Empowering Female Leaders: How UK Businesses can build with female Finance Leaders
In celebration of International Women’s Day, we held a small, intimate roundtable event -Empowering Women in Finance.
The discussions were chaired by three female leaders themselves – Gemma Smith, Partner at Trace Recruitment, Ellie Prideaux, Manager at Trace Recruitment and Jaiya Bhandari – a CFO-level finance leader and transformation consultant, women’s leadership & wellbeing advocate.
This invite-only event brought together industry leaders to explore the realities facing women in finance leadership and, crucially, what the future should look like.
For UK business owners, the insights weren’t just inspirational—they were highly practical.
Here are five key takeaways from the event, and why they should matter to UK business owners, when building high-performing finance teams.
Empassertiveness: The leadership skill nobody knows but businesses need
Jaiya led a deeply interesting discussion on a term not commonly known – empassertiveness.
Empassertiveness is a skill recognised in leaders across business and politics, with both male and female individuals including former President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern named as clear examples of the expertise which balances empathy and assertiveness.
The ability to combine emotional intelligence with decisiveness is exactly what efficient leadership requires and yet, female leaders often face the “double bind”: being perceived as either too soft or too aggressive.
For business owners, this is a major opportunity to empower their teams, and in particular female leaders – current and future.
Finance leaders who can deliver tough messages while maintaining trust and engagement create stronger, more resilient teams.
Authentic Leadership Drives Performance
Many women feel pressure to mirror traditionally “masculine” leadership styles, which encourages them to abandon their own style or strengths, replace authenticity with complicity and set the tone for future leaders to do the same.
UK businesses that embrace authenticity in leadership will see stronger retention, engagement, and long-term growth.
When leaders can build and grow teams with authenticity and support, they not only perform better, but they also create cultures where others feel safe to contribute and innovate.
The Future of Finance Is Human + Technical
While AI is transforming finance one thing is clear: technical capability alone is no longer enough.
The future finance leader must combine:
Commercial awareness
Technical and AI insight
Critical thinking
Communication skills
Relationship & team building
Interestingly, many of these are traits traditionally associated with female leadership styles.
As finance evolves into a more strategic, business-partnering function, these strengths are becoming increasingly essential, not optional.
Again, this presents another opportunity for businesses to develop and nurture the skills and leaders they already have – helping empower current and future leaders.
Culture Add > Culture Fit
There is an important shift - from hiring for “culture fit” to hiring for culture add.
Female finance leaders often bring a valuable layer of further insight to hiring practices:
Diverse perspectives
Collaborative approaches
A willingness to mentor and develop others
For UK business owners, this is a key mindset shift when developing hiring strategies – considering what skills bring additional value to the role, the business and it’s culture, rather than replicating the same type of professional repeatedly.
By building diverse leadership teams, you bring a varied approach to building teams, long-term strategising, and impactful decision-making for future-proofing your business.
Leadership Development Needs to Start Earlier
A clear agreement between all attendees – there is a growing concern for gaps in experience among emerging finance talent, particularly as AI and remote working reshape early careers.
Female leaders are often strong advocates for mentorship, knowledge-sharing, and developing junior talent, but the demand in facilitating this is often in competition with already large workloads.
By having a strategic and supportive approach to mentorship within businesses, Senior Leaders could minimise these growing concerns and building sustainable leadership pipelines for talented finance teams.
Businesses that invest in leaders who prioritise development will be better positioned to navigate future challenges, while keeping and nurturing talented finance and accountancy professionals.
Why all this matters for UK Business Owners
Despite progress, gender equality in senior leadership remains slow. Yet the insights from this event make one thing clear:
Female finance leaders aren’t just a diversity initiative - they’re a strategic advantage.
They bring the balance of empathy and accountability, the cultural awareness, and the people-focused leadership style that UK industries demand and finance team need.
In an era defined by AI advancement, technological change and talent shortages, UK businesses that actively seek out and support female finance leaders will continuously gain a competitive edge not just in hiring, but in performance, culture, and long-term success.
If you’re reviewing your finance team structure or planning your next leadership hire, now is the time to think differently. The future of finance leadership is already here and it’s more diverse, more human, and more effective because of it.