“Collaboration, transparency, diversity and inclusion are key criteria at Sun Life and that’s what I look for in an employer,” said Rowena Chan, newly appointed SVP at Sun Life Financial Canada, who just joined the insurance giant last month.
At Sun Life there is a strong focus on developing female leaders and providing them with opportunities. In fact, there is currently a goal in place to ensure that 40 per cent of the VP+ executive team is female by 2020.
“We need to have a sales force that represents our clients,” explained Chan. “When men and women from different cultures, backgrounds and origins come together to share their knowledge and experience, that’s how we represent our clients.”
Early in her career, Chan did not have a lot of female role models, so she feels strongly about mentoring and providing opportunities to young women in the industry, and developing diverse talent.
“We need to inspire the next generation of women to say ‘I can do that,’” said Chan. “When I see someone that looks like me doing meaningful things, it makes me feel that I can do that too.
“We need to create more of these types of opportunities for us to feature our young talent and let them grow,” she added.
Chan values the flexible work environment that Sun Life has put in place to help staff balance work and family life, which is made possible by technology.
“People can drop off kids at school, go home and go on Zoom (video conferencing), and still participate in meetings,” she said. “It’s really empowering.”
Many advisors at Sun Life also take advantage of the flexible hours which the role permits.
Chan made the leap to the insurance industry after thirty years at TD bank where she held diverse roles ranging from retail sales, product management, wealth management and financial planning to direct investing and sales leadership.
Chan’s inspiring story will be featured alongside the words of other powerful female leaders in a book called The Collective Wisdom of High Performing Women, to be published this month by Barlow Books.
Her advice to young women joining the industry: “Be visible, be curious, have a continuous learning mindset and be confident about yourself.”
