Advancing careers for women

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My name is Elyse Clements. I'm a portfolio manager and wealth advisor with RBC Dominion Securities. I did a program at University of Toronto called Engineering Science, and then you specialized in Aerospace Engineering. I worked in engineering for about a year. And then I was offered a position in sales engineering. Sometimes, when you're working for a large organization, I really felt that there wasn't a strong relationship between how hard I worked and how well I did.

That's when I started exploring the idea of other types of careers for myself. At first, I thought, well, I'm very technical in nature. I'm very analytical in nature. Obviously, that's a natural fit to deal with finances, to deal with money. But, eventually, I realized it's, yes, we are investment advisors, and we manage people's money, but it's really a relationship business. It's about our connections with our clients. And that's the part that I truly, truly love. Making my clients happy is what makes me happy. And it's what gets me out of bed every morning.

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My name is Yvonne Chan. I'm a vice president, wealth advisor, and portfolio manager with RBC Dominion Securities in Mississauga, Ontario. I was born in China. I came to Canada when I was eight with my parents and two older brothers.

My mother worked in a garment factory, and my father worked in a kitchen as a kitchen helper. Growing up in an immigrant family, you know, we didn't really have a lot. I knew that money was important, and it was important to save it and grow it.

I graduated from the University of Toronto with a commerce and finance degree. I was really driven to succeed. You know, I put my head down. I worked really, really hard helping people, and as I'm helping people, they're helping me back because they're giving me confidence and say, Yvonne, thank you so much. You thrive on that because you really are in a position to help, but also to help yourself and your family.

I always thought, you know, how can I relate to people with wealth? So I doubted myself, whether I was going to be able to advise people with money. We're all people. We have the same challenges.

We face the same questions about how to raise children. How do we spend our money? How do we save our money? How do we retire? And how are we going to have enough money to retire?

When we came to Canada, this is what we brought. Our wok. It's been 37 years in my mother's kitchen, and she still uses this wok till this day. And in fact, she's probably pretty mad that I have it here today because she's not using it this moment in time. It's a symbolic item of our journey to Canada, but it also reminds us of who we are and how successful we can become if we worked hard.

I am Violet Liviniuk, portfolio manager, vice president, RBC dominion securities in Calgary, Alberta. I taught business in high school, so I taught marketing, accounting, law, entrepreneurship, and computer technology. One of the most important courses I taught was a segment on investing. I felt it was important for kids to know what a stock and a bond was. And a mutual fund and an RSP versus a non registered account. And I quickly realized that I was so passionate in ensuring these young adults would have that information. So it made sense the natural transition for me, once I had finished my career as a business high school teacher.

To pursue my passion to become a portfolio manager, and really teach families about their finances. I'm a huge advocate of education. I like to be able to constantly learn and constantly share. Being a portfolio manager is a career in which you can come from all different paths. As long as you are wanting to learn, and help put together the pieces for a client, you will be successful. But to put together the pieces for the client is easy when you work for a company like RBC. If I can tap into the estate planners, the financial planners, the banking. That's really the value that I bring towards clients. You have a huge team behind you that can help you shepherd things along. You're not doing it alone, and I can't imagine doing anything that would be more satisfying than what I do today.

I'm Kathi Dodds McMullin, from Fredericton, New Brunswick. I'm a wealth advisor, financial planner with RBC Dominion Securities. I grew up in Moncton, New Brunswick. My dad was a mechanic, and my mom was a medical secretary. I started my career from community college with a large financial institution and then moved to Royal Trust which was part of the Royal Bank. I was able to become a financial planner, being one of the first crew put through a program that took us a year. And so I would take just about any education I could get. And I continue to do that, further my education. It's just interesting. Education is a part of our lives.

My associate at Royal trust, her husband was the manager at RBC Dominion Securities. And one day a phone call came from him telling me that there was a couple of positions opening, and why hadn't I applied. I became an investment advisor when my daughter was about eight years old. And it allowed flexibility. My day was my own. And RBC Dominion Securities gave me the opportunity to challenge myself.

