Choir, a three-year-old firm promoting diversity in the financial services industry through a conference certification service, will close effective Dec. 31.
"In what comes as no surprise to anyone involved with DEI initiatives, Choir has seen a significant drop in industry demand for diversity initiatives in the past two years. Specifically, there has been less interest in allocating dollars toward DEI initiatives, particularly regarding racial diversity efforts," co-founders Sonya Dreizler and Liv Gagnon wrote in an open letter.
"Choir’s journey began in 2021 with one big question: What would the financial industry look like if the people we listened to represented all of the world we walk around in, instead of just those already at the top?" they said, announcing that they're closing Choir and its conference certification services and paid Voices platform, which connects conference planners and reporters to financial professionals from underrepresented groups.
The firm aimed to "lift the voices" of these professionals "in industries historically represented by white men," the website says.
"We connected hundreds of brilliant people of color, women, and nonbinary financial professionals with conference organizers and journalists seeking their expertise. We know that their voices made conference agendas stronger and media stories more interesting," the founders wrote, adding that they're offering a modified, public version of the Voices database for anyone to use through mid-2025.
"Change is possible when companies are held accountable and do the work beyond statements of allyship. We ask each of you to keep pushing company leaders to pursue inclusion, diversity and innovation over the comfort of the status quo," they added.
Choir was founded in the wake of the outrage following the 2019 Tiburon CEO Summit, at which Fisher Investments founder Ken Fisher reportedly compared wooing clients to trying to get into a woman's pants. The furor around the closed-door session, which Dreizler attended, led to conversation within the financial services industry about the representation of women at conferences. Fisher said at the time that his comments were taken out of context.
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