A super fossil-free future

25 October 2019
| By Chris Dastoor |
image
image
expand image

Kirstin Hunter, managing director at Future Super and winner of Money Management and Super Review’s Women in Financial Services award for Superannuation Executive of the Year, is not afraid to shake up the system to create a better world while improving wealth.

For her and the team at Future Super, winning the award was a great acknowledgement of the work they were doing to use the financial system to build a future free from climate change and inequality.

Future Super is Australia’s first 100% fossil-free superannuation fund and Hunter centres her life around ethics: she’s a strong advocate for veganism, gender pay equality, the environment and corporate behaviour.

During the recent climate strikes, the firm led a coalition of businesses called the ‘not business as usual alliance’, which saw over 3,000 businesses across Australia and New Zealand participate.

It started as a request from inside their team to join the strike but led to them calling on other businesses to close their door for the day to take action.

“We called on other businesses to take the same action and made it so that employees didn’t have to choose between a pay cheque and the planet,” Hunter said.

“As a result of that, between 100,000-150,000 employees were able to take time out of work on 20 September and attend the climate strikes across Australia.”

She said the best piece of career advice she had been given was to think about “who your personal ‘board of directors’ are”.

“These are the people who advise you on your career direction, in a similar way to a board of directors would advise a company,” Hunter said.

Once you make it to the top, it was important to remember you started at the bottom and to reciprocate the same help.

“Pay it forward with generosity, all of us who have been successful in our careers, particularly in financial services have done so with the benefit of the advice of our mentors and people who’ve come before us,” Hunter said.

“As leaders, particularly as female leaders, it’s incumbent on us to pay forward that advice and to help build up the next generation of leaders.”

Read more about:

AUTHOR

Recommended for you

sub-bgsidebar subscription

Never miss the latest news and developments in wealth management industry

MARKET INSIGHTS

GG

So shareholders lose a dividend plus have seen the erosion of value. Qantas decides to clawback remuneration from Alan ...

2 months 1 week ago
Denise Baker

This is why I left my last position. There was no interest in giving the client quality time, it was all about bumping ...

2 months 1 week ago
gonski

So the Hayne Royal Commission has left us with this. What a sad day for the financial planning industry. Clearly most ...

2 months 1 week ago

A Sydney-based financial adviser has been banned from providing financial services in the interest of consumer protection after failing to act on conduct concerns. ...

3 weeks 3 days ago

ASIC has cancelled the AFSL of a $250 million Sydney fund manager, one of two AFSL cancellations announced by the corporate regulator....

3 weeks 1 day ago

Having divested its advice business in August, AMP is undergoing restructuring in at least four other departments amid a cost simplification program....

2 weeks 5 days ago