Sydney: Tuesday 26 February: Talent management has shifted to the top of the agenda for most Boards and financial organisations in Australia and across the world said Sarah Woodhouse Deloitte’s Wealth Management leader as she launched this year’s IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders Award.

At the IFSA Industry Agenda 2008 luncheon, the IFSA Board and the who’s who of Australia’s investment and financial services industry agreed that talent management was a top priority in the Australian FS sector, requiring senior leadership support.

For the third year running the investment and financial services industry leaders committed to encouraging their industry’s talent and supporting the IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders program.

Sarah Woodhouse said, “The IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders Award is designed to support the critical and innovative thinking of the industry’s under 30s.”

She introduced the 2007 Award winner, Ben Hare of Goldman Sachs JBWere Asset Management who said, “Writing on a topical issue such as climate change allowed me to further explore the subject with experts from within our firm and the wider industry.”

Hare won a trip from Deloitte to New York for his paper and told the industry leaders that “The IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders Award was a fantastic personal development opportunity for me.

“I had the chance to meet other candidates and their mentors at the various IFSA/Deloitte events, which was a highlight of the program.”

Richard Gilbert, IFSA CEO described the IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders Award as “a dynamic program that requires the active support of CEOs and senior mentors to assist the industry’s aspiring young leaders develop ideas and solutions to some of our most challenging issues.”

“Participants are mentored by their organisations and benefit from the networking opportunities and recognition of their organisations and peers, as well as the industry and media,” he said.

This year IFSA and Deloitte increased the number of topics from three to five and opened the Award up to one candidate per topic from IFSA full members.

David Deverall, IFSA Chairman and CEO of Perpetual Limited, who himself was one of Australia’s youngest CEOs when he took up the leadership role at Perpetual at the age of 37 in 2003, said, “We are very fortunate to again have the support of our nationally and internationally respected industry leaders for the IFSA/Deloitte Future Leaders Award who will be involved in the program and some of whom will judge the papers submitted on the issues selected this year.”

“As in previous years we have no doubt that the leaders of the future will be among this year’s contenders,” Sarah Woodhouse commented.

Please click on the attachment below for the full media realease and key facts of The Future Leaders Award.