“It’s a trust issue. It usually boils down to, the man figures if she likes me, then he likes me.’’
Koenig said statistics on women in the work force are a bright spot: she said that there were an estimated 11.3 million women-owned businesses in the United States in 2016, employing nearly nine million people and generating more than $1.6 trillion in revenues.
About 23 percent of financial advisors in the U.S. are women, Koenig said.
“Women build relationships in business, and men are catching on to that! They see it’s not just getting the assets, it’s about finding out about little things, the dog, the vacations they went on, those are the kinds of things that can be brought up in conversation. Men are realizing that if they dig deeper they can get more AUM,’’ she said.
Koenig said she makes a point of informally helping new women FAs.
I give them tips on all the things I found out and would have liked to have known when I first joined. They appreciate that.’’
Koenig raised two children after her divorce in 2008. She entered the military in 1987 as an electronics mechanic, and retired as a team leader, overseeing male maintenance and technical troubleshooters.
She then received masters degrees in project management and supply chain leadership, which she used in her job at Boeing.
“I learned you could be a successful woman in male-dominated industries. But in the financial industry, female financial advisors are treated differently. Males are asked to be in leadership positions sooner, and at training events, 95 to100% of the presenters are male. Women represent 36% of the region I am in, but very few are asked to be in leadership positions.’’
But she ends her book on a positive note.