One woman’s vision to empower women clients transcends tragedy

Lucy Shair didn’t get the chance to fulfill her vision for the financial advisory practice she opened in early 2019. She died in 2021 at age 43 from metastatic breast cancer.

Now, the board and volunteers of the Lucy Shair Foundation for Women in Finance are carrying her vision forward.

Lucy began her career in Chicago as an auditor and consultant with PwC, and later held accounting and business positions at DePaul University. After stepping out of the business world to start a family and having weathered a first round of breast cancer treatments, she found financial advisory the most meaningful way to restart her career.

“After facing my mortality, I realized I wanted to live with more purpose and impact. I chose financial planning as a career not because I love money, but because I love people,” Lucy often said to friends and colleagues.

She saw the gender gap in finance and unabashedly worked to narrow that gap by building a female-centric firm. The foundation has translated her vision to reduce the gender gap by neutralizing one barrier to establishing a firm of one’s own: lack of seed capital.

CHANGE IS UNDERWAY

While most women will manage personal and family finances during their lives, women comprise just 23% of investment advisers. Only 11% of investment firms in the U.S. are women-owned, according to Cerulli Associates. For years, women have failed to reach critical mass both as investors and advisers.

Change is underway, at least in terms of asset ownership. In the next decade, an estimated $30 trillion in assets will shift into women’s hands. In the past five years, 30% more women started participating more fully in their families’ investment decisions, according to McKinsey & Co.

“I realized I wanted to live with more purpose and impact.”

Lucy Shair

The foundation has zeroed in on one dynamic that can spur even more change, by supporting women who want to start their own advisory firms. In a survey conducted by the Investment Adviser Association, 61% of survey respondents cited the high risk of failure and 56% cited the lack of stable compensation as barriers to entry.

In this mission, the foundation is working with Fairlight Advisors co-founders Katharine Earhart and Maya Tussing. They are providing nonprofit policy guidance and other wisdom on the process of starting a mission-driven foundation. 

“While many companies have recruiting strategies to attract female advisers, few organizations support women financially in launching their own businesses, which is why we are proud to partner with the Lucy Shair Foundation,” Earhart said.

Tussing added, “The first two years are a critical time for new advisers. Many women advisers seek to launch their own firms in part to serve a target client group such as immigrant families, millennials or widows. Many of these women can use additional capital investment to accelerate their success.”

“We are not financial advisers. We are friends with a variety of skill sets and backgrounds, who miss Lucy terribly and want to continue what she started,” said Corrie Puscas, the president of the foundation and a founding board member. “We witnessed the impact Lucy made during her career.”

The Lucy Shair Foundation opened its inaugural $5,000 grant cycle in late August and received 30 applications from women across the country. The first grant recipient will be announced in December.

A common theme in the 30 applications is the barriers that women must navigate to establish themselves as advisers. Many have said they are “the only woman at the table,” and others mention feeling overlooked regardless of performance in the “good ole boys club.”

One applicant wrote, “I developed a passion for financial planning to help empower and educate young individuals (especially women) in their own financial journeys to avoid making some of the early mistakes that my family did.”

In fact, many of the applications echoed comments from Lucy’s clients. One former client said, “When our marriage dissolved, it was the first time I was managing personal finances and trying to navigate savings and investments. Lucy took me on as a client and gifted me with financial literacy and confidence so that I could control my own financial story. Having a female advisor made the discussions feel safe and accessible. She asked what was truly important to me personally, what I believed in, and tailored my investments to align with those values.”

DOING BETTER

As ecosystem partners, the board of the foundation asks the advisory and investment industry to do better.

Can your firms sponsor women to launch their own advisory businesses, through seed capital or grant-making? Or support women entering your firms through apprenticeships that provide stable income and pathways to success? Can you focus on the asset shift by supporting more women-owned firms through business-building referral partnerships?

“We wish Lucy was here to help lead change in this profession,” said Alisa Devlaeminck, founding board member, “but she isn’t, so we are doing the next best thing, which is to use her brief shining moment to illuminate the way for women, their clients and the profession. Nobody can fill Lucy’s shoes, but many can carry forward on the path she loved and left too soon.”

Ellen Cherveny is treasurer and founding board member of the Lucy Shair Foundation for Women in Finance.