Banks try to keep working mothers

Citigroup is one that says it is making progress. In 2001, fewer than 80% of women at its London office returned after maternity leave. This was up to 88% last year after a concerted effort to re-engage working mothers.

A spokeswoman said: "We have tried to make it as easy as possible for people to come back. Our figures reflect that."

Initiatives include more part-time work and a buddy scheme in which a pregnant employee is assigned a colleague who has had a baby to give advice. The bank has also started CitiParents, a group organising activities such as courses on homeopathy and late-night shopping at London toy stores.

Despite the demanding nature of banking, Citigroup may have encouraged more of its mothers to return than the average employer in the UK. The most recent Department of Social Security figures, for the late 1990s, show that only 67% of all UK women returned to work within 11 months of having a baby.

Jane Kinrade, head of interbank marketing at UBS, said all the women on her desk who had taken maternity leave had returned to work, including herself. High pay was a factor. She said: "We are incredibly lucky that we can afford to employ a nanny. Without that, going back to my present role would be extremely difficult. I have to leave the house at 6.15am every morning and there's no way I could take the baby anywhere else first."

Nevertheless, nannies will rarely work 15-hour days and Kinrade said she leaves work at 5pm instead of 6pm: "The bank is very flexible. If you get the work done and perform well they are prepared to let you go. Most of the guys on the desk have families.

"When I walk out the door at 5pm, people don't think I'm slacking. They know I'm going home to do another two hours' work with the baby."

Not all financial services employers are as understanding. Dominique Senequier, chief executive of Axa Private Equity, in a talk at London Business School in 2002 advised female MBAs to have babies in their 20s, as having them later could disrupt their careers.

A human resources executive at an investment bank said a benchmarking exercise in the City of London showed some US banks retained little more than 60% of women after maternity leave, while the figure at some Japanese banks was 50%.

Few mothers feel comfortable about taking long periods of maternity leave even at the most sympathetic offices. Since April, women who have worked for the same employer for more than 26 weeks before their 14th week of pregnancy have been entitled to a year off, the final six months unpaid. Not many women in banking are prepared to take the whole year.

Terri Duhon, head of credit structuring and European collateralised debt obligations at ABN Amro, is planning to return next month, four months after the birth of her son. She said 12 months off would be too long: "The structured credit market is highly innovative and there are always new players. Naturally, one's franchise would be eroded by staying out of the business for too long."

Kinrade said it can be difficult for banks to hire temporary staff to cover client-facing positions. As a result, extended periods of maternity leave can place an unfair burden on colleagues, she said.

"While I was on maternity leave for six months, the other people on the desk covered for me. In this kind of role it is not often viable to get a temporary replacement, so for me to have taken a long time off would be expecting a lot of them."

Banks are also unwilling to disclose how many staff return after having a baby, only to leave a few months' later when it all becomes too much. But anecdotal evidence suggests there are plenty.

At a seminar on diversity by the recruitment firm Sheffield Haworth, a human resources manager at a European fund manager admitted that most women resigned after maternity leave because their requests for flexible work were turned down for no good reason.

A report commissioned in 2001 by the City Parents at Work Group, sponsored by Goldman Sachs and PricewaterhouseCoopers, found the City continued to exhibit a macho culture in which women who asked to work part-time were perceived as lacking in commitment.

Some staff have been emboldened by UK regulations passed last year that require employers to seriously consider requests for part-time working. A fund manager at a US bank said being the first person to ask had been daunting, but worth it: "There is always a risk they will say no and your card will be marked, but they have to consider your request. With me they were surprisingly accommodating."

Whether employers are accommodating or not, front office roles in investment banking may be less demanding than newborn babies.

Duhon said maternity leave had been unexpectedly hard work. "I didn't realise how much time looking after a baby would take. It's non-stop. He feeds every three hours, a feed can last for a full hour. There's not much time to do anything between."