Derivatives industry gets wilder with women’s group

Derivatives industry gets wilder with women’s group

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The group was officially formed last year and is hoping to grow in size and expand globally.

The aim is to give women in the industry a forum for networking, mentoring, education and career advancement.

It was founded by Jessica Titlebaum, an editor/producer at John Lothian Newsletters, and Leslie Sutphen, Newedge’s global head of e-solutions.

The two women each set up their own group, then combined the two to form Wild. Titlebaum got together a group of young professional women in Chicago and Sutphen organised a group of women in the industry who started meeting at the FIA Boca Raton conference three years ago.

“It started out being somewhat social,” Sutphen said. “It was a nice, refreshing change to have our own social agenda.”

At the moment there are about 175 women on the organisation’s mailing list. Titlebaum said this was growing constantly, mainly by word of mouth.

Wild has members in different parts of the world and hopes to form regional branches. It plans to open a European branch called Wilder (Wild European Region) and an Asian branch called Wildest.

“I think what makes us so unique is that we’re just listed derivatives. We’re a very niche group,” said Titlebaum. “We have some great women in this industry.”

So far the group has focused on organising social and networking events, but it plans to start educational events soon. Sutphen said that in the third quarter of 2010, the group aims to hold a panel discussion.

Katherine Murray, Patsystems’ global head of marketing, is one of the founding members of Wild and is on the organisation committee, which meets monthly. She is liaising with women in London to form a regional group, called Wilder. “The mission of the organisation certainly doesn’t stop in Chicago,” she said.

She added that it gave women in the industry the opportunity to “stick together, share wisdom and transfer knowledge”.

“It’s a comfortable environment for women to get together,” she said.

Sian Williams +44 207 779 8370 swilliams@fow.com

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