A study by the London School of Economics (LSE) and Women In Banking and Finance - a non-profit organisation founded in 1980 and staffed mainly by volunteers - has shown that Finance is still a male-dominated profession which lets 'mediocre' men rise to the top.

The research, which was supported by groups including Goldman Sachs, Barclays and Citi, as well as the Financial Conduct Authority, says male middle managers hold women back as they are more adept at playing internal politics.

Additionally, men have realised that being empathetic is a valuable trait and so have developed a tendency to fake this when managing women.

The study used research based on interviews with 79 women working in the City within banking, asset management, professional services and insurance industries. These women felt they had to consistently achieve an excellent standard to progress, whilst they felt that men had more margin for an average performance.

Grace Lordan - Founding Director of The Inclusion Initiative and an Associate Professor at LSE - said it was “much more likely to be average men who ended up being the gatekeepers for the younger women who were coming through” and whilst women were not specifically being held back, men tended to help the career of somebody who was more like them.

Lordan went on to say:

“it’s nowhere near equality . . . we’re still very, very far away from equality”.

Maternity leave which disrupted careers and male-dominated social scenes were cited as some of the reasons that careers were held back and disappointingly, of the eleven black women interviewed as part of the study, several said they felt their performance had to exceed both men and white women to receive the same recognition.

Whilst data suggests the number of females acting as non executives has improved, the numbers of female chairs, CEO’s or CFO’s are still much lower.