As DEI Backlash Builds, This Women's Collective Is Rising

Forbes

09-07-2025

FIF Collective 2nd Anniversary Party at Amazon 424 5th Avenue, NYC June 26, 2025 Photos: James ... More Higgins
When Meghan McKenna first launched 'Female in Finance Collective' (FIF), in June of 2023, it was intended to be a career placeholder. She was between roles in the banking world, and wanted to stay connected. 'I didn't realize the passion or the potential business outcome,' she recalls. 'It was just meant to keep me busy while I found my next move.' However the response made it clear to McKenna, who was no stranger to the challenges facing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), that while she knew there was a gap, she had underestimated how many women were waiting for it to be filled.
As DEI Faces Resistance, FIF Surges Ahead
At its core, FIF is a membership platform, that grants members access executive hiring opportunities, personal profile, board seats, and early investment opportunities. A network that as McKenna describes, was designed to be intentionally exclusive, highly vetted, and built to deliver access to high-profile industry players. In August of 2023, just three months from founding, she had 300 members. By June of 2024, with 1,500 subscribers and a growing list of top-tier sponsors, McKenna was invited to celebrate the first anniversary on the floor of NYSE, with FIF's name and mission displayed across the iconic billboards. A moment that McKenna announced 'was not just a celebration, but also a declaration that women's collective power belongs at the center of business and finance.'
Yet as her audience grew, so too did a nagging feeling within McKenna. 'I was doing two full-time jobs at once, and the biggest challenge was that I was spread too thin,' she says. 'I knew the only way to scale it, to really serve the community and test the possible, was to go all in.' So, in a year when we saw a public retreat from Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, with many corporate initiatives quietly shelved, McKenna did the exact opposite: she doubled down. In September 2024, she left her executive role in banking to dedicate herself full time as CEO of FIF.
FIF Marks One year anniversary at NYSE June 2024 - pictured CEO Meghan McKenna and Husband JIm ... More McKenna
In June 2025, as FIF celebrated 2 years with a large celebration at Amazon's NYC headquarters, I sat down with McKenna to discuss the growth of FIF, her decision to go all in on life as a CEO, and why she is confident the broader DEI backlash won't derail her mission.
One of the changes McKenna introduced when making this her full-time pursuit was the introduction of a paid membership platform. 'We introduced a $1,000 annual membership fee, or $100 monthly, because we knew we needed resources to grow,' she explains. 'But we also created a second tier for allies, particularly male allies, who now pay $2,000 annually. That extra thousand? It goes into a pool we can use to support our members during transitions, when they're between jobs or facing financial challenges.' It's a model that for McKenna, the daughter of a Bronx police officer, was not just financial, but philosophical. 'I know what it's like to have nothing but your own grit to rely on," she says, "and it is important we take care of our own.'
DEI Built on Allyship, Not Optics
McKenna shares that one of the reasons the DEI backlash hasn't impacted FIF is because this model was never built on a DEI trend and was never about women alone. The allyship component was always key, with her events traditionally well attended by men also. 'We realized pretty quickly that we couldn't do this alone. And we didn't want to,' she says. 'Today, we have male founders, CFOs, and venture partners who are not just writing checks, but showing up, and that's the kind of allyship that moves the needle.'
Yet, she also realizes that when it comes to representation, women have a long way to go. 'One need we identified early on was the lack of later-stage female founders on stages at conferences,' she says. 'There are incredible women in our community, but they weren't being tapped for these rooms. So we stepped in.'
CEO Meghan McKenna speaks at GCVI Monteray California March 19 2025
Fueled by Vision, Not Venture
McKenna has deliberately resisted the traditional startup playbook, meaning no VC money, no aggressive growth targets. 'We never considered raising,' she says. 'I didn't want to be driven by outside financial motivations. I wanted the mission to lead first and foremost, not our exit strategy.'
She admits that the decision was practical but also uniquely personal. 'I've had a successful career in banking. My husband has a good job. I don't have kids, and I lost my parents early, so I don't carry the same family responsibilities that many others do. That gives me a unique freedom to take a bet like this.' She is under no illusion that this is not everyone's story and says that her decades in banking showed her just how tough the challenge is for many women to balance career and family. She also recognizes that for many women, that early support can be scrappy and resourceful. 'Not every woman has a sister who can become your chief of staff or a niece who can run your finance ops unpaid at the start,' she says, nodding to her extended family's role in FIF's early traction. 'But if I can use that privilege to build something that helps women who do have caregiving responsibilities or financial constraints, then I have no excuse not to try.'
FIF at Primary Tech Awards NYC January 2025
What's Next For FIF?
The second half of 2025 will see FIF expand both geographically and programmatically. 'New York and San Francisco are still our hubs,' McKenna says. 'But now we're adding Seattle, Austin, Paris, London, and more. We want to be in all the key places with deep tech networks.' She shares that the next 12 months will see a multiplying of their event strategy, with a continuation of small intimate networking events hosted in partnership with technology players like Amazon, Open AI and UI Path, to dinners and larger public panels. 'We've more than doubled our events in the last six months,' she notes. However she is adamant that while growth is the goal, quality will not waver, 'the mission remains the same,' she shares 'to continue to curating high-caliber rooms with access to key decision makers.'
Monetization is also catching up to the mission. FIF recently launched premium partnership tiers - Platinum and Gold - and now counts PwC, CFGI, and Ramp among its 2025 anchor partners. Other finance and tech players like CrossCountry Consulting, Dual Entry, and Remote have also joined as silver partners. 'We're getting more inbound interest than ever before,' McKenna says. 'And what's exciting is that the interest isn't shrinking. Even in a year when DEI has become politicized, the appetite for access to high-quality, diverse talent and leadership hasn't gone away. It's just shifted in where and how you find it.'
Asked what advice she'd give to other women who may be sitting on the fence, who might have an idea, a community, a calling, but feel paralyzed by life's logistics. McKenna doesn't sugarcoat it. 'It's not easy. And I won't pretend it's equally possible for everyone. There is no easy path. But I had zero excuses not to try. So I did.'
At a moment whereby DEI is under significant threat, McKenna's model proves that female community, built on allyship and action remains a powerful force.