Gibraltar's First Woman Banking Chief Cracks The Gender Ceiling

The tracery of cracks that have appeared in the Rock's gender ceiling in recent years have mainly been caused by the carefully-coiffed heads of expatriate achievers, rather than those of female Gibraltarians. So the appointment 18 months ago of Emma Perez as managing director of SG Hambros - the first women to attain such a high office in Gibraltar banking and one of few to reach such heights in the Societe General network - was a watershed event in what remains largely a bastion of male chauvinism.

For though she was born in Britain, Perez is no "ex-pat" having been raised and educated on the Rock where here father was a medical practitioner. What's more she married a Gibraltar Regiment soldier - who was a private when she first met him as a 15-year-old schoolgirl and is now the Regiment's commanding officer.

PROVOKED LIFT-OFF

Perez's appointment to replace Franco Cassar at the head of Gibraltar's fastest-growing merchant bank may have provoked lift-off of a few chauvinist eyebrows, but surprised few in Gibraltar's banking and financial services circles. An astute and highly competent banker she and the team she inherited - which has remained virtually unchanged under her leadership - have continued to build the business in what she acknowledges has been "an increasingly hard market for everyone".

She believes that Gibraltar's glass ceiling - the promotional barrier that in the past has prevented local women from reaching the top rungs of their professional ladders - has developed substantial cracks. Women are already playing a major part in the Rock's developing funds industry and several hold important posts in banking and lesser, but significant posts as partners in leading legal firms - notably in Hassans.

But apart from Perez,  Heidi Bocarissa - who heads the banking division of the Financial Service Commission - is the only Gibraltarian women to attain the assort of high profile which in the past was a male preserve.

"Being a woman has never been as issue as far as any of my jobs have been concerned," Perez told VOX recently. She trained as an accountant with KPMG in Gibraltar - the role in which she began her working career.

"When I left school, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do...though I thought that I would probably end up in some sort of job in finance," she explains. "I actually went to see the then manager at Hambros Bank, John Garrett, who advised me to get some sort of professional qualification first. And, that in a sense pointed me to accountancy.

"In fact, at heart I remain an accountant and risk manager - rather than a risk taker! - and as Deputy MD was the accountant for the bank, rather than for its clients."

"People may find me unapproachable because I'm so reserved," Perez told a local journalist soon after her appointment. And, on initial acquaintance, Gibraltar's first female bank MD gives the impression of an almost-retiring shyness. However her quiet reserve clearly conceals a tough decisiveness which has won the respect of Hambros staff in the six years since she joined the bank as financial controller from Credit Suisse.

"She is strong-willed, tough and very determined," says Bruce Duckworth the bank's commercial director. And she has needed all of these strengths, for she wears three distinctive hats - and none are dainty, feminine chapeaux - all of which are demanding and each of which, for many women , would be a full-time job. As well as taking up the reins at the bank - "I was offered the post, thought about it over a weekend, and discussed it with my husband before accepting", she tells me - she is the mother of a ten-month-old infant, and the wife of Lieut.Col. John Perez, commanding officer of the Gibraltar Regiment.

"In a way at times it is somewhat daunting," she admits. "Though being the CO's wife is no longer as demanding as it used to be, not quite so high profile."  And with the backing of her banking team - as well, she has handled  the pressures without a moment's fluster.

"I've always been competitive and even at school I was ambitious," she says.

EXPANDING BUSINESS

 "But teamwork has been  - and remains - all important, particularly as we have continued to expand our business not only here in Gibraltar but along the Costas and in the Algarve," she told VOX. "The Costas particularly are a strong growth area, with an increasing number of high net worth individuals making homes there."

One of her first public functions as the new head of the bank was to launch the bank's massive refurbishment programme, conservatively estimated to have cost some £200,000. The inauguration of the five new state-of-the-art offices and reception area also coincided with the retirement from the bank's local board of Charles Gaggero after 25 years.   

Specially commissioned works of art by two local women artists Philippa Porral and Jenica Pizarro now adorn the walls of the reception area, the four interview rooms and boardroom...the entire suite is named after Gaggero. Four interview rooms and the boardroom are  dubbed respectively "Iberia", "Italia", "Malta", "Morocco" and "Britannia"  - to represent  the countries from which Gibraltar's population is drawn - while the reception area is dominated by a hugged triptych  in oils of French peasants preparing for a game of boulles signifying the SG Hambros connection with its French parent bank.

A REMARKABLE TRANSITION

The recognition of Gaggero's service to the board of the bank was an apt touch - marked  when  Perez presented  him with a miniature silver replica of the plaque which indicates that the refurbished suite is named after him - for it spanned a quarter century of history which saw a remarkable transition. And his links from the days when Hambros first opened for business were two-fold. Not only was he its first local director, his daughter was the bank's first local employee.

"Things have a funny way of working out," Gaggero recalls. "I knew Tony Cooper who was the bank's first manager in Gibraltar and had employed my daughter as his secretary, and met him in the street just after he had paid a courtesy call on the then Governor Sir William Jackson. He had told Sir William that he wanted to appoint a local director and Sir William had suggested he should approach me."

"I was a non-executive director so I was never involved in the day to day running of the business; nevertheless some of the decisions that I and members of the board have had to take over the years have been difficult ones," Gaggero told VOX at the time. "And there have been significant changes, not only to the bank but also to the way its does business.

"When Hambros opened its doors on the Rock it started with both arms - there was both private and retail banking... and though retail banking closed down not all that long ago the private banking arm has grown and grown."

Gaggero reckons that the first big change was when Hambros was taken over by Societe Generale to become SG Hambros. "It ceased being Hambros as such and the old family firm with its own particular ethos and way of doing business was gradually absorbed into what is now, I believe, Europe's fourth biggest bank. It changed the whole work ethic.

"More recently there was the bank's take over of some of the customers and staff of Credit Agricole when that bank withdrew from its Gibraltar operations. That gave a fillip to SG Hambros' business...but it also created a lot more work for the staff."

Though he has retired from the board of the bank, Gaggero will continue with other business interests - "and I also hope to have more time to devote to my own business affairs which have tended to become neglected in recent years," he adds with a smile.

"Miss the bank? Of course I will. I have been very lucky in my relationship with Hambros and SG Hambros and have made some very good friends as well as some very good memories. I shall cherish the memories and hope to keep the friends...but you know how it is, relationships change with circumstances," he added wryly.