TORONTO: The Scotiabank Women Initiative has launched a new Digital Hub, in collaboration with Shopify, Google Canada, LinkedIn, Facebook and HubSpot focused on delivering key resources to help women entrepreneurs adapt to uncertain economic times.

In addition, The Scotiabank Women Initiative today announced the expansion of the program into Scotia Wealth Management.

Recognizing that women have long been underserved by the wealth management industry, The Scotiabank Women Initiative has expanded to inspire and empower women to take charge of their financial futures by offering a newly formed, comprehensive approach to financial advice and wealth services.

 “We understand that women have distinct wealth management needs,” said Erin Griffiths, Senior Vice President, Client Solutions and Direct Investing at Scotia Wealth Management.

“An overwhelming majority of women investors want to learn more about investing and consider advice from a wealth advisor to be helpful for one or more life events, yet only 22 per cent of women have a formal written financial plan prepared by a professional.

With a dedicated advisory board and expert consultants, we are building Scotiabank’s Total Wealth offering, to transform the way we serve women clients and inspire and empower women to take charge of their financial futures.”

In 2019, The Scotiabank Women Initiative expanded into Global Banking and Markets. This bespoke program for women is designed using client feedback – from emerging leaders to senior executives – to support their pursuit of their best professional futures and to take their careers and businesses even further through exclusive access to Innovation, Advisory, and Education solutions.

In its inaugural year, the program created a dedicated educational series designed to facilitate sharing resources and building subject matter expertise, a tailored good corporate governance program and support for clients on their Diversity & Inclusion journey – among other initiatives.

“From the onset, our mission for The Scotiabank Women Initiative has been to advance women-owned and women-led businesses in Canada,” said Gillian Riley, President and CEO, Tangerine Bank, and executive sponsor of The Scotiabank Women Initiative.

“In pursuit of that mission, we engaged with women entrepreneurs, conducted research and collected data to respond more precisely to the needs of women business owners and leaders. When the pandemic hit, we knew we had to pivot and so we developed The Digital Hub an online platform to help them transform and thrive during these challenging times.”

The Scotiabank Women Initiative is a comprehensive program to help advance women-owned and women-led businesses across Canada through three key pillars: Access to Capital, Mentorship and Education.

Since launching in December 2018, The Scotiabank Women Initiative has achieved several notable milestones. In September 2019, the Bank committed to deploy three billion dollars in capital to women-led businesses in its first three years. www.scotiabankwomeninitiative.com