I feel like I have the best career or the best job in the world. I get to talk to people, and help people every day. I am very successful at what I do. And that success has given me the opportunity to pursue my passion, which has been design and sewing. And I get to travel. I do couture sewing classes. I made this French jacket at a French jacket couture class. I spent about 120 hours making the jacket. It's mainly handmade. It's a passion of mine. It's just wonderful the opportunities that my career's giving me.

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Bonjour, je m'appelle Michèle Holland.

Je suis vice-présidente et gestionnaire de portefeuille chez RBC Dominion Valeurs Mobilières à Montréal.

Mes deux parents sont Québécois.

Ma mère est une Québécoise francophone, mon père est un Québécois anglophone.

J'étais très économe quand j'étais jeune.

Je ne dépense pas l'argent que je faisais.

Et je pense que vraiment, le premier achat que j'ai fait ou la première grosse dépense que j'ai faite, c'est à 16 ans.

Je suis partie sur un voyage de canot de cinq semaines, puis, au retour, je l'ai retourné au camp pour deux semaines.

Puis même mes parents m'ont dit : « Mais si tu veux retourner au camp, il faut que tu paies toi-même. » Alors j'ai payé de ma poche pour les deux dernières semaines de camp.

Et puis, je n'ai pas regretté du tout parce que je suis retournée à ce même camp pendant 6 ans de temps pour travailler là.

J'ai appris jeune qu'en mettant de l'argent de côté, on pouvait se payer des grandes choses qu'on voulait vraiment.

Au début de ma carrière, j'étais une adjointe dans le département de recherche.

J'aimais beaucoup, beaucoup ce travail-là.

Mais j'avais aussi un oncle qui travaillait dans le business, du côté des clients particuliers.

Et puis, après plusieurs années d'expérience, côté CNL, lui, m'a approché pour que je devienne une associée.

1995, j'ai fait le saut pour quitter le côté CNL, aller du côté des particuliers.

Et puis, ce que j'ai su par la suite, c'est que mon oncle était malade.

Malheureusement, j'ai seulement pu travailler avec lui pendant 6 semaines de demi-journée avant son décès.

C'est lui qui a vraiment vu que c'était ma place.

Puis, il a raison, c'est absolument ma place, c'est avec les particuliers.

J'adore travailler avec eux.

Une des grandes différences qu'on a au Québec par rapport au reste du Canada, c'est qu'évidemment, c'est le Code civil.

Alors, les femmes gardent leur nom, il y en a beaucoup qui ne se marient pas, qui sont conjointes de fait au lieu d'être mariées.

Très peu de femmes qui comprennent l'implication financière de ces décisions de vie-là.

Alors nous, avec nos partenaires, on est capables d'encadrer les clients et d'aider à répondre à leurs questions.

À tous les jours, j'ajoute la valeur.

À tous les jours, mes clients me font sentir comme si je les aide.

Et puis, il n'y a rien de mieux que ça.

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My name is Michelle Vickers, I'm the Vice President and Portfolio Manager with RBC Dominion Securities Wealth Management and I work in Ancaster Ontario. My childhood was wonderful. I had two very loving parents, they were both hard working, we didn't have a lot of money, but we were a really close family. I have a sister who's close in age to me, so we were either in love with each other or fighting furiously. My mother worked for a bank and so she said, why don't you consider banking?

And I went into retail banking. So I was a teller, I was a business administrator, I worked as a personal banker. And I learned at that time what the investment advisor role was. And I love the opportunity that I could build a practice that was based on my values, on how I wanted to approach the client, and how we wanted to build this relationship.

And the service we wanted to offer our clients. And I knew I had a lot of skills that I could leverage. I was a great problem solver, I loved the research, I loved to keep learning. And I thought I could probably do this. I cared deeply about our clients and I have a strong confidence that I'll be able to figure something out.

And even if I don't know all the answers, I know that I can find the answers. I think RBC Wealth Management recognizes the importance of women in this business. And they've created a lot of opportunities to help support that. I think if you're really good at connecting with people, and good at building relationships, and you really want to help people, you're coming from a good place. The rest of it you can figure out.

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