAPORE) Just as in many Asian families, women hold the purse strings at a large number of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the region too.

A survey of over 3,000 Asian companies by research firm Kadence Asia-Pacific found that half of all finance heads are women.

Singapore SMEs, in particular, have one of the highest proportions of women financial decision-makers. Slightly more than six in 10 have women handling their money matters.

But this is far behind Taiwan and Thailand where the corresponding figure is almost 80 per cent. And India stands out as the only male-dominant market in Asia where just 5 per cent of women make key financial decisions.

The study aimed to find out how companies managed their finances and payments. SMEs were defined as non-listed companies with fewer than 200 staff.

Of the 300 firms surveyed in Singapore, the highest proportion of women chief financial officers (CFOs) is among the larger SMEs with between 50 and 200 staff. In fact, over 80 per cent of companies in this segment have female financial decision-makers.

The common characteristic of many of the larger SMEs in Malaysia and Singapore is that they are predominantly Chinese family-run businesses. In Malaysia, 70 per cent of large SMEs have female CFOs.

One explanation for this could be that in family-run businesses the person handling the finances is usually a trusted family member. In this context, women in the family are generally perceived to be more meticulous and thus better suited to handling the accounts.

In companies where there are more outside professionals in senior management, the CFO's gender seems to be less of an issue.

Da Vinci Holdings managing director Raymond Phua, for example, said: 'Important fiduciary duties like book-keeping and monitoring expenditure are involved and in this case the person's skill level rather than gender is more important.'

Likewise although she is a woman holding the key financial role, Market Force Integrated chief financial officer Indira Moolchand Ram said that the gender of a company's financial manager was simply 'not an issue'.

In Taiwan, the market is dominated by female CFOs across a range of companies and sectors, although it is unclear if this is also due to the predominance of family-run businesses there.

Meanwhile in Thailand, the involvement of women in financial decision-making roles is driven by a market characterised by entrepreneurship among young women. As a result women are much more common across all sectors in financial decision-making roles.

Commenting on the findings, Kadence Asia-Pacific managing director Piers Lee said: 'As a result (of the survey), financial institutions will need to align their business activity to reflect gender changes in the Asia-Pacific workforce.'

For example, banks might consider taking out advertisements for corporate banking in women's magazines and hiring more women sales representatives to position themselves to take advantage of this demographic, he told BT.